The end-of-the-year spending spree — in which agencies cram contract spending into the last quarter of the fiscal year — is a time-honored tradition in government contracting.  

And Tony Scott, one of the Obama administration’s top tech officials, hates it.

Since being named the federal chief information officer in February, the former corporate IT exec with stints at VMware, Microsoft and Disney said he’s come to learn about the “use-it-or-lose-it” nature of federal IT funding that fuels the annual spending spike.

“That’s just a really bad way to run IT,” he said August 26, 2015 during a presentation at the Digital Government Institute’s 930Gov conference in Washington.

The end-of-the-year pressure drives agencies into “exactly the wrong behavior,” Scott said: more short-term, even frivolous, spending and less of a focus on longer-term investments.

Keep reading this article at: http://www.nextgov.com/cio-briefing/2015/08/federal-cio-tony-scott-hates-end-year-it-spending-spree/119696