James Tunnessen

Jim Tunnessen is the Chief Information Officer and Chief Artificial Intelligence Officer for the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA), where he leads the Office of Information & Technology Management overseeing application development, cybersecurity, infrastructure, enterprise architecture, governance, IT support services, shared services, privacy, operational security, continuity of operations, and artificial intelligence. With over 15 years of experience in federal IT and digital media, he brings a wealth of expertise and insights to support the NEA's mission and strategic goals.

Before joining the NEA in July 2020, Tunnessen served as the Chief Information Officer and Chief Digital Officer for the Voice of America (VOA), the largest international media broadcaster in the U.S. In this role, he spearheaded the development and implementation of innovative technology solutions and products, such as mobile applications, drones, virtual reality, and artificial intelligence, to engage with the VOA's global audience of over 270 million in 45 languages. He also led departmental and agency digital transformations as the Chief Technology Officer for the Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) where he created and co-chaired the CTO Council for the USDA overseeing technology solutions for 18 agencies with a $1+ billion technology budget and as the Chief of Digital Innovation and Development at the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), where he held the first nationwide Federal hackathon and received multiple awards for his achievements in updating the technology stack, moving to the cloud, and implementing DevOps processes.

Tunnessen is a U.S. military veteran, an MBA graduate from The George Washington University, and a member of the U.S. Senior Executive Service.