You Probably Have More CIO Experience Than The Incoming White House CIO

The US has a new federal chief information officer who, based on his resume, has no prior experience as a CIO but is now tasked with overseeing IT operations and strategy for the entire federal government.

Greg Barbaccia made the announcement in a LinkedIn post last week, which was later confirmed by other outlets. Appointed by President Trump, Barbaccia has limited government experience, consisting of one year as a civilian intelligence analyst and four years in a similar role with the US Army from 2003 to 2009, according to his LinkedIn profile. 

The Federal CIO, a role within the US Government's Office of Management and Budget, is responsible for overseeing federal technology spending and strategy, as well as information security and other tech policy. 

"I lead the government's IT strategy, driving innovation, cybersecurity, and digital transformation to enhance public services and operational efficiency," Barbaccia said of his responsibilities. 

Like many of Trump's appointees, Barbaccia's career has predominantly been in the private sector, where he spent time as the head of operations before serving two and a half years as the CISO at Theorem, an AI credit underwriting startup. Barbaccia also spent time as the head of investigations and president at Elementus, a blockchain and crypto analytics platform.

The majority of the new Federal CIO's private sector career was spent at analytics firm Palantir Technologies, where he spent a decade in roles including the head of intelligence and investigations, security lead, operations lead and an account manager dealing with government entities. Barbaccia was also the founder of a "boutique contracting firm" that provided field service representation for Palantir Technologies' early overseas US government clients before he officially joined the company, according to his LinkedIn. 

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While Barbaccia holds a well-respected ISC2-issued CISSP certification and had training in all-source intelligence analysis from the US Army Intelligence Center, it doesn't appear that he has any formal education or training specifically in IT management, based on his profile.

In contrast, the prior Federal CIO, Clare Martorana, spent four years in the US Digital Service (now known as the US DOGE Service after Trump repurposed the organization) before serving for two years as the CIO at the Office for Personnel Management. She then served for four years as the Federal CIO, occupying the role for most of former President Biden's time in the White House. 

While Barbaccia may have other qualifications for the role of heading up the federal government's IT operations, it's unknown what those may be. We reached out to him for more information, as well as asking the White House and OMB why he was chosen for the role, but didn't receive a response from anyone. ®