Interview with Carolyn Staats, Director of Innovation, Information Systems Department Sonoma County, California

What You'll Learn:

Carolyn's journey from business into IT began with IBM's training courses in RPG programming, database architecture, and system design. Her main takeaways?  The importance of taking the long view and designing sustainable, supportable systems that can grow with a business.

Carolyn also discusses the importance of having a team-oriented approach to success, as well as the issue of siloed government systems and how technology can be used to help fix this problem.

0:00 Intro

1:12 From business to IT - Carolyn's Journey

3:27 How open-mindedness to training opens new opportunities

5:21 IBM Principles - Key Takeaways

7:22 Advice on breaking down siloed government

9:29 First Principles Approach

10:04 Private sector demonstrates business value and ROI

11:15 What’s the most common reason people don’t want to partner?

16:49 Start with one person and build

22:50 Advice to vendor partners on productizing their solutions

29:15 API Solutions

31:27 Building a system one room at a time

36:57 Getting out of your own way

42:58 The $2 million federal grant Sonoma County received from the federal government

46:13 Designing a roadmap

47:43 Cross County Collaboration

50:32 Outro

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