(US & Canada) | Enabling People to Perform Is Key to Retention and Upskilling — Army Futures Command CTO for Network Cross Functional Team

Chief Warrant Officer 5 Jeramy Cosner, CTO – Network Cross Functional Team, Army Futures Command, speaks with Katya Mijatovic, Principal Data Scientist at Data Society and CDO Magazine Editorial Board Member, about implementing new technologies and upskilling and hiring staff.

Mijatovic interviewed Cosner on the sidelines of the recently conducted AFCEA CeVA Data Centric Summit.

Sharing a takeaway from his presentation at the summit, Cosner says that the command recognizes a handful of barriers towards getting to data centricity and a way to overcome those through a continued partnership with both industry and academia.

Speaking of his approach to implementing new technologies, Cosner says that the modernization of software in the last three to five years has been the biggest shift, especially, to be able to use other computing environments on the cloud. He further mentions that a focus on the modernization of software will help the command go cross-organizationally across the DoD.

Further highlighting one of the most useful technologies he has seen implemented in the past 10 years, Cosner mentions the maturation of various radio frequencies or transport like SATCOM. This provides better paths and more network options to be able to use data freely.

Sharing his views on applying new technologies, Cosner mentions technologies that can help decouple the current hardware to software dependencies. Going towards more modernized software architectures will allow users to be less dependent on specific hardware underneath it, allowing more of an agnostic approach to capabilities.

Responding to Mijatovic’s question regarding upskilling and recruiting staff, Cosner says that it is a balance of both. He stresses that the key point of retention and upskilling is enabling people to do their jobs. In doing so, they will also want to upskill as technology and environments change. He further says that there will still be a need to hire people who are experts to offset the transition period of people learning how to do new things.

CDO Magazine appreciates CW5 Jeramy Cosner for sharing her insights with our global community.