Arvada’s Craig Poley named Top 10 Chief Information O cer

As far as work goes, Craig Poley is Arvada’s “chief nerd.”

Actually, he’s Arvada’s Chief Information O cer, or CIO. ough, as Poley said himself, the position makes him the “chief nerd” of Arvada.

As CIO, Poley is “in charge of all the IT stu , and that covers a lot of ground.”

From city servers to public safety radios to tra c lights, he has a hand in helping out.

Poley was named a Top 10 City Government CIO by Government CIO Outlook, a magazine focusing on the role of information technology in government. According to a press release from the City of Arvada, the Top 10 City Government CIO “recognizes CIOs who have played an important role in understanding and implementing technological and operational processes seamlessly in their cities.”

For Poley, the title re ects both his own work and the work of the people around him.

“You know, it’s really not about me, it’s about the team,” said Poley. “I’m receiving support from the city changes and to push these things forward. So you know, I am a name that represents a much bigger group of people that are really the ones that have done all of the effort to make this thing real.”

Poley became Arvada’s CIO in May of 2020. His favorite part of the work he does is solving the unsolvable problems.

“On my whiteboard written up on the wall, I have all the different initiatives that we have identified and are working on or are planning to work on. And I keep track, I mean, it’s just really simple,” said Poley. “But I joke that these are the 37 chess games that I’m playing simultaneously all in my head.”

Though his favorite part of being a CIO is problem-solving, Poley sees himself as, above all else, a storyteller.

“I think that good CIOs are really able to slip into the technical speak and understand what are the technical drivers and prerequisites and all the things that go into a technical solution, but also able to communicate that clearly in the business world,” Poley said.

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