Donna S. Canestraro, program manager at CTG, was recently a panelist at The NYS Forum’s Best Practices for Developing IT Skills seminar. The half-day seminar was hosted by the NYS Forum’s MATRIX Committee at the Empire State Plaza and provided information for the New York State IT community in strategizing towards the goal of cost-effectively developing IT skills. The public and private sector panel of speakers shared their recommendations and experiences in IT skills development.

Donna’s presentation focused on the concept of comprehensive prototyping that was used in the XML Testbed as a means for integrating and applying training in the workplace. She provided critical success factors and items that executives need to consider when procuring training.

Additional panel members included Margaret Becker, deputy CIO for administration, NYSCIO/OFT; David Gardam, CIO, NYS Office of Alcoholism and Substance Abuse Services; David Bach, senior manager, Deloitte Consulting; Debi Orton, manager of technology services, and Onnolee Smith, director of Workforce and Organizational Development Unit, NYS Governor’s Office of Employee Relations; Nora Owens, directory, NYS Technology Academy, OCIO/OFT; and Bill Damarè, regional vice president, ESI International.

Topics addressed by the panel were Strategic Actions for Advancing NYS Workforce Goals; Talent Management in IT Training; A Holistic Approach for Developing IT Training; NYS Technology Academy Services with a Demo of the eLearning Authoring Tool; and IT Workforce Training Best Practices.

The topic of this seminar was drawn from a set of recommendations that resulted from the NYS IT Workforce Skills Assessment Project, which was designed to gather information about the existing skills and training needs of New York State's IT professionals. The project was sponsored by the New York State Chief Information Officer (CIO) Council's Human Resource Committee in partnership with the Governor's Office of Employee Relations (GOER), and the Office for Technology (OFT). CTG was a key partner in the project and was responsible for project management, survey design and administration, and data analysis and reporting. The project results include a statewide survey report prepared by CTG and a set of policy and action recommendations prepared by the NYS CIO Council HR Committee.