Bridging Tech and Government with Jennifer Saha

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Narrator

We're in an era of rapid change where resilience is vital. The dude for that podcast dives into the most important topics in government and technology today. Our host, Davood Ghods, sits down with his vast network of colleagues to dish on the tech challenges that affect us all. Follow this podcast on your favorite platform and join the conversation by sharing it on LinkedIn, Twitter, or Facebook.

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Davood Ghods

Hello, everyone. Welcome to the Direct Technologies, Davood for Thought podcast. I'm Davood Ghods and I will be your host today. The way I stay up with the pressing topics of tech and the government of today is to tap into the panel of experts. I've had the honor of connecting with over the years. Today we have Jennifer Saha joining us on the podcast.

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Davood Ghods

Jennifer is the founder of Golden Bridge Strategies, a business advisory services firm that bridges industry and government. Prior to this role, she oversaw the country's public sector councils. And prior to that, Jennifer served ten years as an appointee under both governors Jerry Brown and Arnold Schwarzenegger in the state of California. Jennifer, without going into too much of your background, I want to welcome you to this episode of Davood for Thought and ask you to tell us about yourself. And for someone who doesn't know about your years of experience in the state, please give us a brief overview of what you have done and what you do now. Welcome.

00;01;29;05 - 00;01;58;05

Jennifer Saha

Well, thank you so much, Davood. I'm so happy to be here with you today. And you did a pretty good job of sort of giving the overview. But I just like to say that I kind of bounced around in many different positions with the state over the years.

00;01;58;08 - 00;02;26;25

Jennifer Saha

I worked in the governor's office. I worked in what was the business Transportation and Housing Agency. On economic development issues, I worked at the Department of Finance and I worked on procurement issues at the Department of General Services before I decided to go work out in the private sector and get a feel for what industry was like and got an idea of what working in the technology industry was all about.

00;02;26;27 - 00;02;55;11

Jennifer Saha

So I got to feel what working with government was like from the other side of the table. So I liked it out there and now I'm sort of sitting in between both of them. So helping those technology companies interact with government and connect with government is really what my passion is. So I'm happy to be working with and around government again.

00;02;55;13 - 00;03;27;12

Jennifer Saha

I was born and raised in California, so my roots are here. They grow deep and I'm just happy to be traveling a lot less than I was when I worked with Tia and happy to be sort of back in Sacramento. With the pandemic definitely traveling a whole lot less, but spending a lot of time with family and enjoying the much nicer weather lately, too.

00;03;27;15 - 00;04;08;17

Davood Ghods

Fantastic. Fantastic. Thank you. When you were working with the administrations, different administrations, what kinds of roles you have were they policy or they related to I.T.?  

00;04;08;19 - 00;04;47;26

Jennifer Saha

Mostly policy. To be honest with you. So working on the policy side of things, but definitely on on the procurement side of things. So getting involved in the policy of procurement. When I was at DSS, my office was the Office of Strategic Planning Policy and Research, and that office maintains the state administrative manual. So it's what sets the rules for how you how you administer all the different policies that go about how you buy things, how you sell things. They they update all the state procurement manuals and all of that type of thing. Even when I was in the governor's office, I oversaw a few different state agencies. I sat in the cabinet unit and I was in Assistant Cabinet secretary when I was at the Department of Finance, I oversaw the administration of the state's Recovery Act funding.

00;04;47;29 - 00;05;20;02

Jennifer Saha

That was the billions and billions of dollars that flowed through our state government related to some economic stimulus funding that came into the state and the state administered really how that money got spent. But really on the policy side of how all that money was invested and how that money was spent. So oversaw quite a few procurements related to technology, but for the most part sat on the policy side of technology.

00;05;20;02 - 00;05;45;22

Jennifer Saha

So I like to joke I work in technology, but when it comes to like turning on computers or getting things to function from the technology side, I'm completely clueless. So if I somehow hang up on this podcast, I apologize, but I'm the most technologically incompetent person you're ever going to meet. So we have prepared for that. So we will.

00;05;45;24 - 00;06;17;21

Davood Ghods

Well, your policy experience and expertise shows, because I've been on calls with you and on various conferences and things like that and we know that you have a lot of years of experience in procurement and purchasing experience, and it definitely shows. But, you know, the purpose of these podcasts is to get to know more of the people that are around the community who have worked in I.T. and worked in procurement and business.

00;06;17;24 - 00;06;47;01

Davood Ghods

And as we say in direct technology, we are the human side of tech. So but the next question I have for you is really related to I.T. trends in your role here. Now, with your current role or your prior roles, what emerging trends are you seeing that we in the I.T. and the business fields should be paying more attention to?

00;06;47;03 - 00;07;08;10

Jennifer Saha

So it's interesting, when you asked me if I worked in I.T. or in policy, because that kind of relates to one of the trends that I'm seeing, and it's sort of a convergence between the I.T. and the business side of things. You know, we always talk about like, well, is it I.T. that's pushing this or is it the business side of the house?

00;07;08;10 - 00;07;32;14

Jennifer Saha

Or who do I need to talk to? Is it the I.T. leader or the business leader? And to me, we always talk about it as it's, you know, like two sides of the of the leadership and two sides of the House is that, you know, the deputy director or is it the CIO? And I'm seeing more and more that those two people are really working together to solve problems.

00;07;32;14 - 00;07;55;28

Jennifer Saha

And they're there's a convergence happening in many of these departments where there's a recognition that those two people are working together more and more to solve problems because they have to. And when leadership sits around the table, they're working hand in hand. Technology and business to solve these types of problems. So which I think is a great a great thing.

00;07;55;28 - 00;08;20;01

Jennifer Saha

And it's excellent to see because what happened in the past, a lot of times is they would solve problems in silos and I.T. would try to fix a problem. But there was a miscommunication and, you know, we would say people are bilingual. You either talk business or you talk I.T. and you're talking across each other and you're not understanding what each other's problems are.

00;08;20;04 - 00;08;40;20

Jennifer Saha

So the more those two parties can work together, the more successful you're going to be in solving problems. So from a business standpoint, outside of it, as as the industry is trying to work with these departments to solve the problems, it's a great problem to see solved. And I think it's something that as an industry we're really excited to see happen.

00;08;40;22 - 00;09;11;20

Davood Ghods

Yeah, for technology and business or convergence of I.T. and policy to come together is a great accomplishment. It's something that's been there and probably is going to continue to be there, but hopefully the lesser aspects of it. But I'm glad to hear that they are converging. That's great. That's a that's a unique answer to the emerging trends that we could get from somebody who has been with the policy and can see this coming.

00;09;11;21 - 00;09;38;26

Davood Ghods

So that's great. A direct technology. Jennifer, we like most other organizations, when we accept an opportunity or when we work with a client, we talk about how we are going to get whatever it is we get done in a project or an effort, but a direct technology. We also ask, why are we doing what we are doing? We even have a Department of Why, which is our marketing department. So what is your why? In other words, what motivates you in your work?

00;09;38;28 - 00;10;12;19

Jennifer Saha

I mean, at the end of the day, I'm a Californian, just like everyone else that lives in our great state. And as a Californian, I'm a consumer of government services, so I think it's pretty special when you're able to go to work and what you do impacts the everyday citizen of the state of California.

00;10;12;22 - 00;10;52;11

Jennifer Saha

It was great when I worked for the state and what I was doing directly impacted the citizens of the state of California. And so when I do the work I do now, I still try to find that why. And it's excellent to be able to work in an arena that still touches government in a lot of ways. And I know you guys have that at direct technology as well, and it's why you're involved in a lot of government work because that's your why and it's my why as well, and it's why I work with clients that do a lot of government work.

00;10;52;17 - 00;11;29;09

Jennifer Saha

And it's why I'm passionate about connecting industry to government, because I'm passionate about making government work better. Because when government works better, it works better for the citizen, which is me. And it's my mom and it's my daughter and it's my neighbor. And at the end of the day, it's all of us. And so I think being passionate about making government work better is something that's really a driving force that everyone can get behind because it makes better lives for all of us.

00;11;29;12 - 00;11;58;25

Davood Ghods

Well-said. Well said. As a Californian, I am happy to have someone like you at the helm and to save the state and the taxpayers. So fantastic. The next question is really around two key words inspiration and innovation. You don't hear those two words together much, but the question is what inspires innovation in your organization and on your team?

00;11;58;27 - 00;12;30;05

Jennifer Saha

I really encourage my team to think outside the box and never be afraid of failure. I really I encourage us to try new things, even if it means we are going to fall flat on our faces and fail. Because the one time that we don't fall flat on our faces and fail is the time that we're going to absolutely hit a home run.

00;12;30;07 - 00;13;01;19

Jennifer Saha

And so it is always something that I'm allowing for and giving my my team the freedom to kind of shoot for the stars with like an example is I had one of my team mates ask me if we could apply for this contract to represent a client that we're not super qualified to represent. But she thought it would be a really cool client to work with.

00;13;01;19 - 00;13;41;10

Jennifer Saha

And not only did I say, Yeah, we should absolutely go for it, I said, like, why don't we call this friend of mine? That would make us better qualified and ask her if she wants to partner up in team with us because maybe we'd be better qualified if we did team with her. And so just looking for opportunities to sort of allow us to spread our wings and shoot for the stars and just sort of empower the team members that I work with to sort of be the best that they can be and sort of always remind them that the sky's the limit.

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Jennifer Saha

I work with a really small team. There's three of us here at Golden Bridge Strategies, so it really is a team of I like to refer to each of us as a little Swiss Army knife. We do a little bit of anything and everything here, so allowing people to sort of reach for their goals is something that I'm passionate about because any one of us, any day is the number two in line or the number one in line, depending on what kind of day we're having.

00;14;16;00 - 00;14;45;08

Jennifer Saha

So it's a small but mighty team and really just letting people know that I'm behind them. 100% and that any given day they are empowered to sort of reach for the stars is sort of what what I'm about when it comes to innovation.  

00;14;45;11 - 00;15;10;13

Davood Ghods

Right, Right. That's great. I'm glad that you're encouraging your team to think outside the box. I remember days that that was discouraged in the state government. It was discouragement was a bad word to think outside the box. Right. You know, never try anything new. Came to me at state government, right? Yeah. Certain hearing comes to mind. Even any way. But, you know, not being afraid to fail. That's the only way to make progress. You have to try things. And in order to make progress, you might fail, but you'll get up and continue again. Yep. Jennifer, What is something that would surprise people about your background or interests?

00;15;10;13 - 00;15;51;04

Jennifer Saha

So people might be surprised to know that I am actually a pretty big introvert. I am not super comfortable in an extrovert role. I actually do a pretty good job playing one professionally, but I am far more comfortable at home.

00;15;51;06 - 00;16;31;24

Jennifer Saha

Hold up. You know, scrolling through Netflix, watching the latest series at home, not visiting with anyone. So I've been in a totally comfortable place over the last year, as you can imagine, with COVID. But yeah, I just am in a much more comfortable place, my own, you know, But I constantly push myself professionally and really to get out of that introvert role and try to be more extroverted just because I know it's a better place to be.

00;16;31;26 - 00;17;03;05

Jennifer Saha

What were. Yeah. So yeah, I think that probably would surprise most people because I put myself in situations a lot that are kind of extroverted situations and I just do that because I think that pushing yourself into an uncomfortable position a lot of times is a good way to grow. So that's what I do.  

00;17;03;07 - 00;17;31;22

Davood Ghods

That's very good for you. And I could never tell if you were an introvert doing a great job in all the shows, conferences and things that you put together. I could never guess, but good for you. And that's again, why we call ourselves the human side of tech. We want to learn about our partners and our community. So where can people find you and keep tabs on what you're working on?

00;17;31;24 - 00;18;01;21

Jennifer Saha

You know, the easiest place is LinkedIn. Jennifer saw on LinkedIn, and I'm sure, Davood, that you're going to post a link to this podcast and have all your listeners link to this and find it on LinkedIn as well. But LinkedIn's a pretty good place. You can find all, all the updates to what I've got going on and links to my website and all the fun stuff that I'm working on there.

00;18;01;21 - 00;18;31;29

Jennifer Saha

But yeah, definitely involved with Tech S.A., the Technology Association of California, and also doing some great work for some awesome clients in the state of California. So I appreciate having that opportunity to talk with you, Davood, And thank you for being able to keep up with you and and what's going on with direct technology as well. Thank you.

00;18;32;01 - 00;19;06;21

Jennifer Saha

You mentioned tech K so please give us the full URL for text here. For those of listeners who are not familiar with it. Jeff Texea, The Technology Industry Association of California. It's at WW W dot tech C a dot o rg Definitely keep up with some really cool upcoming events going on there. We have a spring symposium featuring officials from the Department of Technology in the state of California, all up, most of them new appointees, honestly.

00;19;06;21 - 00;19;34;26

Jennifer Saha

So tune in. That's happening on April 28, so just a couple weeks from now and everything's free that Texea does. So we would love to have everyone tune in and I will be moderating in my uncomfortable, introverted way. I was just going to say,  

00;19;34;29 - 00;19;59;22

Davood Ghods

Yeah, we'll watch it. Everyone will watch. Hopefully this podcast out by that date. Yeah, Yeah. But I appreciate you being on this podcast. Thank you so much for joining us today, Jen, and thank you to all the listeners out there for joining us as well. We will see you in the next episode of Davood for Thought, where we will shed more light on the human side of tech.

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