Since Teri Takai became CIO for the state of Michigan in 2003,
the office has enjoyed significant results, including savings of
$100 million (U.S.) Bringing to the table years of experience in
senior roles at Ford Motor Co. and EDS Corp., Takai is a large part
of why Michigan is highly ranked within the government technology
field. She was saluted herself when Crain's Detroit Magazine named
her as one of its 100 Most Influential Women. Takai spoke with
senior writer Lisa Williams at the Lac Carling Congress, where
among other issues they discussed the challenges of her job and why
more women aren't in senior public sector positions. Excerpts from
their conversation follow.
Q. I'd like to start with your background. I know that you
attended the University of Michigan, what did you study there?
A. My undergraduate degree is in mathematics, and I have a
master's degree in management.
Q. So the work that you're doing now as CIO of Michigan, was
this the kind of thing you always wanted to pursue?
A. I really started off being interested in technology, and went
directly into the automotive industry, because of course being from
the Detroit area, that's where a lot of the jobs were. So I went to
work for Ford Motor Co. and worked for the bulk of my career in the
automotive industry, and really had no idea that I would ultimately
be going into a government role. So when I was approached by
Governor Jennifer Granholm to look at a job in government, my first
reaction was, 'I don't think so', because I had never really
thought about it. But when I talked to her, she really convinced me
that I was at a point in my career where it was important to talk
about getting into government and really looking at public service,
and that's how I ended up here.
Q. What are the major projects or initiatives that your office
is working on?
A. Well, we're working really in three different areasb &First of
all, our direction is to make government more efficient, and so our
intent there is to make sure that the information technology
dollars that citizens are spending are well spentb &we've reduced
over 25 per cent of our spending, over $100 million (U.S.)b &so
that's number one, is to make government work more efficiently. The
second is what's being discussed (at Lac Carling), it's really to
make government accessible and give citizens, through the
technology, multiple channels, multiple ways, and make it easier
for them to do business with government.
The third thing that we're focused on really is to meet the
citizen demands to grow the economy. In Michigan that's a big deal.
Our whole view is that we have to create jobs and we have to retain
jobs, and so many of our initiatives are focused on making sure
that happens.
The next area is really to protect our families, and that's
everything from human services to securityb &And the last thing that
we always have to keep our eye on, because we are technology
professionals, is prudently introducing new technologies where we
believe it can make a difference in all of those other areas. So
those are our objectives, those are the things that we're focused
on every day.
Q. Michigan is highly ranked in the U.S. with respect to
technology in governmentb &Since taking over the position in 2003,
what role did you play in that?
A. One of the nice things for me in Michigan is that it had a
long history of being very active in technology, under our former
governorb &Governor Granholm picked up on that, and what we've done
is take a lot of the technology work that has been done before, but
improve on the efficiency with which we've been able to do it.
We've taken significant amounts of spending out by doing things
better.
Secondly, we've consolidated all of our IT resourcesb &One of the
things that's unusual about Michigan, compared with many other
states, is that all of the IT professionals in the state report
within my organization. In other states they're dispersed across
all of the individual agencies in the executive branch and so it's
very difficult. In fact the theme (Lac Carling) is around how do
you get service transformation by looking inter-jurisdictionally.
Well interestingly enough in the U.S., the inter-jurisdictional
isn't necessarily about federal, state and local, it's about within
a state.
So my major challenge was really to take an organization that
was 19 different organizations and turn it into a single
organization that could align with the Governor's prioritiesb &I
think the legacy of what we've done and the ability to realign, to
be focused on the governor's priorities rather than the agency's,
has been some of the things we're very proud of.
Q. You were ranked in the top 100 Most Influential Woman by
Crain's Detroit Business magazine. What was your response to that
kind of acknowledgement?
A. Well, it's really thrilling as an IT professional to be
acknowledged along with 100 other women who are in various aspects
of business, and I think it's always wonderful to get recognition,
to be in that pool of women who have all done such amazing things.
It was really a thrill for me.
Q. All of the CIO's I've interviewed have been men. Do you think
there's a need for more women in these kinds of roles? Why do you
think it is that women are choosing not to go into this area as
much as their male counterparts?
A. I think it is a struggle. I think that the information
technology field is not different from many of the other fields
where there seems to be a thinning out of women as you go up in the
ranks, and I think one of the challenges for state CIO's is that
now that more CIO's like myself are coming in from the private
sector, the fact that most (private sector CIO's) are men tends to
mean that the state CIO's tend to be men. And I think the challenge
for us as women is to - number one - be willing to take on that
leadership role.
Secondly, the state and government jobs have a significant
amount more visibility, and by virtue of visibility have more risk
in that the things we do right are more visible, but the things we
do wrong are also more visibleb &there's a lot more scrutiny and I
think we just have to encourage women to take those roles on, and
to be willing to be a large part of it.
Q. What do you find to be the most challenging aspect of your
position?
A. I think the major challenge for us is really finding a way to
do things faster. What's interesting is the structural aspect,
which isn't terribly different in the U.S. from Canada. In order to
do anything, you have to have a legislature involved, you have to
have the executive office - in our case the governor - involved,
you have to have the agency heads involved, and ultimately you have
to have the media involved, because the media actually shapes how
the citizens view government.
Q. What do you think is the main difference between e-government
in the U.S. and Canada?
A. One of the things I find very fascinating is that many of our
struggles are so similar. We have states instead of provinces, but
the challenges with the federal government are still there, the
challenges to the municipal governments are still there, so I think
that those things are very, very similar. Some of the things that
I'm so impressed with here at Lac Carling is that you have a forum
like this focused on service transformation that's focusing on the
cross-jurisdictional issuesb &What I find in the U.S. is that we have
very good groups that deal at a local level, state level and the
federal level, but there isn't the kind of dialogue and interaction
that I'm seeing here, which is why I find this so very
exciting.
The silos and the chimneys in the U.S. are very strong, and
we're just now starting to see some of that cross-jurisdictional
(work) because times are tight and depending on where you are in
the U.S. - and certainly in Michigan with the automotive industry -
in many ways the economics are forcing much more of what you're
talking about here at this conference.
Q. I'm always curious to know what people do outside of the
office. Are there organizations or causes that are important to you
that you're involved with?
A. Yes, the organizations that I'm largely involved with have to
do with the support of children. One of the organizations is
focused on taking care of children who in some cases have to be
taken out of the home and then transitioned either into foster care
or back into their families, so it's all around taking care of
children who are in difficult home situations. I do fundraising for
that organization.
The second group that I'm active in, probably something that you
have here, is called Junior Achievement, which is around educating
children on how to manage their lives from a financial point of
view. I think that's so extremely important. So I sit on a board in
the south east Michigan area, and when I've had time I've actually
participated in teaching children.
The second area in addition to children are women's groups. I'm
active in a group called Michigan Women's Foundation, active in a
business women's group and also a women's technology group, because
I think it's important, back to your earlier point, to get women
out there. And thirdly I'm involved in university activities, in
one case it's an advisory board on technology curriculum, and for
another, it's around an art gallery that's associated with a local
university.
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