Venice M. Goodwine, a member of the Senior Executive Service, serves as the Chief Information Officer of the Department of the Air Force, which includes both the U.S. Air Force and the U.S. Space Force. Mrs. Goodwine directs three key areas – enterprise information technology, data and artificial intelligence, and cybersecurity – and supports the missions of 20,000 cyber operations and support personnel worldwide with a $17 billion portfolio. She guides the Air Force’s information technology investment approach, overseeing everything from network and cloud adoption to enterprise policies, data strategy, digital modernization, IT resource management, technological innovation, and information security across the Department of the Air Force. As CIO, Mrs. Goodwine advances cybersecurity priorities and ensures compliance with the Freedom of Information Act, Privacy Act, and ethical AI practices. She connects and secures air, space, and ground capabilities to integrate warfighting and mission support functions. Additionally, she manages professional development initiatives for 12,000 IT and cyber civilian employees, covering the entire spectrum of human resources from recruitment to development.
Mrs. Goodwine has had a distinguished military career. She began active duty in 1986 as a signals intelligence analyst. She later transferred to the Air Force Reserve and was commissioned as a communications and information officer in 2003. She served at the squadron, group, wing, joint, and combined levels, ultimately retiring from military service in 2022.
Orozco will take over as Acting CIO.
Prior to becoming Deputy CIO, Orozco served as Director of Security, Special Programs Oversight, and Information Protection in the Office of the Secretary of the Air Force. She oversaw the highly sensitive Special Access Programs (SAP).
She served as an Air Force officer for 20 years, both at the active and reserve levels. In 2008, she joined the civil service in the Intelligence Directorate of the Office of the Secretary of Defense and transferred to the Department of the Air Force in 2013.
With Goodwine’s retirement on Friday, Orozco will now take over as Acting CIO. In March, Goodwine shared on LinkedIn that she intended to retire from federal service and pursue opportunities outside of government.
Goodwine wrote, “After years of facing difficult challenges, I welcome this period of rest and reflection. This is only a pause, not the end. I look forward to future opportunities and new ways to contribute.”
Odom Leads IT Programming and Financial Oversight
Cecily Odom, Senior Advisor for Enterprise IT Programming and Financial Management, directs this effort.
Odom manages financial priorities, including creating and justifying enterprise IT budget presentations, guiding resources within the Strategy, Planning, Programming, Budgeting, and Implementation system, and developing a metric and analysis framework for enterprise IT resources.
“I am eager to advance efforts that demonstrate the importance of IT spending in the Air Force and Space Force,” Odom said. “Airmen and Guardians deserve capabilities that make them effective. Taxpayers also need confidence that we use resources efficiently. Our goal is to uncover hidden IT costs and eliminate wasteful or illegal practices.”
The CIO Office Drives IT Strategy and Governance
Goodwin explained that his team ensures that all Air Force and Space Force IT stakeholders use governance processes to express their priorities. He also emphasized the importance of accessing service catalogs, which outline capabilities developed by government and industry for command-level requirements.
Goodwin said, “My office works closely with Air Force A6 and Space Force S6 to prioritize and invest in IT capabilities that benefit all Airmen and Guardians.” He added, “We rely on the Cyberspace Capability Center to design and deliver these services, just as the Defense Information Systems Agency provides support to the Chief Information Officers (CIOs) of the Department of Defense.”
In the Secretariat, the Chief Information Officer (CIO) staff provides strategy, policy, governance, oversight, and advocacy across the department’s IT enterprise. This includes the IT portfolio, mission areas, cybersecurity, data, and artificial intelligence—ensuring that investments align with the strategic objectives of the services.
The end of a distinguished chapter
“This marks the end of a meaningful journey through military service, private industry, and government leadership. I was privileged to support our mission, lead technological transformations, and stand alongside the remarkable men and women of our Air and Space Forces,” he shared in a LinkedIn post announcing his departure.
Goodwine played a key role in the department’s adoption of zero-trust cybersecurity, a Pentagon priority. His zero-trust strategy, released last year, highlighted the importance of cloud-first capabilities and the integration of identity, credential, and access management (ICAM) tools.
Goodwine, an Air Force veteran, began active service as a signals intelligence analyst in 1986 and later transferred to the Air Force Reserve in 2002, where she served until her retirement from uniformed service in 2022.
“After many years of facing complex challenges, I welcome this time of rest and reflection. Yet this is not a conclusion—only a pause. I look forward to future opportunities and new ways of serving,” she wrote.
Since August 2023, Goodwine has been guiding the Air Force as Chief Information Officer (CIO). She managed a $17 billion portfolio and fostered innovation within the Air Force. Her key efforts included establishing a 400-person Field Operating Agency, tasked with providing modern IT solutions to the Air Force’s 600,000 daily users.
A Career of Leadership and Innovation
In a conversation related to her 2025 Federal 100 Award, Goodwine said she feels fortunate to work with senior Air Force officials who are “committed to deploying cutting-edge technology in warplanes, increasing their lethality and readiness, reducing unnecessary IT costs, and improving enterprise-wide investments.”
Prior to assuming the CIO position, she held senior leadership positions such as Enterprise IT Director and Cybersecurity Officer in the Air Force, as well as CISO at the Department of Agriculture. She also held several other key government positions throughout her career
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