As Techwire was first to report last fall, California is utilizing agile principles in the development and procurement of a new statewide child welfare system, eschewing the “waterfall”-based design model that has been entrenched in state government for decades.
Over the past few months, Techwire’s editors and writers have spoken to more than a dozen state officials and subject matter experts about California’s plans to switch to agile. If there’s a common theme from those conversations, it’s that the state must “start small” if it hopes to succeed.
Starting small could prove to be a challenging task, given that the Child Welfare Services-New System (CWS-NS) will be, by its very nature, one of the largest mission-critical systems used by the state and its 58 counties.
The state seems to be aware that a smaller, modular approach is important. It has divided the procurement phase of the CWS-NS project into smaller chunks by quickly releasing separate bids for an intake module and Application Program Interface (API). The hope is those modular projects will go live in a matter of months instead of the several years it typically takes a big-bang, waterfall-type project.
“It's a key premise of agile that you're going in and you have a limited scope that you're doing, and you're going deep through the process. And as you find issues it allows you to iterate and to make improvements and to do adjustments very quickly so that you apply lessons learned and you get better over time,” John Boule, director of the state’s Office of Systems Integration, said in a recent interview with Techwire.
“There are going to be issues, but that's why you have multiple feedback loops. You're always self-examining to be able to address those things, so over time it gets more and more efficient, the system gets more and more relevant, and it's always designed to meet the end users’ needs,” Boule added.
Going smaller might have other benefits. One agile expert told Techwire that these smaller contracts for CWS-NS could conceivably enable the state change out or switch developers if that’s needed. Another pointed out that one of agile’s strengths is that it allows an organization to fail quickly — and then readjust quickly — and that should reduce the chances that the state will experience a big project failure that’s insurmountable.
Meanwhile, others told Techwire that when an inexperienced organization moves into agile, it’s typically best practice to start out with a smaller project, such as a public-facing e-government application that improves the customer experience; if it fails, it’s less likely to be a big problem. One could argue, though, that California is going in the opposite direction by starting with CWS-NS, which is a huge mission-critical system.
California’s large-scale approach, though, isn’t necessarily uncommon. Experts say going “all-in” on agile can bring its own positives, such as reducing organizational resistance and cutting the transition time it takes to move from waterfall to agile. One person familiar with California state government said there’s some audacity to California using agile on such a large system, and that is commendable.
In other words, one could say California is “going big” on going small.
Read more about agile development within California state government in the next issue of Techwire magazine.
