Justice's Paul becomes acting OMB chief architect

Kshemendra Paul has taken over as acting chief architect at the Office of Management and Budget. He started Oct. 1, the day after Dick Burk retired from the position after more than 36 years of government service.

Burk announced Paul’s three-month detail during his retirement ceremony in Vienna, Va., Oct. 2. Paul will remain the Justice Department’s chief enterprise architect during that time.

Federal officials said OMB will seek to hire a new chief architect through the usual process. However, OMB might have a hard time filling the position because it still has not hired a new chief of the Information Policy and Technology Branch, a post from which Glenn Schlarman retired nearly a year ago.

Many experts say Paul is an up-and-comer in the chief architect community. He is co-chairman of the Services Subcommittee of the CIO Council’s Architecture and Infrastructure Committee, which will analyze how agencies use shared services and service-oriented architecture. The subcommittee will also develop best practices for sharing hardware and software.

Paul has been a leader in implementing segment architecture, which OMB mandated to help agencies understand how enterprise architecture can solve business challenges.

Experts say Paul will have his work cut out for him during his short stay at OMB because the budget for the agency’s Federal Enterprise Architecture Program Management Office has been cut each of the past two years, decreasing from $2.2 million to $550,000.