Executive Team

Frank Ono

Frank Ono founded IFG in 2007 and serves as the company’s President. Throughout his career, Frank has led high-profile IT engagements with the State of California and local government agencies and departments. He exemplifies IFG’s commitment to helping make government digital services more efficient for departments and more effective for citizens.

Frank’s leads the IFG Executive Team with his technical and business expertise – entrusting his team with strategic direction, partnerships, client management, and growth and opportunity development. He further promotes the company culture or community involvement and client collaboration to continue making IFG a great place to work. Frank enables IFG to bring together the principles, processes, people, and tools necessary to promote adaptive mindsets and methodologies for our clients’ and projects’ success.

Frank and his wife are supporters of the foster care community having served as foster parents for over 7 years. Their passion has been to provide hope to their foster children by showing them love, support, and stability during their stay. This passion is at the core of the IFG commitment statement, and Frank is driven to help support our public-sector partners to consistently deliver the highest value for the missions they serve.

Frank is a Project Management Institute Certified Project Management Professional and Certified Information Systems Security Professional. He is also a devoted grandparent and avid competition bass fisherman (thus, the company name.)

Gretchen Williams

Gretchen Williams joined IFG in 2018 as Managing Director, responsible for business development within California State and local government. In her role as Director of Business Development, she partners with executives, managers, and project teams to advance initiatives and achieve programmatic goals. Investing in organizations, and their people, is a passion for Gretchen. The leadership, communication, and collaboration skills she brings to each partnership opportunity and client engagement supports an increase in their organizational success. Gretchen invests both internal and external to IFG through facilitation of a variety of Innovation initiatives and leadership development practices.

Gretchen has a wealth of experience in State and Local Government. Most of her state carrier was spent within the California Health and Human Services Agency (CHHSA) as the CHHSA Deputy Agency Information Officer. Her leadership fostered the collaborative development of the first Agency-level Strategic Plan, which casted a common vision for CHHS. Her development and implementation of agencywide enterprise governance, project portfolio management, enterprise architecture, and security practices supported multiple departments in achieving their defined strategic, programmatic, and technology modernization goals. Gretchen’s extensive experience and understanding of government programs and organizational needs are furthering IFG’s commitment to help make government services more efficient for departments and more effective for citizens.

Just before joining IFG, Gretchen served as Deputy Director of the CA Department of Technology’s Office of Professional Development where she created and led multiple leadership academies, mentorship programs, and training services for state and local government. Her background also includes Chief Information Officer and Strategic Planning Manager at the Office of Systems Integration and Customer Engagement Manager at the Health and Welfare Data Center – All positions in which her strong collaboration and communication skills were key to her success. Gretchen is Certified in Dare to Lead, a Lean Six Sigma White Belt, and a Certified Prosci Change Management Practitioner. In her free time, she loves to work in the shop with her husband rehabbing vintage furniture, raising chickens, and riding around her property on the tractor with her grandchildren.

Dawn Lewis

Dawn Lewis joined IFG in 2016 and is the Director of Capture, Marketing & Project Support responsible for capture management and marketing teams including brand strategy and management, procurement response development, and post-award contract transitions. Her extensive experience with procurement strategies, analysis, communication, compliance, and client education allows IFG to effectively compete in the marketplace.

Dawn also manages strategic partnerships for IFG’s Technology Solutions division, partnered with industry-leading manufacturers to help clients procure known and trusted technology solutions and products through IFG’s California Software Licensing Program and other state and local government contracts.

Her 27 years of diverse experience in strategic technology marketing, business development, and proposal and contract management includes 14 years leading proposal management efforts for large, multi-year, state and local government procurements, yielding multiple contract awards of up to $100 million. Dawn has her bachelor’s degree in Marketing from Miami University and is a Six Sigma Green Belt. She is also a devoted mother to two amazing young women and enjoys fine wines.

Michael Shirk

Michael Shirk joined IFG in 2017 as Director of Professional Resource Management & Strategic Partnerships. He leads the growing IFG Recruiting team and partners with and guides his clients on project resource planning strategies to maintain the highest level of quality without compromising on recruiting standards or delivery. Michael’s dynamic relationship-based approach and extensive referral network combined with his in-depth ability to understand both client and project requirements has yielded many successful, long-term client partnerships and loyal, top-quality talent placements.

Michael’s over 22 years of talent acquisition, resource placement, business development, and management experience include project resource management, succession planning, performance management, and national placement of IT professionals for large public sector and commercial projects.

His government program expertise includes extensive understanding of and talent placement for many of the most visible state projects in California and nationwide. Michael is dedicated to family, health/fitness, and coaching high school baseball. He is also an active member in his church.

Thomas Weitzel

With over 25 years of experience in the IT industry, Thomas, Director of Managed Services, has a long track record of implementing complex technical projects and managing teams. At IFG, Thomas fosters a positive, supportive environment and productive team while nurturing and growing relationships with existing customers, vendors, and partners. He oversees staff development to ensure the team’s capabilities align with Managed Services opportunities, develops and implements business strategies and best practices, and cultivates business development opportunities. In addition, Thomas also manages IFG’s hardware, software, services, and organizational process assets repositories.

Thomas got his start building PCs and providing Technical Support before becoming a Technical Services Manager at NTT Data’s Healthcare Solutions Division where he was responsible for the technical implementation and support of a nationwide electronic medical record application suite and associated hosting. As a Senior Consultant, Thomas went on to provide services for the California Mental Health Services Oversight and Accountability Commission, California Department of Toxic Substances, California Department of Justice, and Special District Risk Management Association (SDRMA) with IFG, and directly to the California Community Colleges Chancellor’s Office. He has participated in a wide range of roles including project management, statistical data analysis, and full-stack development for strategic initiatives. In 2021, Thomas rejoined IFG as the Agile Project Manager for SDRMA’s product development and support and was quicky promoted to Director of the IFG Hosting and Managed Services division.

Thomas and his family enjoy working their garden and small farm, which includes cows, goats, and chickens.

Lori Hayword

Lori Hayword joined IFG in 2022 as Director of Finance and Operations. Lori manages the day-to-day operations and provides oversight on the financial goals of the company.

With over 20 years of experience supporting development programs and functional processes, she has a proven ability to manage risk, analyze financials, and improve and document policies. Lori’s strong analytical, business partnering, critical thinking, leadership and problem-solving skills are valuable to IFG’s growing internal Finance and Operations teams.

Lori holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Business Administration, Accountancy from the University of California, Sacramento and is a Certified Scrum Master.

Lori and her husband were high school sweethearts, have one son who currently lives in Reno and a black lab named Oliver. In her spare time, she enjoys photography and writing poetry.