A Function of "How"

The exact meaning of the phrase “May you live in interesting times” is disputed, but is widely believed to have originated as a Chinese curse. Whether or not the phrase actually implies a curse, we most certainly seem to be living in very interesting times!

By all accounts, 2016 was the most “abnormal” election season ever, and technology played a very disruptive part. And while we were watching the election drama unfold that would determine the leader of the executive branch of our federal government, there were some interesting events going on within government that deserve a bit more attention.

Many of us have been talking about disruptive technologies, events, and methods for several years. I have moderated many conference sessions and panels involving the notion of disruption over the years, hoping to encourage government (and industry partners) to find new and better products, new and better ways to work that can make meaningful differences in government’s ability to deliver services more effectively, efficiently. In one session in which I was a panelist, I offered that as a large state government, California has the power and the ability to shape procurements more, shape pricing more, and shape how we organized projects more. Peering over the horizon, we could see some of the concepts that are now taking shape.

We all know that change in government can be very slow to materialize, and perhaps that glacial pace is responsible for some of the surprise that we’re seeing with the current focus on agile systems development and project delivery and modular procurements. Some reactions have registered as fear; in government we are not often encouraged to take risks, and we’re not always successful at convincing decision-makers that a new way of doing something could be whole lot better than what we convinced them was good half a dozen years ago.

Be that as it may, the impetus for new ways in government appears to be growing. 

In the human services space, a small wave of federal “guidance” is suggesting to states that smaller procurements are better and organic evolution of requirements is preferred. One of the biggest sessions at the American Public Human Services Association’s Information Systems Management conference this year was California’s showcase of its move to an agile development and modular procurement approaches to its new Child Welfare system. The Feds are getting impatient with states’ efforts toward connecting systems and providing a more holistic view of a person and/or family, and they’re backing that up with technology funding parameters. And while the federal wave seems to be confined to one department at the moment (in terms of strongly worded advice), there are plenty of signals that suggest more to come.

In the health services arena, states other than California are making bold decisions to go “all in” with not developing software at all. At the Medicaid Enterprise Systems Conference this year, Nebraska announced that it is not building a new Medicaid Management Information System (MMIS); instead, the state is asking bidders to provide an MMIS that the state will use with their data. While not for the faint of heart, “renting” software as a service frees up state resources to focus on some of the bedrock technology that is sorely needed around data, security, privacy, and confidentiality.

At the south end of the state, San Diego County is wrapping up its ConnectWellSD (San Diego) project that shares data between probation, health, and human services as well as external service providers – a project that started as a traditional waterfall method and moved in-flight to an agile method of project management. As amazing as that is, the real innovation here is that ConnectWellSD is one of the first major projects demonstrating intelligent information sharing. After a decade of effort to provide a holistic view of a client, ConnectWellSD demonstrates interoperability of data at scale. While this project has been underway, several other states and counties have (finally!) initiated data sharing projects that promise big benefits in seeing the whole person/family. By seeing the entire service eligibility and consumption of those services for a person/family, governments can maximize efficiency and minimize waste, and the citizen is left with a better experience when seeking or consuming services.

That connecting systems requires collaboration is a no-brainer, and technology is certainly an enabler. Yet, collaboration in practice is much easier said than done. A recent article on the StateTech website observed that in spite of our heavy reliance on collaboration, “…59% of knowledge workers experience challenges with technology”, and 71% of millennials responding reported, “… a variety of challenges using the collaboration tools provided to them.” This could mean that we have kludgey tools and/or byzantine communications structures that inhibit collaboration

There is a LOT of work to do. Many of the facets of collaboration are not technological, and really do IMHO constitute the hardest part of change. That the Feds are invested in helping states make progress with these changes is encouraging, and those states and local governments that seize the disruption opportunity are beginning to see the intrinsic benefit of sharing data. When these pioneers can share their lessons and best practices with the rest of us, our own disruptive opportunities can begin. 

It is, by all accounts, much easier to have 20/20 vision in hindsight, and like the election, disruption may fall into a “be careful what you wish for” category, but it certainly does not have to. How you frame the message has a lot to do with how the message is received, both up and down the communications channels. The biggest conversation that we should be paying attention to is the one that is encouraging the intelligent risk of finding a better way.

Shell Culp is a Senior Advisor with Public Consulting Group, a Senior Fellow with eRepublic's Center for Digital Government, and a principal strategist with Almirante Partners.