Suburban tech leaders don’t always get the same opportunities as their big-city counterparts. But that’s not the case for Dublin, Ohio, CIO Doug McCollough.
He’s a public-sector veteran, having held tech roles in four agencies in Ohio state government. When Richmond, Va., called looking for its first IT director, McCollough made the move, and spent nearly 18 months there before becoming Dublin, Ohio’s inaugural CIO. “It has been a really great experience doing IT for a municipality,” McCollough said. “I feel like I’ve gotten a wider experience base because I’ve been in these different environments, and I actually love working for cities.”
Dublin borders Columbus, which has made headlines for leading smart city efforts, but McCollough’s work in the suburb is anything but second fiddle. He’s a big proponent of innovation and disruptive tech, and isn’t afraid to take chances, a passion that shows in Dublin’s work on the 33 Smart Mobility Corridor, a partnership with the city of Marysville, Union County, DriveOhio and Smart Columbus, and a 35-mile proving ground for connected and autonomous vehicle technology. Through this initiative and others, the work McCollough and his team are doing is impacting not just the city of Dublin or even the metro Columbus area, but the state of Ohio as a whole. For McCollough, driving emerging efforts in this area is important. “If cities do not lead, then the state is not going to sit around waiting for us,” he said, and he’s taken that leadership to heart, working around Ohio with an eye toward not just building smart cities, but also establishing the first intelligent state.
McCollough is also invested in creating a more diverse tech workforce in Dublin, and his excitement for the work shows when he describes the shift he’s seen in his years in public-sector IT: The CIO is no longer just the guy managing desktops and updating firewalls, but is now forging ahead as a true government leader.
