Federal Government Information Technology

How CIO John Edwards modeled CIA's IT security after McDonald's to stop shadow IT

FedScoop: When you eat at McDonald’s, no matter where in the world, you expect a Big Mac to taste like a Big Mac. Some parts of the experience may vary location to location, but at the core, all McDonalds franchises are rooted in the same expectations.

CIO John Edwards has replicated that franchise model with IT security operations at the various branches of the CIA. Rather than trying to control every IT team across spy agency — which he said would often result in secretive, unapproved shadow IT operations at branches with specific mission needs — Edwards decided about two years ago to treat those teams like franchises, freeing them to personalize their IT while remaining in sync with his team overall.

Read article