As part of Industry Insider — California’s ongoing efforts to educate readers on California government agencies, their IT plans and initiatives, here’s the latest in our periodic series of interviews with technology leaders.
For the last five and a half years, Kevin Gray has been the chief information officer for the city of Burbank, a tenure that’s included some pivotal changes in the tech industry and in government.
Before taking over as Burbank’s technology chief, Gray had been a tech executive for some of the biggest names in the entertainment industry: He was with Orion Pictures as a Unix system administrator; he was the manager of Data Center Operations for DreamWorks SKG and then head of Data Center Operations and Systems Administration for DreamWorks Animation; he was vice president of IT infrastructure for Paramount Pictures; and then was vice president of Global Media and IT Infrastructure Technology for Viacom. He took the position with the city of Burbank in February 2018.
In addition to his role as Burbank’s CIO, Gray is a chapter vice president for the Municipal Information Systems Association of California. He’s also active in leadership of various professional and civic organizations; he’s a frequent speaker at industry conferences; and he volunteers extensively with youth sports and mentorship organizations. Gray is also a fluent Francophile and reads novels in French.
Industry Insider — California: As CIO of Burbank, how do you describe your role?
Kevin Gray: I describe my role as a business leader who is focused on innovation, technology, process, policy and strategy to drive value and better outcomes for the residents, businesses and visitors of the city of Burbank. My department’s mission is to be a trusted business partner, adviser and service provider for technology, process improvement, citizen experience, and operational efficiency.
I like to say that the CIO or CTO who wakes up in the morning thinking about technology is thinking about the wrong thing. We provide a multitude of services for the people of our city. From ensuring our streets are clean, safe and well paved, to ensuring our residents and businesses have reliable and affordable water and electricity, and much more in between, the city of Burbank IT Department has a hand in ensuring those services remain top-notch. We are well-known for our exceptional city services, and the IT Department is charged with helping to ensure those services continue to improve.
IICA: How do you define “digital transformation?” How far along is Burbank’s IT in that process, and how will you know when it’s finished?
Gray: For me, digital transformation is about transforming inefficient, manual, paper-based, wasteful workflows into more efficient, more automated, digital workflows. I argue that digital transformation is not just about digitizing paper forms or wrapping technology around inefficient processes. It’s about identifying and eliminating the 8 Wastes of Lean in your processes, digitizing the optimized workflows, applying technology solutions to automate as much of the work as possible, and finding innovative ways to improve services and outcomes for your customers.
That’s a mouthful. But I think it underscores the broad scope of what we provide for the residents, businesses and visitors of our city. Technology is but a means to business outcomes, and we must keep those business outcomes in focus.
I think the city of Burbank has made great progress in our “digital transformation” journey. We’ve enabled new online and mobile services for our community, and we’ve improved and digitized many city workflows. However, that journey is never finished. Continuous improvement and continuous learning never end. My experience is that there is great value and high rates of success in first-order change for an organization. First-order change is when you make incremental adjustments in the processes of an organization to allow for continuous evolution and improvement. However, I would argue that our SAFe (Scaled Agile Framework) adoption is a third-order change because it has completely transformed our organization and enabled our ability to drive incremental change throughout the city.
IICA: What are your top two or three priorities for 2023 for Burbank’s IT Department? What opportunities should vendors be watching for?
Gray: We have so many priorities, it can sometimes feel daunting. However, I’ll say that today the top three are to complete our agile and product-based reorganization, complete our redesign and redeployment of the Burbank Water and Power website and customer portal, and replace our Police Department Computer Aided Dispatch and Records Management solution.
IICA: You joined the city after a career in the private sector — specifically, in technology working with major media companies, studios and production companies. In terms of technology, what does the private sector do better than the public sector? And what does the public sector do better than the private sector?
Gray: This is a legitimate question that I’m asked often. First, I’ll say that there is a quote from W. Edwards Deming that I refer to when speaking about the differences between the media industry and local government: “A common disease that afflicts management the world over is the impression that our problems are different. They are different to be sure, but the principles that will help to improve the quality of products and services are universal in nature.”
With that said, the media sector and the public sector couldn’t be more diametrically opposed to each other in terms of change and stability. Media is always changing. Innovation is always disrupting media. Think of how home entertainment has changed since the advent of the DVD. As a result, the media industry does change very well. Innovation and change are the norm. However, a tremendous amount of instability coincides with that. It’s not an exaggeration to say I experienced some sort of major reorganization every one to two years in the media industry.
On the other hand, the public sector is very stable. While innovation is enabling new and better ways for us to provide services to our residents and businesses, it is not disrupting our industry to the point that entire value streams and job classifications are disappearing overnight, like in the media industry. On the other hand, the public sector doesn’t do change as well as the media industry. Change management is more arduous in the public sector.
IICA: What is Burbank’s estimated annual IT budget, and how many employees does your IT team have? What is the city’s overall budget?
Gray: Burbank’s IT budget for the current fiscal year is $20 million. We are budgeted for 33 full-time positions. General Fund appropriations for the city are $219 million. All Fund appropriations for the city are $792 million.
IICA: How do you prefer to be contacted by vendors, including via social media such as LinkedIn? How might vendors best educate themselves before meeting with you? Is your IT strategic plan available online for those vendors who want to do their homework?
Gray: The best way for vendors to contact me is via email. I usually respond, but I often don’t have time to engage. We have an extensive Epic backlog, and we’re driving a lot of transformation for the city. So, I often don’t have the time to engage unless it is regarding something that is already at the top of our priority list.
I generally only accept LinkedIn connection requests from people whom I have met. I’m often inundated with connection requests from people who have found me in a search, and it is not possible for me to engage with them all.
Our IT strategy is available on our website, but it is not the typical IT strategic plan I have seen from other local government agencies. Our IT strategy talks about our mission, our guiding principles, and our approach. We practice Lean Portfolio Management. So, the plan changes to meet the changing needs and expectations.
IICA: You’ve been a champion of lean, kaizen and agile methodologies as pathways to efficiency and productivity, and you partnered with a vendor, Info-Tech Research Group, to help clarify your goals to the city staff. When was the “Ah ha!” moment when you felt that your vision was being understood and adopted?
Gray: I think there have been many “Ah ha!” moments along the way of our three-year journey to adopt lean, kaizen and agile methodologies at scale for the city of Burbank. ”Ah ha!” moments come at different times for different people in a change journey like ours. I believe that the biggest moment for the IT staff happened in April 2022. IT staff had previously been assigned between 40-60 hours of online training on agile product owner principles, Lean Six Sigma, design thinking, and UX (user experience) design principles. IT staff had completed another 48 hours of agile fundamentals, Leading SAFe, and SAFe POPM training, and receiving SAFe Product Owner/Product Manager certifications. However, I knew that the vision had not yet sunk in because we had not yet put any of that training to use. Plus, there was still extensive pushback.
So, our next step was to do a four-day Product Owner Workshop with Info-Tech. It was after that workshop when I noticed a change with IT staff. Following at least 100 hours of training and 32 hours in a workshop trying their new skills out was when their “Ah ha!” moment happened.
Of great surprise to me, the IT leadership “Ah ha!” moment didn’t happen until after our first PI Planning event later in that month. IT leadership was still very worried that PI Planning was going to be a disaster for us. They had even discussed encouraging me to pull the plug and delay the event. But I was determined at that point. We had come too far to turn back. The event ended up being a rousing success.
Recently, I realized somewhere along the line many of the city executives had their moments. One of our few remaining executive detractors was upset at me about an article I had written and attacked the efficacy of our lean and agile adoption. I understand the feelings because they interpreted my article as degrading the city before we adopted lean and agile. That was not my intention. Nevertheless, one by one the other executives stepped in to support and praise what we’ve accomplished. That is when I had my “Ah ha!” moment that we had turned the corner with city executive leadership.
IICA: If you could change one thing about public-sector IT procurement, what would it be?
Gray: I would streamline it while maintaining the spirit of open, fair competition that is built into the bureaucracy today. I don’t know exactly what that means overall, but we’re trying to figure it out. We’ve executed one kaizen event on our contracting processes that yielded a ton of ideas on how we can streamline that part of our procurement processes. We are executing on some of those ideas. We will continue to iterate to streamline more.
IICA: What do you read to stay abreast of developments in the gov tech/SLED sector?
Gray: I read everything that I can set my eyes on, including blogs, books, advisory service publications, marketing materials and magazine articles. In fact, I read the GovTech* newsletter every week.
IICA: What are your hobbies, and what do you enjoy reading?
Gray: My hobbies are French, wine, fine dining, golf and cycling. I began learning the French language in 2015. I now speak and understand it at a B2 level, which is considered moderate fluency. I’m a bit of a Francophile, as I love French language, culture, wine, and the architecture of Paris.
Currently, I’m reading La tresse by Laetitia Colombani. It’s a French novel about the interconnected lives of three women from entirely different parts of the world, who know nothing of each other. It’s fascinating, and it’s working my French skills.
I’m also reading Crucial Conversations by Joseph Grenny and a host of others. I love the book because it is expanding my toolbox for having difficult conversations with the people who I work with and my loved ones.
IICA: Can you tell us a bit about your family — and your interest in coaching youth sports?
Gray: I have three adult children. Charles is 34, Isala is 27 and Salihah is 26. I want to congratulate my baby girl, Salihah, for recently graduating from the University of Southern California with her bachelor’s degree in philosophy, politics, and law. I’m very proud of her. It’s a big accomplishment. Her older sister graduated from the American University of Paris during the pandemic. She is a digital content professional now, running her own consulting business. I’m very proud of her also. Plus, I’m very proud of Charles, my son. He is doing great, studying to become a counselor. Lastly, Nichet and I are approaching our 30-year wedding anniversary.
I began coaching youth sports nearly 30 years ago when my son was a little guy. However, I’m not like other parent coaches because I continued coaching even after he moved on to other teams and into high school. In fact, I continued coaching until after my grandson made his way through my teams. My grandson now plays football for Junipero Serra High School in Gardena. I’m super proud of that guy too. I coached sports up until the start of the pandemic.
I think that I’m a teacher, coach and mentor at heart. I truly enjoy helping others realize their potential. That is what coaching is all about. Also, I was previously a mentor with the Youth Mentoring Connection when I was at Paramount Pictures and Viacom. Now I mentor with STEM Advantage. Coaching and mentoring are rewarding and fulfilling.
*Government Technology magazine is a publication of e.Republic, which also produces Industry Insider — California.
This interview was edited lightly for style and brevity.
Burbank CIO: ‘I’m a Teacher, Coach and Mentor at Heart’
