PEO Perspective: November 2021

The month of November kicks off fast and furious at EIS with our portfolio-wide participation in AFCEA Belvoir Industry Days (ABID). From Nov. 3-5, over 30 presenters from our organization will participate in 16 ABID sessions, including keynote remarks, panels and breakout sessions. We will also have booths out on the exhibit floor. You can find more information on our Events page.

RECENT NEWS & EVENTS

More Organizational Changes at EIS

While change of charter season has come and gone, we have some more important organizational changes to share with you. Last month, John Howell wrapped up his 120-day developmental assignment as acting deputy PEO and returned to his permanent position as assistant PEO for Networks, Cyber and Services. I’m incredibly grateful for his service over the past four months and glad that he can now focus on overseeing EIS’s contributions to the Army’s unified network priority. Since the selection process for a new permanent DPEO is still ongoing, I recently asked Lee James, project director for Enterprise Services, to take on a developmental assignment as acting DPEO. Lee has held several other leadership positions throughout EIS since 2004. His new assignment is well deserved, and his star continues to rise at EIS. Congratulations Lee!

With John Howell’s return to the APEO position, Aric Sherwood has been freed up to assume his new permanent role as director of the Acquisition and Systems Management/Strategic Initiatives Group. As the DASM/SIG, Aric will be working closely with Ron Crevecoeur, who did a great job serving in the acting role these past months.

Meanwhile, to backfill Lee James at the helm of Enterprise Services, Sergio Alvarez has assumed the role of acting project director, with Deidra McCaskill filling the deputy role. Dave Thompson has stepped up to serve as acting product lead for Enterprise Content Collaboration and Messaging in Deidra’s absence.

Finally, I’d like to welcome back Rich Eva as the new acting product lead for AESIP Hub in our Army Data and Analytics Platforms portfolio. Rich took over for Matt Gohil, a longtime EIS teammate who accepted a 120-day developmental assignment as acting chief information officer at PEO Soldier. This is a great opportunity for Matt, and many thanks to Rich for stepping up.

Spinning Up the Unified Network at AUSA

It was great to see so many Army and industry colleagues at the AUSA Annual Meeting & Exposition last month. One of the hot topics during the conference was the Army’s announcement that it would soon release an implementation strategy for its newly unveiled Unified Network Plan.

I was fortunate to be part of a C4ISRNET panel discussion on “Data at the Tactical Edge: Delivering the Unified Network,” along with colleagues from Army G-6, PEO C3T and the Network Cross-Functional Team. As I explained to attendees, what differentiates EIS’s support for the Unified Network from past network modernization activities is that it’s the first time we have a comprehensive, multi-year strategy for a single, unified network, enabling us to touch camps, posts and stations fewer times, thus creating efficiencies.

We’re thrilled to be part of the collective team aiming to deliver a single unified network to our Army for the first time. In case you missed this informative panel, you can watch the full webcast at https://www.c4isrnet.com/native/leidos/2021/10/08/webcast-data-at-the-tactical-edge/.

 Applied Cyber Technologies Wins Defense Acquisition Workforce Award

Congratulations are in order to our Applied Cyber Technologies (ACT) team within our Defensive Cyber Operations portfolio. We received notification late last month that ACT received the David Packard Excellence in Acquisition Award, which is designed to recognize DOD civilian and/or military organizations, groups or teams whose significant contributions demonstrate exemplary innovation and best acquisition practices.

ACT received the award for its work on the Defense Cyber Operations Resource for Updates, Innovation and Development (DRUID), a cloud-based continuous integration/continuous delivery pipeline designed to deliberately drive innovation through industry inputs. Our winning team will be recognized at a virtual recognition ceremony in December. Great work team!

UPCOMING EVENTS OF NOTE 

November Observances: 

Veterans Day: On Nov. 11, we honor the brave men and women throughout history who have stepped forward to defend our nation. Many PEO EIS workforce members are veterans or have veteran family members, and we will be spotlighting them on our social platforms this month.

Native American Heritage Month and Military Family Month

There is no better time to pay tribute to the first Americans and to our service families who are the backbone of our Soldiers — truly at the heart of everything we do.

Thanksgiving

Finally, this month we come together with family, friends and community to give thanks for our blessings. Our nation has faced a challenging couple of years, but in the hardest times, we learn what people are made of. I’m proud of this workforce and the heart and soul that our team puts in to every task set before them, always with Soldiers and their missions at the forefront of our priorities. Without Soldiers, our nation cannot be safe. In this season, I know many of you share profound gratitude for their sacrifices and for the freedoms that we hold dear.

Thank you to all who have served, and from our family to yours, have a great month and a Happy Thanksgiving!

Ross R. Guckert, Program Executive Officer, PEO EIS

Connecting the Army. Working for Soldiers.