The award is a significant achievement for Freedom, which has operated primarily on a subcontract basis, supporting larger prime government contractors. The company has established a reputation for providing exceptional customer support with a focus on the IT requirements of program management, engineering, and communications.

“We are pleased that GSA has recognized the hard work and exceptional results our team has accomplished by awarding Freedom this new contract vehicle,” said Freedom President, Mark Ogles. “Coincidentally, we received this award on our eighth anniversary of operation. We believe this new GSA contract, our stellar workforce, and our commitment to customer service have us well positioned to continue the support of our existing clients while expanding our services to other federal agencies.”

Freedom Information Systems, Inc. is a leading provider of information management services, products, and training with offices in Crystal City, Va., Madison, Ala., and technical staff located at federal facilities in Alabama, Ohio, Texas, Virginia and the District of Columbia. Freedom provides enterprise architecture, application and database development, enterprise information management, and strategic communication services for federal agencies.

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Freedom currently offers training for two Atlassian products:

• Confluence Wiki: A Web-based tool that allows employees to collaborate on document development, meeting support, action tracking, and more.
• Atlassian JIRA: A software development tool that allows programmers to track and resolve software bugs through a user-administrator workflow process.

Atlassian Confluence and JIRA trainings are available immediately, with other Atlassian tool trainings to follow later this summer. Whether a company is new to Atlassian products or has been using them for years, Freedom trainings help organizations to maximize their investments and improve efficiency. The trainings include:

• Interactive training, including hands-on exercises;
• Clear and concise explanations of complicated concepts;
• Learn best practices and little-known shortcuts from instructors with real-world experience;
• Ample Q&A sessions to answer your specific questions;
• Printed workshop materials including handouts, worksheets, and more.

To sign up for an onsite or Web-based Atlassian training workshop, contact Freedom at Training@FreedomIS.com.

Freedom is an Atlassian Partner. Through this relationship, Atlassian authorizes Freedom to offer this training, but does not specifically endorse it.

Freedom Information Systems, Inc. is a woman-owned, small business with offices in Madison, Ala. and Arlington, Va., and technical staff located at federal facilities in Alabama, Florida, Ohio, Virginia and the District of Columbia. Freedom provides enterprise architecture, application development, enterprise information management and strategic communication services and support for programs and projects in federal agencies.

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The move elevates Freedom’s D.C. presence and facilitates planned growth for the company. “We also needed more office space for our employees to work away from client sites on proposals, training, and other corporate work,” said Freedom President Mark Ogles.  The new office provides Freedom team members with dedicated office space, a proposal “war-room,” a conference room, and reception area.

The new location is a 20-minute commute by Metro from the federal agencies Freedom supports in the District of Columbia.  Freedom clients and employees can access the office via a short walk from the Metro through the underground corridors of Crystal City.

Freedom’s new executive office address is:

Crystal Plaza One
2001 Jefferson Davis Highway, Suite 302
Arlington, VA 22202

Freedom Information Systems, Inc. is a woman-owned, small business with offices in Madison, Ala. and Arlington, Va., and technical staff located at federal facilities in Alabama, Florida, Ohio, Virginia and the District of Columbia. Freedom provides enterprise architecture, application development, enterprise information management and strategic communication services and support for programs and projects in federal agencies.

The Freedom team’s impressive fundraising efforts for this event included Freedom corporate and individual

The Browne family: Jason, Ashleigh Leigh Ann, MacKenzie, and Jackson

sponsorships. Two team members have a special connection with Big Brothers Big Sisters – one as a “Little” and one as a “Big.”

Freedom Information Manager Jason Browne, who works at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC), was a Little from the age of nine, and still maintains a relationship with his Big. “I was an only child with a very busy working mother,” said Browne. “The time I spent with my Big Brother was invaluable. I’m glad to be able to support BBBS and teach my children about this program that meant so much to me growing up.”

Freedom MSFC IT Services Program Manager Sonnie Hereford was a Big Brother for several years to one fortunate Little. “After he outgrew the program, I joined the Board of Directors, where I’ve now been for about 16 years,” said Hereford, who helps organize fundraisers and generate interest in the North Alabama chapter. “It’s a very trying time, not only for Big Brothers Big Sisters, but for all non-profits. Donations are down, government support is reduced, and in the current economy, people who might normally volunteer are forced to choose paying positions over volunteer efforts.”

Big Brothers Big Sisters is a non-profit organization that matches at-risk children with mature, responsible adults. The purpose is to provide long-term, one-to-one mentoring relationships that transform the lives of children. This critical fundraiser helps the organization maintain recruitment, screening, matching, training, and continual support of the “Big” and “Little” – who sometimes come from very different worlds.

Freedom Information Systems, Inc. is a woman-owned, small business with offices in Madison, Ala. and Alexandria, Va., and technical staff located at federal facilities in Alabama, Florida, Ohio, Virginia and the District of Columbia. Freedom provides enterprise architecture, application development, enterprise information management and strategic communication services and support for programs and projects in federal agencies.

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November 12, 2010 — Republished from Celebrate Huntsville

This is the first in a new series of posts that shine a spotlight on local Huntsville businesses that are helping to drive Huntsville’s economy.

For more than 13 years, Mark Ogles worked as a data management integration engineer for a payload integrator contracted to NASA in Huntsville. It was during this time that he constructed advanced databases designed to handle data coming from the space shuttle and commands going to the shuttle. In fact, some of the databases he created are still in use by NASA today, more than 14 years later.

In 2001, Mark had an opportunity to bid on a project to build a database that performed technical and program management analysis/tracking for NASA. After building this system, he realized that there was an opportunity to help NASA focus on the information in these types of management systems. The struggle is to ensure the confidentiality, integrity, and availability of the information, Information assurance would enable their clients to make better decisions based on more accurate and more complete information. After all, you can build these extensive systems, but unless you know how to move information through them, they have little value.

Mark and his wife Andrea founded Freedom Information Systems in October of 2003 when he bid on a competitive subcontract with Marshall Space Flight Center and won. The contract began in December, working on the next generation launch technology (NGLT) program.

In January, President George W. Bush terminated the orbital space plane and NGLT programs in favor of the Constellation Program, which aimed to develop new shuttle technology and send astronauts back to the moon. The NGLT manager was selected to move to Washington, D.C. to lead the new moon landing program and asked Mark and Freedom Information Systems to move with him.

Freedom Information Systems has continued to grow and prosper ever since. The company has maintained its presence in the Huntsville area, where their headquarters, human resources, IT and other essential departments are housed. Mark and Andrea have chosen to stay in Washington, D.C., to drive new business development and expansion of the company’s client base to agencies outside of the aerospace market. Since its founding, the company has grown and expanded its core competencies. The company originally focused on enterprise information management and helping agencies control access to information, organize information and organize workflow going into and out of an organization. They have since added software development, program management, strategic communications, content management and enterprise architecture services to the corporate portfolio.

The company now has the capacity to set up an agency’s infrastructure for information sharing, build software tools to help the flow of information, analyze and interpret the information and disseminate it to stake-holders. They can essentially move, interpret and disseminate all information for a program or organization.

Freedom Information Systems’ location in Huntsville is integral to the company’s success. With NASA and the Missile Defense Agency as current clients, the company’s presence in the city helps them keep their relationship strong and grow their business. They also are excited by the potential impact that BRAC will have in the area, bringing a larger Army presence to the area and increasing the potential for additional new business in the future.

However, Mark doesn’t see the company’s offerings as exclusive to the aerospace market. Information assurance is something that all agencies struggle with, regardless of whether they are defense agencies, intelligence agencies or civilian agencies. In fact, Freedom just teamed with Whitney Bradley & Brown to win a contract with the Department of Homeland Security expanding Freedoms support into the DHS enterprise. It’s for this reason that Mark continues to reside in the D.C. region and works tirelessly to grown the company’s business to support other government agencies.

In fact, Freedom Information Systems will soon open a new office in Crystal City, a neighborhood of Arlington, Va. The new office will be located right next to the Pentagon and just a stone’s throw from the nation’s capital.

Freedom Information Systems has seen impressive growth despite constant change. The first project that they won a contract on was terminated by the Bush Administration after a month. The Constellation Program was discontinued by the Obama Administration. Regardless, every time change occurs and doors close, new opportunities arise. It’s for this reason that Freedom is yet another successful Huntsville company growing despite the down economy.

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Madison, Ala., October 19, 2010 — Freedom Information Systems announced today that Pamela Valentine has accepted the company’s Deputy Director of Human Resources position.

Valentine hails from Scotland, where she earned a bachelor’s in Human Resources Management from the University of Stirling, situated near the William Wallace Monument.

With a decade of human resources experience in Europe and the United States supporting a global bank and a newspaper group, Valentine brings a wealth of experience and an international perspective to Freedom’s small venture endeavors.

“This is an exciting opportunity-people are my business, and our talented individuals set Freedom apart from our competitors. I very much appreciate the opportunity to support Freedom as the company grows.”

In a small business that places great value on work-life balance, Valentine put the company’s benefits to the test earlier this year after giving birth to twins Matt and Jack. She continues to retain an accomplished workforce and helps attract new talent as Freedom grows.

“Her unwavering work ethic exemplifies Freedom’s values,” said Freedom President, Mark Ogles. “This promotion is a testament of our dedication to support Freedom’s workforce, helping employees to maintain a healthy and productive work-life balance.”

Freedom Information Systems, Inc. is a woman-owned, small business with offices in Madison, Ala. and Alexandria, Va., and technical staff located at federal facilities in Alabama, Florida, Ohio, Virginia and the District of Columbia. Freedom provides enterprise architecture, application development, enterprise information management and strategic communication services and support for programs and projects in federal agencies.

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July 9, 2010 – Madison, Ala., — Freedom Information Systems, Inc. was one of 10 organizations selected from hundreds to present at the second annual Atlassian Summit in San Francisco, Calif. The summit is a two-day event consisting of lectures, demonstrations and presentations related to Atlassian products.

Freedom was selected based on a case study of its Atlassian Confluence wiki implementation supporting one of NASA’s vehicle design reviews. Freedom Information Manager Nick Smith, who led the wiki implementation and wrote the case study, was selected as the first presenter in the Collaboration & Projects track on June 10.

“I was very excited to speak at the Summit,” exclaimed Smith, Freedom’s unofficial wiki authority. “I really wanted the Atlassian community to know about the awesome work Freedom does for its clients using Atlassian products.”

Collaborative technologies, including wikis and blogs, are becoming more common in the engineering organizations Freedom supports. By helping clients adapt and put this new technology to work, Freedom is bridging a gap between traditional engineering practices and contemporary Web 2.0 technologies.

Smith’s presentation, “Confluence at NASA: Where No Wiki Has Gone Before” was the story behind the winning case study, which explained the challenges, solutions and success of a wiki implementation that conquered seemingly insurmountable logistical details for a design review spanning 10 NASA centers.

The presentation also explained Freedom’s “Top Ten Things We Know About Wikis,” a series of lessons learned from years of successful wiki administration. The top seven “things” were posted, one each week, for seven weeks prior to the summit, on Freedom’s blog (blogs.freedomis.com). The top three were revealed at the summit.

Freedom President Mark Ogles attended the summit. “Our clients have given us a great opportunity to improve their design review process with our collaborative services and we’re excited that Atlassian gave us an opportunity to showcase the successful results,” he said. “We’re proud of the way Nick represented all of our Information Managers who are working daily with our clients to make their processes more efficient.”

For more information about collaborative technology implementation and training, follow Freedom at blogs.freedomis.com and twitter.com/freedomis.

Watch Nick Smith’s presentation at the Atlassian Summit here:

www.atlassian.com/summit/2010/presentations/general-sessions/atlassian-summit-2010-keynote-1.jsp

Freedom Information Systems, Inc. is a woman-owned, small business with offices in Madison, Ala. and Alexandria, Va., and technical staff located at federal facilities in Alabama, Florida, Ohio, Virginia and the District of Columbia. Freedom provides enterprise architecture, application development, enterprise information management and strategic communication services and support for programs and projects in federal agencies.

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