Editor’s Note: Other members of the xmlCoP who played key roles in DRM 2.0 included Joe Chiusano and Ken Sall.

December 29, 2005

Dear Mr. Owen Ambur,

Congratulations! The U.S. Office of Management and Budget (OMB) has released the Federal Enterprise Architecture (FEA) Data Reference Model (DRM) Final Version 2.0 at: http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/egov/a-5-drm.html. As Co-Chairs of the Architecture and Infrastructure Committee (AIC), we thank you for your service to the Data Reference Model (DRM) Interagency Team which produced this excellent framework document. Today, due to you and your colleagues’ efforts, we have a federal government enterprise architecture blueprint to enable information sharing and reuse nationally.

In our opinion, the DRM open collaborative effort serves as a best practice for future AIC efforts. Specifically, the DRM team effort validated three key success factors: a strong partnership between the AIC and the Federal Enterprise Architecture Program Management Office (FEA PMO); a strategic “line of sight” into the work influenced by Chief Information Officers
through designated agency representatives; and the importance of one department or agency to lead and facilitate the process.

As a vital member of the DRM team, representing the XML Community of Practice, you forged the necessary conceptual agreements crucial to advancing mission-related information-sharing challenges faced by all Agencies. Through unity of purpose around this national challenge, the DRM team turned myriad agency and experience differences into a source for our collective strength. Thank you especially for facilitating contributions from the XML community toward the implementation pilots of the DRM.

The steadfastness of your team in responding to this formidable challenge and the open, collaborative organizing process employed, clearly demonstrated the multiplicative benefits available from government-wide improvement communities, when the right mix of purpose, openness, and structure is in place. We commend you for demonstrating the efficacy of this collaborative organizing practice around Communities of Interest, now recognized as integral to the implementation and evolution of DRM v2.0. By maintaining team records of resources, meeting notes, conversations, and drafts in an accessible and transparent manner, you also demonstrated exemplary practice of knowledge management.

The DRM v2.0 will assist Federal agencies in supporting the President’s Management Agenda through the development of their enterprise architecture business driven transition strategies and advancement of appropriate information sharing priorities. Thank you for your hard work, determination, and dedication to the creation of the DRM v2.0.

Sincerely,
Kimberly T. Nelson
Assistant Administrator and Chief Information Officer, Environmental Protection Agency
Co-Chair, Architecture and Infrastructure Committee of the CIO Council

Reynolds Cahoon
Senior Advisor to the Archivist on Electronic Records, National Archives and Records Administration
Co-Chair, Architecture and Infrastructure Committee of the CIO Council