Leslie Beavers to Give DOD IT Update in the Age of Gov’t Efficiency

Leslie Beavers is a highly consequential figure in the Department of Defense, with a great deal of decision power. Like all modern organizations, the Pentagon is increasingly powered and shaped by its technological systems and, as principal deputy chief information officer of the whole enterprise, Beavers plays an instrumental role in selecting focus areas and driving modernization efforts.

Beavers will offer insights into where the department is going in this incredibly turbulent and unpredictable time in government at the Potomac Officers Club’s 2025 Digital Transformation Summit on April 24. Save your spot to learn about the direction of the federal sector and what it means for your partnerships and services going forward.

Let’s dive a bit into Beavers’ career and explore what she’ll be discussing at the event.

Beavers’ Background

Like many DOD officials, Beavers has military history as a service member, completing several assignments as an intelligence officer in the Air Force and rising to the rank of reserve brigadier general. Over the course of her DOD career, she has been awarded honors such as the Defense Superior Service and Legion of Merit, in addition to her status as a member of the Senior Executive Service. (To add to her distinctions even further, she was bestowed with the Wash100 Award, a marker of high achievement in government contracting, in 2024.)

Private Sector Detour

In the intervening period between her early Air Force years and her current upper ranks DOD leadership, Beavers spent time in the private sector, in industries as distinct as healthcare technology (with GE HealthCare) and entertainment (with NBC Universal and Timepiece Entertainment). In these roles she was able to hone her management skills and demonstrate how effective she can be at steering a large business.

DOD This Decade

Beavers pivoted back into the public sector when she took the position of director of intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance enterprise capabilities at the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Intelligence and Security in 2020. Building on her prior work as an Air Force intelligence officer, in this role, she spearheaded the Defense Intelligence Digital Transformation Campaign Plan, a.k.a. Project Herald.

The purpose of the initiative is to modernize intelligence delivery mechanisms to military service members as well as develop the next wave of technologies to support these systems.

In 2023, Beavers was appointed principal deputy CIO for the DOD. Her oversight in this role spans information management and assurance, non-intelligent space systems, and satellite communications, navigation and timing programs, among many other areas.

When Hon. John Sherman exited the top CIO position in 2024, Beavers also spent nine months as acting CIO before Katie Arrington returned to the department during the early part of the second Trump administration. Beavers reverted back to principal deputy CIO in wake of this change.

Focus Areas for the Future

Cloud is a crucial concern for the department and for Beavers moving forward. At a recent event, she revealed that the Joint Warfighting Cloud Capability, which has been established and worked on by multiple industry partners, is forging ahead, having completed the “nuts and bolts” stage where the groundwork was laid for a multi-cloud ecosystem and moving into an emphasis on attribute-based access control.

“JWCC got us started. That’s not where we end. We need a multi-vendor, multi-cloud environment that behaves as if it were a single vendor, single cloud. And we need it with our allies and partners,” Beavers said, according to GovCIO.

Software, as evidenced by projects like the U.S. Marine Corps’ software factory, is of central importance to DOD right now too, per Beavers.

“You’re going to see in the coming years, a larger focus on really maturing the software factory ecosystem and making it more integrated to deliver at the enterprise levels. The software is where the magic happens,” Beavers said.

In her remarks, Beavers also highlighted workforce training activities and a certainty in zero trust cybersecurity’s maturation by 2027.

You can expect the principal deputy DOD CIO to address all of these important topics and much more at the 2025 Digital Transformation Summit on April 24! Amid a federal sector in flux, come learn how the military and government are realigning themselves with new priorities and how you can get in on the ground floor for new collaboration and deal-making.