Meet the Latest Round of GovLoop Featured Contributors!

We put out a call for the selected Featured Contributors for this quarter, and many applicants sprang into action. This cohort is one of our best. 

Read on to meet these contributors for GovLoop who will be posting once a week for the next three months. They bring a variety of government experience ranging from engagement and retention to state and local HR to diversity and leadership management.

Our new cohort’s posts start going up later today – so get ready!

Franco Amalfi leads the go to market strategy for smarter government for Oracle Public Sector North America. Franco advises government officials on how to leverage modern cloud-based solutions and emerging technologies to help government organizations deliver personalized government services. In addition to working with customers, Franco authors, publishes white papers and articles on leveraging technology to drive business value for governments. He is also a frequent speaker at government conferences. He is a graduate of McGill University in Montreal, Canada and has completed an Advanced Certificate for Executives in Management, Innovation, and Technology at MIT Sloan School of Management in Cambridge, USA.

Nhu-Phuong Duong is a recent grad with a Master’s of Arts in English and the Humanities. Nhu worked in several non-profit organizations serving the homeless in DC and New York City and currently works as an analyst for the federal government. With two years in her current position, Nhu deploys project management strategies to improve efficiency and efficacy. In her undergrad, Nhu studied English and Philosophy with a track in Performance in Media Studies. Research follows the Baudrillardian studies and the influence of simulation and hyperreality on human interaction in the social and political spaces. In her free time, she attends bluegrass shows and homebrews.

Steve Ganey is the Deputy CIO for Collin County Texas and oversees centralized technology for courts and justice, detention, facilities, public works, healthcare and all other critical and ancillary county functions. Steve has over 25 years of IT leadership within the private and public sectors and has held positions in R&D, software design, project management (PMP), finance, customer support and quality assurance. Steve has a passion for process automation, efficiency, digital transformations, leveraging technology to offset personnel growth, and most importantly, providing an outstanding IT experience to Collin County’s citizens, elected officials and county employees.

Michelle Malloy has been a devoted Colorado state employee for nearly 13 years. In that time, she had dedicated herself to being the best steward leader possible, ensuring that everyone and everything left in her care are nurtured and developed in order to provide the best value and service to the citizens of the state of Colorado today and into the future. Michelle’s expertise lies in strategy, program management, project management, change management, process improvement, facilitation and working with people. Michelle believes that people are the government’s #1 asset and the products and services we aim to provide and improve upon would not happen without them.

Derrick Moreira, President of Censeo Consulting Group, has more than 22 years of management consulting and industry experience leading and delivering complex supply chain and operations strategy solutions. Most recently, Derrick has played a key role in standing up and managing several large-scale supply management transformational initiatives across federal agencies. Key areas of subject-matter expertise include supply management and strategic sourcing, cost and business case analysis, workforce planning, program governance, change management, and process improvement/ reengineering.

Jamie Desrosier has spent the past 2 years in Colorado working as a Marketing and Communications professional within state and local government technology for government authority, Colorado SIPA. Prior to moving to Colorado, she spent 2 years as a Fulbright Scholar in Malaysia. She spends everyday learning as much as she can and is excited to be working on her Master’s of Information Technology Management with a specialization in cybersecurity.

After earning her PhD in chemistry at Rice University, Erica Bakota joined USDA as a research chemist, where she studied lipid oxidation and alternatives to partially hydrogenated oils. She then returned to Houston, Texas to join the Harris County Institute of Forensic Sciences, where she led method development and validation for the Forensic Toxicology Laboratory. In March 2018, she made a move back to the feds and is now with the FDA as a chemist at the Kansas City Laboratory. Her work at FDA focuses on active ingredients in dietary supplements and pesticide residues in foods.

Mary Roche Cronin is the Director of Human Services for the Town of Manchester, Connecticut and has held that position since January 2005. She is responsible for management of four divisions, provides contract oversight for community agencies receiving town funding, and represents the town on community, regional and statewide human services planning and advisory groups. She also provides oversight of the department budget and state and federal grant funding. She has a Master’s degree in Child Welfare from St. Joseph College in West Hartford, Connecticut and a Juris Doctorate from Western New England College School of Law in Springfield, Massachusetts.

Tyler Sweatt is the founder and Managing Partner at Future Tense. Tyler works to identify and address risks and opportunities in changing environments. He advises startups across the cybersecurity, artificial intelligence, and physical security domains, and regularly supports R&D, S&T, M&A and strategy initiatives across DHS, DoD, the IC and Fortune 500 organizations. Previously, Tyler worked at futurist consulting firm Toffler Associates, leading emerging technology and security efforts, and worked at Deloitte where he focused on rapid technology acquisition for DoD. A West Point graduate, Tyler served as a Combat Engineer and Counterintelligence Officer with the Army, serving multiple combat deployments. You can find him on Twitter @Tyler_Sweatt .

A government nerd, customer service practitioner and 311 pioneer, Janice Quintana has worked in local government as the Director of 311 in three different municipalities. She is fascinated with innovation, technology, data, service delivery and community engagement. When Janice is not following local government rock stars or trends she enjoys her status as a tennis enthusiast and travels the globe to watch a good match. She currently lives in Charlotte, NC with her two chihuahuas.

Wagish Bhartiya is a Senior Director at REI Systems where he leads the company’s Software-as-a-Service Business Unit. He created and is responsible for leading a team of more than 100 staff focused on applying software technologies to improve how government operates. Wagish leads a broad-based team that includes product development, R&D, project delivery, and customer success across State, local, Federal, and international government customers. Wagish is a regular contributor to a number of government-centric publications and has been on numerous government IT-related television programs including The Bridge which airs on WJLA-Channel 7.

June Cox is a Human Resource Specialist, Human Resource Development (HRD) with a federal agency. She has a masters degree in education and provides employee training and development to federal employees. June is a certified workforce development professional and a member of the National Association of Workforce Development (NAWDP). She has trained and developed hundreds of employees. She values investing in others. Married with three children, two are young adults and one living at home. She loves to have intellectual conversations, particularly politics. She also likes to watch the long-running drama series The Young & The Restless, which she watches on the weekend.

Danielle Metzinger leads efforts across agencies and sectors to think big about improving government for generations to come. Danielle serves as an Organizational Excellence Specialist in the executive office of the California Department of Transportation. Throughout her public service career, she has worked on high profile projects related to organizational development and succession planning in California state government. She leads NxtGov, a nonprofit professional network for public servants, and Innovative Pathways to Public Service, a collaborative of educators and government officials to bring young people into public sector careers. Danielle holds an MS in Organizational Development from the University of San Francisco and a BA in Psychology from William Jessup University. In her spare time, Danielle enjoys spending time with family and friends and attending arts and cultural events in California’s capital.

Brandon L. Greene is the Manager of the Civic Design Lab in Oakland. Brandon is a graduate of Boston University Law School where he was a Public Interest Scholar and Martin Luther King Social Justice Fellow. Previously, Brandon was an Attorney and Clinical Supervisor at the East Bay Community Law Center where he created and lead the decriminalization of poverty clinic. Brandon’s article Depraved Necessities: Prison Privatization, Educational Attainment and the Path to Profit was published in 2013 by SRBLSA Law Journal. His forthcoming articles will be published in the Harvard Blackletter Law Journal and the Berkeley Criminal Law Journal. Twitter: @brandonlgreene.

Joel Carnes has spent his career in innovation, and has experience at every level — with products, teams, organizations and entire communities. While he’s always been a technologist, he’s much more interested in the impact on real human lives than the technology itself — a passion that inspires him to work with local governments and communities across North America. Joel has held senior executive roles at XPRIZE, Activision, SecondMuse, and Disney Imagineering, and has become a thought leader in connected innovation — where individuals, teams, organizations and businesses come together to solve a problem, going beyond what any single entity could accomplish on its own. With this strategy, Joel has built relationships across sectors, industries and political boundaries, creating entire innovation networks that continually produce solutions to real-world problems.

Andy is the Associate Director for the Engagement and Retention office, Internal Revenue Service. He is responsible for leading engagement strategies for IRS. He has been part of the IRS Engagement and Retention office since its inception. Andy’s tenure with IRS includes numerous domestic and international senior leadership roles. Andy earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in Political Science from Point Park University, a Juris Doctor from Taft University and a Certificate in Executive Leadership from Cornell University. In addition, he has a French Language Diploma from the French Government. Andy is a graduate of the IRS Executive Readiness Program.