Speaking with Federal News Radio recently, former e-government administrators Karen Evans and Mark Forman called on the federal government to end legacy and redundant systems to slash IT spending.

The two agreed that Obama administration's 25-point IT reform plan is a good first step, but fully realizing IT cost-effectiveness will require the replacement of legacy systems with shared services, such as a service-oriented architecture.

"You have to shut things down. You have to turn things off. And if we don't turn things off, then we are just going to be layering things on top of it and it's going to be more complexity and more cost," Evans said on the In Depth with Francis Rose Federal News Radio program.

Both she and Forman said the government needs to deploy technology, such as SOA, in order to catch the private sector in terms of IT efficiency.

A recent report of IT managers at federal agencies also highlighted the need for legacy modernization and SOA adoption. According to the report, the federal government spends an estimated $36 billion - or almost half - of its IT budget to maintain legacy systems.