We are SO Here for Federal IT Efficiency

A Few Points Before We Begin:

• The points here are based on our expertise within the Federal IT landscape and are not meant to apply to the broader topic of administrative/executive government efficiency.
• In no way is this an indictment of the Federal Workforce, their admirable public service careers, or their dedication to their specific mission(s) – but rather a sober assessment of the IT landscape that has grown in support of our American system.
• The views expressed herein are apolitical, objective, and based on?direct experience in?Federal Contracting, specifically in?Software Engineering.
• Tackling?government inefficiency?for IT should be a?continuous activity through?every administration—and accompanied by?clear metrics.

The Inconvenient Truth: Government is Complicated, and so are its IT Systems (but it doesn’t have to be this way).

Today, many government systems are so outdated?that they pose serious operational concerns – which makes America less able to win for a variety of reasons. The story is most always the same: The Government contracts vendors to build a system often architected using “well established” techniques and built on “stable technology.”? Decoded, this means using approaches and technologies that have been used for the last 10 years (or more), and are, of course, nearing End of Life.?After fewer years than planned, the Government experiences the natural result of building a system this way (slow, expensive to maintain, hard to upgrade, etc.) and puts out another RFP because the vendor they are working with either does not know how to build a modern system, nor how to modernize the aging/old one. During the time required to write the RFP, put it out, evaluate responses, onboard a new vendor, and make meaningful change, these systems get older, more outdated, and perform worse and worse. To top that off, the need for the “legacy” (such a nice way of putting it) system to keep evolving to support mission needs means adding to technical debt, making the modernization task even bigger.?What does this all net out to? This approach actively works against mission achievement by slowing down pace and increasing the amount of work, ultimately slowing mission success or advancement.

The two most common arguments for not modernizing:

1)??? Mission First and IT doesn’t directly help the mission.

2)??? The need isn’t critical (yet).

So how do you break out of this cycle? That’s where we come in – through our work we have proven that building modern, effective systems accelerates the mission with higher quality and greater speed. We have also educated our customers that if something becomes critical, it’s too late and MUCH more expensive in both real cost, and opportunity cost to get it right. We bring our advanced systems engineering experience, including modern application architectures, cloud first design, DevSecOps, security-oriented development, and most importantly, deep mission understanding, to develop lightweight, componentized, and containerized systems that can be rapidly scaled and expanded to meet changing mission requirements.

Do NOT Cut Us Loose – Set Us Free

?As Elon Musk and the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) are looking to get to “the next level down” on IT systems and associated spend to identify fraud, waste, and abuse, we as Engineers, have assessed the problem and come up with a workable solution that can be rapidly deployed and have immediate impact by writing simple, elegant code using modern frameworks that can be shared/re-used across Offices, Agencies, and Departments.

Three things need to happen:

1. Mandate the Modernization of the Techno-State

• A more modernized IT infrastructure would reduce spending?on legacy systems, drastically lower acquisition costs, improve cyber-security, and create a more competitive and streamlined government.
• The Administration must formally prioritize IT modernization as a fundamental necessity for speeding up government.?Doing so will allow Federal decision makers (existing or new) to move much more rapidly toward simpler government IT, reducing spend, and increasing efficiency.

2. Leverage Existing Federal Leaders with Technical Delivery Experience

• There are MANY existing Federal workers that are experienced with modern technologies and approaches, knowledgeable of Federal laws and regulations, and that have amazing ideas of how to slash without creating chaos (which wastes time).
• ?These people, if put into positions of authority, and given support by external expertise from the likes of SpaceX, Tesla, Facebook, IvoryCloud (see what I did there?) Google, Netflix, or any other high-tech company who has the technical capability to implement their ideas, can be the most effective resource for cutting through red tape to modernize or develop modern systems and retire old ones rapidly. Find them, listen to them, empower them. It will make the job so much easier.

3. Leverage the Engineering Capability You Already Have

• Most agencies have the capability they need to clean up the excess, but the very people who know how to solve the problems are handcuffed to old operational models weighed down by bureaucratic complexity.
• Highly experienced small businesses have skilled software engineers that have?deep, hard earned knowledge?of how and why government systems operate, expansive technical expertise because they are always experimenting with cutting edge tech, AND SIMULTANEOUSLY, see clear paths to making the systems they work on better, faster, and more efficient.

While the desire for the Administration to do this is great, its success will be entirely about HOW it is done.?At present, the resources to really succeed are not only available, in most cases they are engaged.?As it pertains to only the IT landscape within the government, IvoryCloud’s 15 years of experience understanding and thriving in these dynamics has allowed us to find and deploy strategies to work through or around these dynamics. We are excited to use them and get this work done. All we need is a mandate, air-cover of an official policy, and the Administration setting us free to do our jobs.?We are here for it, always have been, and are ready to get to work. LFG!!