Story by American Army Sgt. 1st Class Michael O'Brien, JFC Naples Public Affairs
LAGO PATRIA, Italy – JFC Naples and the NATO Command, Control, and Communications Board (NC3B) hosted this year’s third NATO Information Management Advisory Group (NIMAG), from October 16 to 18 here in the unit’s headquarters building.
In 2009, the North Atlantic Council approved the establishment of the NATO Information Management Authority (NIMA) to implement the NATO Information Management Policy (NIMP) within NATO civil and military bodies.
The NIMA comprises a NATO IM Executive Body (NIMEX), a NATO IM Advisory Group (NIMAG) and a NATO HQ C3 Staff (NHQC3S) support element.
The NATO Information Management Advisory Group (NIMAG) is the centre of expertise for IM in NATO and provides specialist advice to the NATO Information Management Executive Body (NIMEX).
The NIMAG coordinates information and knowledge management at the technical and operational level.
More than 50 participants from NATO Nations, and NATO Civil and Military Bodies participated in the meetings.
Romanian Army Brigadier General Remus Bondor, JFCNP Director of Management provided opening remarks, highlighting JFCNP progress to achieve the goals included in the NATO IM Strategic Plan.
“New things are old things happening to new people,” said Bondor. “As information and knowledge managers, we should enable new things to new people in the easiest way.”
This iteration of the NIMAG discussed the future NATO IM Strategic Plan, the new NATO Knowledge Management Culture, Master Data Management, NATO Enterprise templates, and the Information Technology Modernization (ITM) “Polaris” Program.
Edward Bergstedt from the US Army Mission Command Centre of Excellence provided a keynote session on the interoperability gap and knowledge management training.
“To achieve true Interoperability between our NATO Allies it is critical that we cultivate a climate that accepts change, founded on trust and based on sound KM principles, policies and processes,” said Bergstedt.
The mission of the NIMA is to support the achievement of the three key objectives for IM as defined in the NIMP.
The first is to support the achievement of Information Superiority primarily within an information sharing networked environment; the second is to support the effective and efficient use of information resources in the conduct of the NATO mission; and the third is to support the identification and preservation of information of permanent value to NATO.