The Social Security Administration (SSA) has named Marcela Escobar-Alava as the agency’s new chief information officer, with a start date of March 4.
Escobar-Alava has spent the past three years deeply involved in technology operations at the White House as both chief of enterprise applications since May 2023, and as deputy director of technology since 2021.
The new SSA CIO also brings a wealth of private sector experience to government service, including stints as CIO at Monarch Landscape Companies, chief digital officer at the Hispanic Scholarship Fund, and divisional CIO at Sony Pictures Entertainment.
“She has a wealth of experience in successfully building highly engaged, transformative, agile, and innovative organizations with a customer-first orientation,” said SSA Commissioner Martin O’Malley in a statement. “She will make an excellent addition to our senior leadership team.”
The new appointment at SSA comes after the agency said late last year it would look for a new CIO after announcing a restructuring of its technology organization.
That effort has involved an overhaul of the agency’s Office of Systems – which had served as the main arm of SSA’s IT apparatus – to realign the agency’s IT management focus around a new Office of the CIO.
As part of that process, Sean Brune moved from his role of deputy commissioner/CIO systems to the new position of assistant deputy commissioner of operations. At the same time, Patrick Newbold was named acting CIO at the agency. He has since left SSA and is now acting deputy CIO at NASA.
