Federal CIO Leader to Guide Scaling CORAS’s Mission-Ready Agentic AI Decision Intelligence Platform With Real-World IT Governance, Insights and Management Expertise
MCLEAN, Va., October 2, 2025 (Newswire.com)
– CORAS, the only IL5-authorized decision intelligence platform used across the Department of War (DoW, formerly the DoD), today announced that Jennifer Wendel has joined its Board of Advisors. As the former Chief Information Officer of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), Ms. Wendel oversaw a ~$7 billion IT portfolio supporting more than 83,000 personnel and drove priorities spanning cybersecurity, enterprise IT, and customer experience.
Prior to HHS, Ms. Wendel served for more than two decades at the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), culminating as Acting Deputy CIO, where she led enterprise IT management initiatives and aligned data and technology resources to mission operations. Her FBI tenure gives her uncommon, practitioner-level insight into how complex federal organizations modernize securely and at scale.
“Jennifer has sat in the chair where our federal and DoW customers sit – managing billion-dollar portfolios, hardening cyber, and turning data into operational advantage,” said Dan Naselius, President and CTO of CORAS. “Her guidance and knowledge around understanding complex federal IT systems and challenges will help our customers treat data as an asset, reduce cost, and optimize human teams with Agentic Agents and real-time decision intelligence.”
CORAS and its Agentic Agent GARY operate at IL5 and FedRAMP High in government environments including NIPR and SIPR, offering profound ROI and 50+x productivity. Agencies can acquire CORAS and GARY through GSA, NASA SEWP, SBIR Phase III, Tradewinds AI Marketplace, Carahsoft, and AWS partner channels. Learn more at www.coras.ai.
USAF and SF IT Leader’s experience driving transformational technology adoption and operational efficiency aligns with CORAS’ mission to revolutionize DoW business and decision intelligence processes with leading-edge Agentic AI Solutions
MCLEAN, Va., September 30, 2025 (Newswire.com)
– CORAS, the only IL5-authorized decision intelligence platform used across the Department of War (DoW, formerly the DoD), announced today that Venice M. Goodwine has joined its Board of Advisors. Mrs. Goodwine most recently served as Chief Information Officer for the Department of the Air Force (USAF) and Space Force (SF), where she led Enterprise IT, Data & Artificial Intelligence, and Cybersecurity directorates – overseeing a $17B portfolio enabling missions of approximately 20,000 cyber operations and support personnel. Mrs. Goodwine’s experience moving USAF forward with leading technology makes her an ideal advisor for CORAS as it expands leading edge Agentic AI solutions and contracts within the DoW.
“As the former Chief Information Officer of the Department of the Air Force, I understand the vital role that timely, trusted, secure and actionable information plays in safeguarding our nation,” Mrs. Goodwine said. “CORAS is at the forefront of delivering decision intelligence solutions that turn complex data into strategic advantage – accelerating mission outcomes, strengthening readiness, and enhancing investment decisions across the national security enterprise. I am honored to join the CORAS Board of Advisors and look forward to contributing to its mission of equipping our warfighters with the tools they need to make faster, smarter, and more secure decisions.”
A recognized technology and cybersecurity leader, Mrs. Goodwine previously served as the Director of Enterprise IT in the Air Force CIO office and as Chief Information Security Officer at the U.S. Department of Agriculture, where she managed roughly $208M in annual cybersecurity expenditures. She announced her retirement from federal service earlier this year after more than three decades in government.
“It is an honor to have Venice Goodwine as part of our broader agentic decision intelligence visionaries to help CORAS expand our collaboration with customers, data optimization, and mission vigilance,” said Moe Jafari, CEO of CORAS.
Dan Naselius, President and CTO of CORAS, said, “Venice’s track record integrating cyber, data, and enterprise IT at global scale aligns directly with CORAS’s mission to deliver secure, real-time AI decision intelligence advantage. Her insights and real-world experience will help CORAS deliver ROI and 10-50x productivity today, expanding and accelerating readiness outcomes for the Warfighter.“
CORAS and its Agentic Agent GARY operate at IL5 and FedRAMP High in government environments, including NIPR and SIPR, offering profound ROI and 50+x productivity. Agencies can acquire CORAS and GARY through GSA, NASA SEWP, SBIR Phase III, Tradewinds AI Marketplace, Carahsoft, and AWS partner channels. Learn more at www.coras.ai.
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Eighty-eight percent of CIOs say their role is becoming more digital and is increasingly focused on innovation, which begs the question: How is education, a notoriously slow industry, going to keep pace with digital transformation?
During a session at FETC 2024, Marlon Shears, CIO of IDEA Public Schools, offered a realistic view of what CIOs across all sectors are prioritizing and how digital transformation is driving changes and investments in education.
Defining digital transformation, though, isn’t quite as easy as it sounds, because digital transformation will look different for every organization. But while there’s no set definition, in general, such transformation can be defined as the integration of digital technology into all areas of a business, creating fundamental change around how business operates and how the business delivers value to stakeholders, Shears said.
But to drive this transformation, CIOs must challenge the status quo and must be comfortable with failure, Shears said.
“You must challenge, ‘We don’t do that here,’” he said. “You have to become the leader who challenges that. You may not always be liked, but you have to build a culture where you can lean in and trust one another to take on that digital transformation. It’s not an overnight success story.”
In pursuit of transformation, CIOs must be comfortable with failure. “This is one of the hardest ones,” Shears added. “No one’s perfect when you’re trying to change, integrate, and do different things to bring value into your organization. If we’re not comfortable failing, if the organization isn’t comfortable with us failing, are we really doing digital transformation? You have to push that to your superintendent.”
CIOs across other industries are prioritizing AI—80 percent are spending their time on AI and machine learning, up from 55 percent in 2023, according to new research on CIOs. Seventy percent are focused on cybersecurity, and 61 percent are focused on data privacy and compliance.
Challenges include staffing and skills shortages, changing business conditions, addressing security threats, and budgetary constraints/demonstrating ROI.
CIOs are looking for their tech budgets to increase in 2024, citing needs for security improvements, to keep pace with rising costs of tech and services, investments in emerging technologies such as AI, investments in new skills and talent, and modernizing or migrating infrastructure.
“Digital transformation isn’t just computers–it’s how to get your organization to the next level,” he said. “This is something we’ve all started, but we also need to know where we want to go. It means bold choices.”
Laura Ascione is the Editorial Director at eSchool Media. She is a graduate of the University of Maryland’s prestigious Philip Merrill College of Journalism.
As Citizens implements AI, the bank is also training its team through its engineering academy, which focuses on building internal capabilities to support the bank’s technology transformation, he said.
In an interview with Bank Automation News, Ruttledge discussed AI use cases, developments in technology and training techniques throughout the bank. What follows is an edited version of the conversation:
Bank Automation News: What AI trend in finance are you focused on?
Michael Ruttledge: Generative AI has the potential for great efficiencies and countless ways to improve overall customer experience. This is an exciting time for the industry. We have an opportunity to truly reset the productivity curve for the bank.
AI has the potential to help us learn about our customers at an accelerated pace and constantly update, improve and adapt priorities as conditions change over time. Citizens has a number of AI use cases that we are actively exploring, and those use cases are to benefit customer engagement, customer and colleague insights, and streamlined operations.
Additional implementation includes safety and security, legal and compliance, fairness and bias, and performance and accuracy. We are working to assess where existing capabilities can be leveraged and built out.
BAN: What other projects are you working on this year?
MR: For the remainder of 2023 and as we look ahead, we will accelerate to deliver differentiating, market-leading capabilities beyond our next-gen technology strategy. Citizens is focused on three areas:
Transformation of our business applications stage, building a modernized platform fully on cloud;
Innovation by including emerging technology such as AI, quantum computing, banking-as-a-service, microservices containerization, real-time data streamlining, next-gen connectivity and sustainable technologies; and
Continuous optimization via automation and digitization.
Through 2026, we will position Citizens’ technology to have leading capabilities to drive continued business value.
BAN: How do you approach new technology with your team?
MR: To prioritize innovation to the extent we do, we need not only financial, but top talent resources to dedicate to it. At Citizens, we are constantly looking to the new digital frontiers, and we prioritize a healthy organization and view each employee as a whole person beyond the figurative four walls of our office.
Our talent is what keeps us future-ready, cultivating our strategic partnerships, exploring new technology and ensuring we and our customers are protecting against any risk.
The key is a strong focus on engineering skills, diversity, early career talent and retention. Since 2019, we have hired more than 550 full-stack engineers, reduced contractors and have increased our organization’s diversity and internal mobility.
BAN: What technology are you monitoring closely?
MR: Like everyone else, we are monitoring generative AI closely. We think it has great potential, especially when it comes to improving the customer experience.
Banks can introduce future-proof technologies and processes to keep up with customers by empowering their CIOs and IT teams to help build deeper relationships with customers and focus the shift from transactions to relationships through automation and automating tasks and transactions. This would allow branch colleagues and relationship managers to have the time to build relationships and serve in a more advisory manner.
It goes without saying that a digital transformation and the customer experience should be always at the forefront. At Citizens, we focus on using data to improve our customers’ experience and help them achieve their financial goals and reach their potential.
BAN: How do you lead your team?
MR: I strive to lead by example while at the same time empowering my team to make decisions and motivating them to reach their full potential. I also hold my team accountable as it not only helps them to grow in their roles but also as leaders.
Our Employee Value Plan (EVP) is an example of my leadership in action — I have empowered my leadership team to help deliver and drive this program for our colleagues. Through EVP, we have improved our hiring model, provided training opportunities and focused on diversity and early career talent.
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