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The US army’s ability to embrace and acquire technology is vital for its abilities to enhance operational capabilities, cybersecurity, interoperability, and ensure the efficient integration of advanced technologies and improved adaptability to evolving threats. These modernized systems increase efficiency, improve decision-making through data enabled AI/ML capabilities, and provide intelligent automation and predicative tools. These benefits in modernization can reduce long-term costs, improve support of modern equipment, and contribute to mission success by maintaining a technological edge. However, a digitally enhanced and modernized army has to overcome the challenges of integrating legacy systems with cutting-edge technologies, ensuring these systems have robust cybersecurity defenses, and acquiring these systems within budget and timing constraints.
Join GovExec as we convene with leading army and industry experts at AUSA 2024 to discuss how they are addressing the challenges to Army systems modernization, the role of intelligent automation, human-machine collaboration and the benefits of data management and AI/ML integration.
Speakers
Leonel Garciga
Chief Information Officer
U.S. Army
Mr. Leonel Garciga was selected for appointment as US Army Chief Information Officer (CIO) in July 2023.
As CIO, Mr. Garciga is the principal adviser to the Secretary of the Army on information resource management (IRM) and information technology (IT) and the effect of IRM and IT on warfighting capabilities. He sets the strategic direction for and oversees the execution of policies and programs for IRM and IT, including managing an integrated IT architecture, information sharing policy, cybersecurity policy and cybersecurity program management, managing the life cycle of IT resource management processes, and ensuring the synchronization of the information enterprise.
Mr. Garciga is a career civil servant with a diverse background in acquisition, engineering, intelligence, and information technology having served in these roles across the Department of the Defense and Intelligence Community since 2003.
Prior to his role as US Army CIO, Mr. Garciga served as the Director, Army Intelligence Community Information Management, Office of the Deputy Chief of Staff for Intelligence (G-2). He provided operational, technical and security expertise and oversight of Army Intelligence Community’s information management and information technology capabilities across the Army. He was the strategic manager and integrator of intelligence information technology and data systems with Joint, Intelligence Community and National systems, serving as the Army’s Intelligence Community Chief Information Officer.
Mr. Garciga is a recognized subject matter expert in digital transformation, secure software development (DevSecOps) and data analytics. Previously serving in several roles redefining software acquisition for the Department of Defense and operationalizing data analytics capabilities at scale across the Department of Defense and the Intelligence Community. He also served as the Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA) – Joint Improvised Threat Defeat Organization (JIDO) as the Chief Technology Officer and Senior Advisor on technology to the DTRA director. Prior to working at DTRA, Mr. Garciga served as the Joint IED Defeat Organization Deputy Chief Information Officer, USJFCOM Joint Transformation Command – Intelligence (JTC-I) as an Intelligence Analyst/Information Technology Specialist and started his career as a Mechanical Engineer at the Navy Engineering Logistics Office.
Mr. Garciga has a BS in Mechanical Engineering Technology, graduate work in Organizational Management, is a certified Information Technology security professional, and a graduate of Naval Nuclear Power School. Mr. Garciga’s awards include Meritorious Civilian Service Medal, Army Superior Civilian Service Award, Commander’s Award for Civilian Service (x3), Secretary of Defense Medal for the Global War on Terrorism and 2018 DoD-CIO Team Award.
Mr. Garciga is a U.S. Navy veteran earning his submarine warfare pin aboard the USS Memphis SSN-691. He currently resides in northern Virginia with his wife Linda and his two daughters.
MG Jake Kwon
Director of Strategic Operations, HQDA G-3/5/7
U.S. Army
Brig Gen Jake S. Kwon commissioned from Vanderbilt University in 1999 as a Quartermaster Officer and served as a lieutenant in the 194th Maintenance Battalion, Camp Humphreys, Republic of Korea. MG Kwon moved on to serve as the Aide-de-Camp to the 48th Quartermaster General and later deployed with the Combined Joint Special Operations Task Force – Afghanistan, in support of Operation Enduring Freedom.
Following the Combined Logistics Captains Career Course, BG Kwon was assigned as the Deputy Support Operations Officer for the 307th Brigade Support Battalion in the 504th Parachute Infantry Regiment, 82nd Airborne Division at Fort Liberty, North Carolina. He deployed in 2005 to support Operation Enduring Freedom before transitioning to the Army Reserve in 2006.
In his first Army Reserve assignment, MG Kwon commanded the Headquarters Detachment, Joint Reserve Element (J-9), Defense Logistics Agency at Fort Belvoir, Virginia. He then became the Executive Officer and Acting Commander for the 5th Battalion (Ordnance), 80th Regiment in Abingdon, Maryland. MG Kwon then moved to the Pentagon where he served as a Joint Strategic Planner in the Joint Staff J-7. In 2012, he became the Logistics Officer and later the Operations Officer for the 3rd Brigade (Ordnance), 94th Division (Force Sustainment).
MG Kwon assumed command of the 378th Combat Sustainment Support Battalion in 2015 at Fort Indiantown Gap, Pennsylvania before moving on in 2017 to be the Chief of Staff, 143d Sustainment Command (Expeditionary) in Orlando, Florida. BG Kwon then assumed command of the 77th Sustainment Brigade, Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst, New Jersey and deployed to Kuwait in support of Operations Inherent Resolve, Spartan Shield, and Freedom’s Sentinel.
MG Kwon’s most recent command was of the 316th Sustainment Command (Expeditionary), Coraopolis, Pennsylvania. He assumed his duties as the Director of Strategic Operations, HQDA G-3/5/7 (Operations) on August 7, 2023.
In his civilian career, BG Kwon works with a cybersecurity company that specializes in endpoint security and cyber threat intelligence. He and his wife Lauren have three children.
LTG John Morrison
Deputy Chief of Staff, G-6
U.S. Army
Lieutenant General John B. Morrison, Jr. assumed duties as Deputy Chief of Staff, G-6, on 4 August 2020. In this capacity, he is thenprincipal military advisor to the Chief of Staff of the Army for planning, strategy, and implementation of Command, Control, Communications, Computers, Cyber, and Information Technology (C5IT) for worldwide Army operations. Most recently, he served as Chief of Staff, United States Cyber Command. Lieutenant General Morrison, an Army brat, was commissioned a Signal Officer through ROTC in 1986 at James Madison University where he graduated with a Bachelor of Business Administration degree, majoring in marketing. He also holds a Master of Science degree in Telecommunications Management from Webster University and a Master of Strategic Resourcing from the Industrial College of the Armed Forces.
Lieutenant General Morrison’s military education includes the Signal Officer Basic and Advanced Courses, the Tactical Signal Officer’s Staff Course, and the Advanced Airborne (Jumpmaster) School. In addition to ICAF, he is a graduate of both the Command and General Staff College and the Joint Forces Staff College.
Lieutenant General Morrison’s early career included an assignment in Germany and deployments to Saudi Arabia in support of the Persian Gulf War, to Florida in support of Hurricane Andrew relief efforts, to Bosnia-Herzegovina in support of peacekeeping operations, and to Iraq in support of Task Force Baghdad. He later commanded the globally-deployed Joint Communications Support Element (Airborne) from2007-2009. At the Pentagon, he was the Executive Officer, Army CIO/G-6 from 2009-2010, and LandWarNet/Mission Command Director in the Dept. of the Army G-3/5/7 from 2010 to 2012. Between 2012-2019, Lieutenant General Morrison served as Commanding General, 7th Signal Command (Theater), Fort Gordon, GA, followed by Commanding General, U.S. Army Network Enterprise Technology Command (NETCOM) at Fort Huachuca, AZ, and, later, Commanding General, U.S. Army Cyber Center of Excellence and Fort Gordon, GA.
Lieutenant General Morrison is married to the former Ann Graves, and they have four daughters – Christine, Kate, Colleen, and Kelly – three sons-in-law, and two grandchildren.
HON Jordan Gillis
Former Assistant Secretary of Defense for Sustainment and Federal Engagement Executive
UiPath
Read MoreHON Jordan Gillis
Former Assistant Secretary of Defense for Sustainment and Federal Engagement Executive
UiPath
Jordan is the Federal Engagement Executive for UiPath’s Public Sector practice with a focus on the Department of Defense. In this role, he leverages over 20 years of professional services and operational management experience where he created and implemented strategies, delivered process improvement, and increased value for numerous clients across the public and private sectors.
Jordan joined UiPath from Deloitte. Prior to that, he served as the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Sustainment and as DoD’s Chief Sustainability Officer and Chief Housing Officer. He also served as the Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Army for Installations, Energy, and Environment.
Jordan served in the Army on active duty as a Field Artillery officer and was awarded the Bronze
Star Medal and Purple Heart. He earned a BA from Duke University and an MBA from Emory University.
He is a native of Atlanta, GA but now lives in Great Falls, VA with his family.
George Jackson
Executive Producer
GovExec TV
George Jackson is the vice president of events at GovExec – the largest and most-influential media company in the public sector marketplace. George joined GovExec in October of 2020 to enhance the scale of their events and audience experiences.
He graduated from The Ohio State University in 2003 with a bachelor’s degree in English. In 2006, he earned his master’s in broadcast journalism from the University of Maryland, College Park.
George spent the first five years of his journalism career at WJHL-TV in Johnson City Tenn. – beginning as an overnight producer for the station’s 6 a.m. broadcast. He advanced to lead on-air reporter for WJHL’s 11 p.m. newscast.
As a reporter, George examined the earnings of two non-profit hospital systems, felony charges filed against a local sheriff, predatory paving companies, a health benefits backlog for local veterans, and a series of cold-case murder investigations. He received an honorable mention for Best TV Reporter in the 2011 Tennessee AP Broadcast awards and won a Best Investigative Reporting award from Media General in 2010.
George joined DC’s ABC affiliate WJLA-TV in 2012 to produce Capital Insider, which won him an Emmy award. One year later, he developed and recorded the pilot episode of Government Matters – a program about the business of government. It debuted as a weekly show on Sunday, August 4th of 2013. George led Government Matters through September of 2020, expanded its reach to a daily worldwide audience, and produced its first feature-length documentary “The Dawn of Generation AI.”
George is from Toledo, Ohio. He lives with his wife, twin daughters, and a pair of rescue dogs in Northern Virginia.