New Hampshire CIO Denis Goulet receives NASCIO’s 10 Year Service Award

Denis Goulet, New Hampshire’s longtime chief information officer, on Wednesday received the National Association of State Chief Information Officers’ 10 Year Service award.

He received the award at NASCIO’s midyear conference in Philadelphia, joining a “prestigious yet small group” of state tech officials to have served in their roles for a decade, reads a NASCIO news release.

New Hampshire Gov. Maggie Hassan appointed Goulet commissioner of the state’s Department of Information Technology in 2015. Gov. Chris Sununu reappointed him in 2019, and he has continued to serve under Gov. Kelly Ayotte since January — making him one of the few CIOs to serve under three governors. 

Goulet most recently led New Hampshire through a project to revamp its digital government offerings — overseeing the redesign of websites, apps and other online services. The project focused on citizen services and digital government, including a unified web presence for 80 state websites. It also included a business portal website that helps new businesses find permits and other documents.

He worked with public health and local government officials to deliver more state services online during the COVID-19 pandemic, and crafted New Hampshire’s first new IT strategic plan in more than a decade.

He also made New Hampshire one of the early states to begin exploring generative AI. In 2023, Goulet said the state was using AI to improve its human resources functions, such as by writing effective job descriptions for unfilled positions. 

Goulet has also served as a director, vice president and president of NASCIO. Before joining state government, Goulet worked nearly 30 years in the private sector, in various industries.

“One of the things that’s helped me is that I listen a lot, try to be thoughtful about what’s going on,” Goulet told StateScoop on Tuesday. “I think that’s helped me understand the situation of the environment. That transition from the private sector and public sector, there’s a lot of opportunities to make mistakes, and so I avoided some of those — at least the ones that get you fired, right?

“I didn’t realize how challenges of doing this job would be so fulfilling. So I think the fact that I enjoy what I’m doing probably helps. It shows that I like what I’m doing, shows I care. And I think that probably rubs off on the people that are judging my performance and deciding how to keep me in my position or not.”