1% Better Podcast: Tarek Tomes

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1% Better: Tarek Tomes, CIO State of Minnesota
Quick Links

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Key Takeaways

• Diverse Backgrounds Foster Innovation: Tarek’s unique upbringing, being a “military brat” with a German mother and living in various locations, including Germany and several states in the US, has provided him with a rich understanding of diverse cultures and perspectives. This background seems to have played a significant role in shaping his approach to innovation and leadership within the realm of IT and public service.
• Transition from Private to Public Sector: Tarek’s career journey from being fascinated with technology and programming at a young age to working in iconic companies like Control Data Systems and British Telecom, and finally transitioning into public service, highlights the path of applying private sector strategies and a competitive mindset to public sector challenges. This trajectory underlines the importance of leveraging technology and innovation to enhance government services and operations.
• Focus on Customer Experience in Government Services: Under Tarek’s leadership, there’s a strong emphasis on improving customer experience within government services. This approach is part of a broader initiative to make government operations more efficient and responsive to the needs of the public. By adopting a mindset of continuous improvement and being open to learning from other cities and countries, Tarek is driving a shift towards a more service-oriented public sector.
• Adaptability and Continuous Learning: Tarek’s narrative stresses the importance of being adaptable and continuously learning, especially in the face of rapid technological changes. His involvement in initiatives around generative AI and other emerging technologies showcases a proactive stance towards adopting innovative solutions to enhance public services, while also being mindful of the potential risks and ethical considerations.
• Personal Development and Hard Work: Lastly, Tarek’s advice towards the end of the podcast, emphasizing hard work during one’s early years and the pursuit of a career with conviction, reflects his personal philosophy towards achieving success. He advocates for a proactive approach in career development, urging individuals to actively seek out their passions and work diligently towards realizing their goals.

1% Better Episode 7 Transcript

[00:00:01.060] – Craig
Hello, I’m Craig Thielen and this is the 1% Better Podcast. Today I’m speaking with Tarek Tomes calling in from the great state of Minnesota. Tarek serves as the Commissioner of Minnesota IT Services and the State of Minnesota‘s Chief Information Officer. Tarek and I have known each other for more than 10 years, and he has been a frequent guest at some of our executive roundtables, including one just last month on Business Agility, and hopefully, we will go deeper on that in today’s session. Welcome to 1% Better, Tarek.

[00:00:31.500] – Tarek
Thank you, Craig – Huge fan of the podcast and an even bigger fan of the title of the podcast.

[00:00:37.450] – Craig
That’s great. I know you have a lot of your belief system and how you operate, I think, fits into that mold. So why don’t we start by walking us through your background and your life story… Where did you grow up, your education, your early career, and this progression that led you into public service?

[00:00:56.650] – Tarek
Excellent. Well, my life story, if you will, is a little bit complicated, or maybe not complicated. I absolutely love the way that I grew up, but it’s a little bit non-traditional. I was born in Germany and what we refer to as a ‘military brat’, meaning my father was a career Army service member. And as such, we moved around quite a bit. Generally stayed in one spot for about three years and then moved. And for the most part, from my youth through my graduation from high school, I alternated three years in Germany and three years somewhere on the East Coast. I ended up going to a number of different high schools… Went to high school in Georgia and in North Carolina and ultimately graduated from a Department of Army School in Stuttgart, Germany. And it was really a terrific way to grow up. You meet a lot of different people, a lot of different cultures. My mom is German, so certainly a lot of familiarity with Germany. But you learn a lot about different states. I spent a little bit of time living in Massachusetts. And so from the Upper East Coast to the Lower East Coast, I really wouldn’t trade that for the world.

I ended up going to college at the University of Maryland in Europe. They have a campus, or at that time had a campus there for children that were affiliated with the Department of Defense or any of the military branches and graduated from the University of Maryland there. As it relates to career, interesting or maybe not so interesting, in some ways, I may owe my career choice to a somewhat lucky break like most kids. When I grew up, maybe dating myself a little bit, there weren’t a lot of electronic games, if you will, but it was the advent of electronic games. Atari, right? Yeah, there was one game in particular. It was a Dr. J vs. Larry Bird game that I fell in love with. And at some point, I think I was 10 or 11, got a Commodore 64, and I played this game on this Commodore 64. But I also taught myself how to program in Basic. And so when I went to college, initially did not major in Computer Science. I initially majored in Business Management, and then I switched major to Psychology, but at some point switched to Computer Science, and that has been my career for really my entire working life.

[00:03:17.930] – Craig
Well, that is an interesting background. The first thing I wanted to go back to Germany, not a lot of people, particularly in the Midwest, grew up in Europe or grew up in Germany. So just go back to your earliest recollections of living in Germany, and how would you just compare that and contrast that with the U.S. for those of us that would not know what that feels like?

[00:03:37.250] – Tarek
Of course, when you’re born into it, you’re not aware of the differences, if you will. And growing up on military bases, you really have one foot in an American world, if you will, even though it’s in Germany. And then when you leave a military base, then you’re immersed in this German culture that I happen to be born with. Probably one of my more vivid recollections, though I grew up in a time when Germany was not one when there was a West Germany and an East Germany. And at times, we lived relatively close to that border and it left a pretty distinct impression on you. You could see the border guards on a monthly basis. You hear or read about stories of people attempting to escape. And living there when that wall literally came down, it certainly was a moment that I’ll never forget. But growing up in this divided country where people speak the exact same language, part of a major city which is now the capital of Berlin, was actually in East Germany. So if you travel to West Berlin, you had to travel through East Germany. And so there was this mystique and this mysteriousness always about living there, and you exercised evacuation plans. It was just a different day in age growing up, but it felt like it was normal. And then the times that we lived in the United States, of course, we lived on military installations, Fort Bragg, Fort Stewart, Fort Devens in Massachusetts. The military really is an amazing melting pot that is a really close-knit community that is a really unique way to grow up, if you will.

[00:05:10.570] – Craig
Fascinating just what you’ve seen and lived through that. Of course, now there’s conflict in the East. Just fascinating. We could talk the whole podcast just about that. But let’s jump into a little bit more into your career after that. We met when you were the Chief Information and Innovation Officer at the City of St. Paul. One of the things I recall is that you had very much a business mindset and an innovation mindset… always looking outside, not just what are we doing in city government, but what are other cities doing and even what are other countries doing? I’m just curious, and I asked you then, why do you have all this curiosity? He goes, We’re really competing for constituents. People have a choice. They can live here. They can live in other communities, and we want to provide the best service. We don’t have the monopoly on ideas. That was different. I had a chance to work for other public sectors, different mindset, different philosophy that you had. Where did you get that from? You worked in the private sector before that… How has that transitioned from private sector to public sector? Then where did you get that, I’m going to bring this mindset into the City of St. Paul.

[00:06:17.470] – Tarek
I think a little bit of it probably dates back to the way that I grew up and a little bit something in my personal life that was core to me. Like many people, I had a chance to play athletics a little bit even after high school. And the competitive aspect of playing high-level athletics really is one that is at its core has a model that is really tied to the title of your podcast. If you’re not getting 1% better in those competitive spaces, you simply can’t play. And so it becomes a part of your culture that every day you’re looking for a way to get a little bit better. You’re looking for a way to gain some type of competitive advantage as a means of just a building opportunity to play, whether you’re doing something physical and increasing your speed and agility or strength. And so that athletic background really is always tied to how I view my career work. Started working in Minnesota at really an iconic company, I think, in computing history, Control Data Systems. At one point in time, employed 80,000 people in the Twin Cities and subsequently worked for British Telecom. But in those spaces, you’re competing constantly. You’re competing with other vendors, you’re competing with other technology organizations. you’re competing to sell the services that you have. And that competition means that you have to continue to evolve and you have to continue to get better because certainly, your competitors are.

[00:07:44.840] – Craig
And globally, I mean, even back… Control Data… I actually worked for Control Data for a couple of years. And even in the 80s and 90s, they were competing globally before a lot of companies were even thinking globally.

[00:07:57.380] – Tarek
Absolutely, 100%. And certainly working at those types of organizations, I started working for a large technology organization in Germany, you’re looking for competitive advantages that you may find across the globe somewhere else that some organization is implementing or is really successful with. When I ultimately move to the private sector, maybe your motivation certainly isn’t profit-based, but your motivation as a technology has similar intrinsic values and opportunities. If you can use technology and innovation to make a traffic stop safer and save someone’s life, or if you can create an opportunity where someone gets a building permit faster, or an inspection happens more effectively, maybe you prevent a house fire. And so those intrinsic motivations of the services that government provides, they’re just not necessarily connected all the time with revenue. And so as a technologist, that competitive fire to continue to try to find ways that other cities, other municipalities, other governments, maybe it’s in Australia, or maybe it’s in Germany, or maybe it’s in California, are using technology to better our world, reduce homelessness, to make sure that people are connected with jobs, to make sure that people are connected with health care, I think is something that is just core to me a little bit from this competitive aspect. I just can’t sit still, Craig.

[00:09:21.900] – Craig
It’s just natural. You want to always get better and compete. Well, let’s talk about what you’re doing now. City and state governments, or any government agency for that matter, are not traditionally known as change-oriented environments, agile, or even customer-focused when you go back. But that’s really what you’re doing at the State of Minnesota right now. You’re driving a significant amount of change. It’s very constituent or customer-focused. It’s very, let’s be more nimble, again, very business oriented, has that feel to it. So tell us about the initiatives that you’re driving and the approach that you’re taking in a very large scale… City of St. Paul is one level, but this is 23 executive agencies across the entire state of Minnesota.

[00:10:06.390] – Tarek
Love that question. I’ll answer that. But I’m going to maybe start in the beginning of that, Craig, if you don’t mind. I’m going to push back a little bit on the narrative of government. I do think government has that narrative. When I first started working for government, I had a friend of mine who was a vice president at British Telecom that called me at some point and said, hey, technology here is a mess. Can we just draft you for two years? It coincided with a time that I was eager to get off airplanes. My kids were small. I had two preconceived notions at the time about government, and I’d never spent any time with government. One notion was that there was no talent, and the second notion was there was no money. Both of those could not have been more wrong. I think the thought that government is not customer service oriented or that it is not change-oriented, I actually think is incorrect. I think if you were to look at public sector workers across the gamut, whether they’re in a direct care and treatment facility or they’re working on homelessness, there are a lot of public sector workers, career employees that are unbelievably customer service oriented. And of course, we know that there are opportunities to raise. And I’ll get to that because it is a core focus of ours.

The other piece about not being change oriented is an interesting one. And I don’t necessarily totally disagree with the narrative. In our case in the State of Minnesota, and this is really across government, across the United States. And in Minnesota, every two years when a governor’s budget is approved, it literally comes with thousands of policy changes that have to be implemented as a result of the budget being approved. Maybe, to make up bad examples, maybe a speed limit changes from one mileage to another mileage, or the eligibility to receive a benefit change in time. So literally, thousands of policy changes that have to be enacted. And I would say that that actually contradicts that government is not change-oriented. Where government is not change-oriented, it has a hard time processing these new changes and moving forward existing service changes. And so there is a lot of truth to the change-oriented, but I think a little bit of it is caused by the fact that every two years there are thousands of new changes that become the new, new news, the new priority of the day.

One of the things that is really important for us in the state of Minnesota, and I consider myself unbelievably lucky that I work for a governor, that he’s a former teacher, a former football coach that is incredibly relatable, that really understands everyday things because he literally has walked in those shoes. And he’s a governor that really believes strongly in the power of technology to bring about change and is very people-oriented. And one of the things that is a core part of his policy agenda over the next four years, which I think is very unique for a governor, normally policy agendas are really big, climate, homelessness, children, and families. In our case, one of the governor’s one Minnesota policy initiatives is an intense focus on customer experience. And to meet and help support that customer experience objective, we really have a number of things going, certainly proliferating around and building out our human center design capacity and our ability to connect with people that use our services as the core feedback loop or the core way to improve those services.

We have a really large effort ongoing to move from a project methodology to a product methodology. And I think that one is going to be really impactful for government services where you’re not implementing things and then ending, but you’re really productizing those core services you provide the citizens. You’re creating persistent teams of business-side and technologists that are human center and put customers at the center of what they’re doing that are funded with small incremental service-related changes. And so the product approach is incredibly important. We have a huge modernization effort that is encapsulated in what we refer to as our modernization playbook. And so really excited about so much of the work that is going on now and will continue to go on.

[00:14:26.290] – Craig
Yeah, you made a great point about the amount of change I love that, giving a different or maybe more accurate narrative in that maybe it’s not that it’s not change-oriented, maybe there’s constant change, like you said in this, every two years as we’re changing all these things. And then on top of that, you are changing the foundational things, like how do we work together? How do we plan together? This is this project to product. It’s a vastly different way of working and teaming together than some of the human-centered design, design thinking. There’s so much change. Maybe there’s almost like, Hey, this change will pass, too. But let me go into that a little bit. We can talk about technology change and process change, and this is just stuff that, like you said, happens every day, every quarter, every year. But at the end of the day, it’s about change of culture, about how we think about doing the work, how we work together, even across agencies. I know we had a conversation once about it used to be a very siloed, and now it’s we’re really thinking one Minnesota, and how do we benefit from each other. So a lot of people talk about culture change, but how do you do it? The old saying, culture change is like the weather. A lot of people like to talk about it, but they don’t like to actually do it or stand in it. How do you think about that?

[00:15:37.550] – Tarek
One of the things that we have done and implemented over the last four years, the culture that we are looking to instill and install, I guess for that matter, it’s branded. We have a name for it and we refer to it as the Connected Culture. The Connected Culture is really all about the relationships we have with each other. As technologists, it’s about the relationships we have with the business partners and the agencies. It’s about the relationship we have with Minnesotans and businesses that use services. One of the things that was always really important as we talked about this culture was that it’s going to be okay for everyone to have a slightly different definition of what the Connected Culture means for them and to embrace these different definitions. We just had a huge survey that we got back related to employee engagement, and you can really feel the effort of our Connected Culture throughout this. And so we’re very, very intentional about leading with culture over everything. And certainly, in athletics, I don’t remember exactly how the saying goes, but there’s a long-held view that culture will defeat talent every day of the week, and it is so true. And we see that play out all the time. One of the things that is a part of this culture, though, is encouraging people not to be afraid to fail. And in government and public sector sometimes gets really visible. And it’s okay to not have things perfect. It’s okay to take some chances. It’s okay to innovate, take smaller steps, prototype, rapid prototype, move forward, and encouraging that experimentation and making sure that you’re listening to all layers of your organization has been really important.

[00:17:13.230] – Craig
Yeah, I think even what you just said there, again, a lot of organizations, they want change, they drive it, they have all these programs. But then giving people the room to experiment and fail and learn and get better with new things is easier said than done. So that’s a big change in itself. Let’s shift to you for a minute here, Tarek. The world’s changing really rapidly. That’s no surprise to anybody. Faster than ever, and it’s never going to be this slow. It’s just going to keep going faster and faster. You and I have had a couple of conversations about generative AI as an example. It’s a technology that’s one of the biggest opportunities in the world to really drive change at an exponential level, but it’s also a big threat. How do you balance your role in running a massive organization and complex organization and all the meetings and just day-to-day operations? But also you have to understand things like generative AI and keep up to speed and learn yourself. So how do you find that balance?

[00:18:12.050] – Tarek
That’s a good question. I’m not exactly sure there’s a balance to it. I think a little bit of that comes from one of the things that I’ve always believed and I do think is absolutely crucial for any technology organization, but probably any organization of any kind is, you have to stake some bets on emerging things, and they’re not all going to be right. But you have to have a little bit of intuition and guesswork related to a variety of technologies that may be emerging and really dive in and really try to prepare yourself as best as possible. In our case, as it relates to generative AI, and we’ve had different incarnations of AI, Machine Learning related initiatives, and opportunities the way we do teacher licensing and otherwise, for many years already. We’ve actually spun up a team that really includes a cross-section of technologists, legal folks, procurement folks, members of our equity office that are really deeply engaged and gathering as much information as possible. Just personally, it is an area that interests me tremendously. I’m really lucky that I have connections to people like you and many of the CIOs from across the Twin Cities.

I was just recently at the Mayo Clinic with their CIO just diving into their perspectives and their views. As it relates to generative AI and large language models, we really want to be on the forefront. We want to put the necessary guardrails and training wheels in place, if you will, but we really feel that it could be a force multiplier, that it can really be an agent that can help us, if done responsibly, deliver government services more effectively and more efficiently and maybe even return the things that people are expecting in a faster way. And so we really do think that there is large potential, but it comes a little bit with self-interest as well. I certainly it’s an area that is easy to spend late nights trying to read. There are a variety of podcasts and videos that caution about some of the negative consequences. And to be honest, I ask our team to watch every one of those because if you’re going to be on the progressive side, you have to do that respectfully and make sure that you’re really looking at the negative consequences as well.

[00:20:23.080] – Craig
Yeah, it’s interesting that you mentioned that. So one of the podcasts out there that’s one of the big ones is a gentleman by the name of Lex Fridman, and he’s an AI scientist himself, but he interviewed some of the most widely known people on the planet, Elon Musk… Zuckerberg. He just did one with Benjamin Netanyahu, Prime Minister of Israel. The interesting thing is they were having the same conversation that we’re having. That’s one of the things that I find very interesting about AI, is that everyone on the planet is thinking about it and having to address it. No other technology or no other thing, really, that we’ve ever seen before, whether you are a leader of a country or leader of a department, or you’re just trying to do your job better and you’re thinking, what if it replaces me? Even today, I heard on the news the Screen Actors Guild is going to strike, and one of their top concerns is AI and replacing them. It literally is touching every fabric of society and everyone’s trying to figure out and do it. So that’s just an interesting dynamic that I don’t think we’ve seen before.

[00:21:20.970] – Tarek
One thing, Craig, if I can add, it’s interesting to this, again, dating myself just a little bit. I remember almost like it was yesterday, my first moments on the internet. I vividly remember my thoughts. I remember the conversations I had with people. And this was a time when you jumped on the internet and there were no browsers. There was essentially no effective way to find things. Certainly, that younger version of myself underestimated. There were these online services, Prodigy and AOL, and these other things that had graphical interfaces. That younger version definitely underestimated where things were going. I think I resolved since then to never underestimate an emerging technology unless you see that it’s literally not going that way. I don’t remember how long this must be 20 years ago when Segway scooters before they came out, there was this cloaking mystery about the Segway changing the way… and that never really obviously happened. But that has always stuck with me a little bit. That first experience with the internet, and I view this AI inflection point that we’re in now much the same way in terms of just don’t underestimate the potential here.

[00:22:37.460] – Craig
That’s a great connection point and observation. And even you can think of anything bigger than the internet and the Worldwide Web because of the threat of can it take out humanity or can it overcome even what we’re doing on the planet. Two more questions. One is, this is a topic I think anyone who’s leading, whether they’re leading a small team or an organization or a large organization, has this feeling that the world is moving fast, too fast. My team or my organization is not moving fast enough. I’m sure you feel that every day. If you had to guide or provide just some practical 1% Better advice, what would you give to people? Say, how do you meet that challenge? What are some techniques or how do you think about doing that in a team or organization?

[00:23:20.410] – Tarek
I certainly feel that way, so I can absolutely sympathize. I think one of the things in an organization that’s really important is that there are synergies between the senior-most leadership, leaders of various divisions, departments, and then the people that work within those areas as it relates to where do you want to be from that innovation, that speed perspective. And so if there’s a dramatic mismatch, organization wants to go really slow and you’re interested in going really fast, that’s always going to be a little bit difficult. I think the speed, frequently, to be honest, is just associated with risk and how much risk an organization is willing to tolerate versus the potential return that may come about on the other side.

I had a chance to participate in a worldwide study related to autonomous vehicles years ago, and the question really centered around at what point in time is society ready for autonomous vehicles? Is it when autonomous vehicles are safer and can save lives, or is it when autonomous vehicles will never kill a human being? Really, there’s a big gap between those, and not the least of that gap is probably saving 500 to 750,000 lives a year, depending on where you are. Now, everything doesn’t have to be quite that dramatic, but I think that is really literally where you are as it relates to the speed that you’re going is how much risk and what is the upside and benefit to that increased risk? And is that benefit commensurate with the risk that you’re willing to incur? One of the things that we do certainly is I really encourage, and it has a formal name, I don’t remember it because I didn’t realize that I was actually doing it. I really subscribe to this theory of chaos. And I had a chance to listen to a keynote where a person went through this whole theory and my former CISO tapped me on the shoulder and said, hey, that’s you. But there is a little bit of chaos that I kick up where I just say, hey, let’s just try this. Teams already and I just say, well, that’s fine. Let’s just try that. So I think you can move your teams to varying speeds just by the way you enable and encourage them to take on different opportunities.

[00:25:31.020] – Craig
Yeah, that’s great stuff. If anyone wants to immerse themselves in Chaos Theory, go to India and get in a taxi and drive through one of the big cities, and you will absolutely be astounded by how traffic happens and how flow happens with seemingly no structure whatsoever.

[00:25:48.010] – Tarek
And it works.

[00:25:48.970] – Craig
And it works. It’s amazing, but it somehow works. So last question on 1% Better is going back to this moment when you were first on the internet… if you could go back to that person or go back to go back to this young you coming out of college, knowing what you know now, what would you give your sofa advice to how to just live your life and how to get this idea of 1% Better?

[00:26:11.090] – Tarek
Well, I answer first in a non-career way, if I could. One of the things that I did not learn until a little bit later in life is there are some things that you want to probably, maybe if you can, which is not necessarily always possible, but if you can spend a little bit more money on it. One of those being a mattress and another of those being shoes because you’re always going to be in one or you’re going to be in the other. When you’re young, you just think, hey, I’m just going to… I don’t need it. But when I got a little bit older and all of a sudden the way you sleep just changes because for the first time in your life, you have a decent mattress. And I did not know that there was a difference. So I would tell my 18-year-old self, don’t spend years 18 to 30 on a bad mattress because the small difference in price is definitely not worth it.

I think the thing, and I learned and I’ve seen this through my kids that have graduated now and are off and working already is, as that 18-year-old person that is full of energy and full of initiative, really grind, really, really, really work hard during those years when you have energy. Don’t let your career come find you. Sometimes that will happen. You’re not going to know what you want to do, but really sit down and spend however much time you need to until you figure out, that’s what I want to do, and then go become that, and then go do that. But I think spending those years when you’re young… My three kids, I’m really lucky. They are off to terrific starts, but they each have worked really hard in those young years. But I think as they get older, they’re going to really understand why and how that has opened doors of self-reflection and learning and other things, not financial things, but just created opportunities to experience and learn different things. And so the biggest advice would be 18 to 24, don’t spend it just hanging out. You’re going to still be able to hang out plenty but really use those years to really work and grow.

[00:28:05.260] – Craig
That’s great advice. Hard to replace hard work, right? There’s nothing like it, whether it be in sports or whether it be in work or anything that you’re trying to change. You have to sweat through it and work through it, so that’s great advice. Well, Tarek, it’s been a pleasure. I’m grateful for our friendship and it’s been an honor to work with you as well in some of the work that we’re doing with you at the state, and just couldn’t be happier to be part of what you’re driving, your vision and also being a constituent of the state of Minnesota. I think it’s a great thing. These are just great things that you’re driving and that we’re all going to benefit from. So thank you so much for your time.

[00:28:39.610] – Tarek
Thank you Craig and likewise and look forward to continuing to collaborate and learning from you. I love this podcast and look forward to the next episodes.