AGA TOPICS Newsletter

CGFM Profile: Certification Helps IT Professional See the Big Picture

Norman Adkins hadn’t worked for the National Institutes of Health for long before he started looking around for a way to learn more about managing finances within the government environment.

Adkins, 25, is Business Operations Specialist at the Division of Enterprise and Custom Applications at the NIH’s Center for Information Technology. “Basically, I’m responsible for financial management duties of an IT division at the NIH,” he said. The division develops, manages and customizes software applications, and charges user fees for those and other services. “It’s a lot like the private sector, but without the profit motive,” Adkins said.

He came from the private sector where the Veterans Health Administration was one of his biggest clients. While that experience gave him a good background on government financial requirements, it wasn’t enough.

Adkins said he wanted a broader base of knowledge — to learn about financial statements, the auditing process, performance reporting and more — and to grow professionally. An online search of course offerings by Management Concepts led him to a description of the CGFM Training Series, which looked like the perfect combination.

Mitch Laine, an AGA Past National President and the former Deputy Chief Financial Officer at the U.S. Department of Education, taught all three courses. “It takes a special instructor to teach a semester’s worth of courses in six days,” Adkins said, adding that he benefited from the active participation and the real-life examples that complemented the course work.

Adkins’ initial plan was to attend the three courses, which were paid for by his employer, without taking the next step of sitting for the three examinations. However, he was encouraged to obtain a new certification to add to his Project Management Professional credential. Adkins passed all three exams in November. “You don’t want to underestimate any of the tests,” he said. “They were a challenge.”

Adkins said that as a Financial Manager, he’s doing more than just managing resources, he’s providing services to Project Managers. He makes it his responsibility to understand the programs so he can tailor services accordingly. “This certification provides me with the ability to better understand the constraints they work under,” he said. Project Managers often request data from Adkins, who said he can provide the information with more context now that he has a better understanding of the government environment.

Renee Edwards, Chief of the Custom Applications Branch, said Adkins’ “big picture” perspective is one of the benefits of certification. Adkins interacts with managers throughout the entire life cycle of their projects to ensure costs are accurate, she said. “I consider him to be a stakeholder in the portfolio of projects the division manages.”

Edwards said that by encouraging Adkins to pursue the CGFM, she hoped he would gain a better understanding of the terminology used by the Project Managers while enhancing his own skills. A wider range of knowledge and skills fits with the branch’s strategic plan, which emphasizes improved project management and is a focus of the Office of Management and Budget.

Adkins said he is proud to be recognized as an expert in government financial management. “It’s a complicated, broad field — and I have a ways to go to learn — but the peers that I support can trust that they can rely on my advice.”