Good morning, good afternoon or good evening, I hope this finds you well. For those who are reading this, that I have not had the pleasure of meeting, please allow me to quickly introduce myself. My name is Nick Sturgeon and I am the Chair for the Capabilities and Services Working Group (WG2) for the ISAO Standards Organization. I chair WG2 alongside my co-chair Jill Fraser. I have been leading this working group since February of this year and have been involved with the ISAO Standards Organization since mid-2016.
In March of this year, the Capabilities and Services Working Group was tasked with authoring ISAO SO 200-1: Foundational Services and Capabilities, currently out for public comment on the ISAO SO’s website. The goal in producing this document was to expand on those services and capabilities that were specifically outlined as foundational in Appendix A of ISAO 100-2: Guidelines for Establishing an Information Sharing and Analysis Organization (ISAO). I do want to highlight this point, WG2 nor the ISAO SO leadership unilaterally decided or arbitrarily picked these capabilities and services as the foundational services and capabilities. It was those individuals from industry, government or academia who comprised the ISAO Creation Working Group (WG1) who determined those particular services and capabilities as foundational.
Going into the development of this document, I wanted to make sure we (WG2) produced a document that truly helped those wanting to start an ISAO or those who have just started one. It is our hope that this document will serve as a guide for those new and emerging ISAOs, giving them a better understanding to what the fundamental services and capabilities are. In the end we want to give them a solid starting point to build out their ISAO. In my own opinion, I do think that WG2 meet that goal. I know the Request for Comment period is ending today, November 30th, and I look forward to reviewing those comments.
In “Part 2” of this blog post, I will discuss my point of view of how ISAO 200-1: Foundational Services and Capabilities fits in to the ISAO Certification discussion and my opinions of and on ISAO Certifications.
