Qld govt divides IT office

The Queensland Government has split its chief information office into three separate units to focus on priority areas in its ICT strategy, with the executive director of the office expected to reapply for a role.

Alan Chapman
(Credit: Queensland
government)

The first unit is the Telecommunications, Broadband and Digital Economy Co-ordination Office, which ZDNet.com.au reported on earlier this week.

The second is the ICT policy and coordination office, intended to coordinate high level ICT policy from a whole-of-government perspective and manage Queensland's input into the national IT agenda.

A public sector development office, the last of the three units, will liaise with other agencies on their IT directions and keep up a conversation with the industry.

Breaking the office into three was prompted by the government's ICT strategy announced by Premier Anna Bligh in September, according to a spokesperson for Queensland ICT Minister Robert Schwarten. The strategy is a five-year plan pushing community engagement, a consistent government approach to service delivery, more online front-line services and industry government partnerships.

The government will advertise for heads of the latter two units next year. It has already put out a call for an executive to head its broadband division.

Alan Chapman, who had been carrying out the executive director role of the chief information office will "have the opportunity to apply for these positions", according to the spokesperson.

Chapman had also been the acting chief information officer after former CIO Peter Grant left to lead Microsoft's Queensland operations at the end of 2007. Chapman was moved to the executive director position of the CIO office when Mal Grierson was made government CIO late last year.