Kundra: TechStat Needs $60 Million

A planned expansion of Office of Management and Budget "TechStat" meetings requires $60 million in congressional appropriations, Federal Chief Information Officer Vivek Kundra told a House panel March 17.

Speaking before the House Appropriations subcommittee on financial services and general government, Kundra said that the $60 million OMB requests for fiscal 2012 in a line item called "Integrated Efficient and Effective Uses of Information Technology" would go to supporting the meetings. TechStat would increase in scope to not just examinations of troubled agency information technology projects, but to a search for duplication across the federal government, Kundra added.

Kundra began conducting TechStat reviews, which are 60-minute meetings meant to analyze project shortcoming and develop remedies, in January 2010; they have resulted in a $3 billion cost avoidance, OMB says.

"What's difficult, as you look at these TechStat sessions, is not the act of just conducting the TechStat sessions," Kundra said.