Best Practices

News and Events on Best Practices

38 posts

Am I doing it right? A checkup for agile teams

Even on the best teams, things need to be monitored and adjusted. If you are doing this for the first time, it can be even harder. In this article, I share some signals of what success looks like and what to do if you are stuck in one of the many common pitfalls. — via 18F

Mar 23, 2023

Inclusive Acquisitions

The Basics of Buying Accessible Products and Services

A discussion with members of the U.S. General Services Administration (GSA) and U.S. Access Board (USAB) on best practices for buying information and communications technology and services that can be used by anyone.

Posts by Michael Horton Posts by Megan Reed Posts by Robert Jolly Posts by Bruce Bailey Posts by Andrew Nielson

May 03, 2022 2022

The Weekly Ship: What It Is, Why Useful, and How To Create Your Own

The Weekly Ship: What It Is, Why It’s Useful, and How To Create Your Own—The weekly ship has been a staple of 18F projects for years. It is a way to engage partners, inform teammates, and reflect on our work. — via 18F

Oct 21, 2021

Navigating ATOs

Navigating ATOs—Authority to Operate (ATO) processes work differently at different federal agencies. As a technology and design consultancy inside the United States government, 18F has worked on ATOs at many of them. We are still learning and experimenting, but there are definite patterns we have seen work well across multiple agencies. — via 18F

Oct 19, 2021

Acquisition

Discovery BPA Evaluation Process: How to Operationalize this Practice

This guide provides acquisition professionals the steps and resources needed to operationalize the evaluation process developed for the Discovery BPA.

Posts by Bridget Fields Posts by Omid Ghaffari-Tabrizi Posts by Michelle McNellis Posts by Ashley Owens Posts by Rebecca Refoy

Oct 26, 2020

Have You Critiqued Your Critique Process?

DEMO Whenever I hear someone complain about the process of a design critique, I’m always a bit surprised. Blame it on the fact

Posts by Meghan Lazier

Jul 31, 2017

‘Cybersecuring’ the Internet of Things

I recently had the chance to talk with the legendary Vint Cerf, one of the founding fathers of the internet. We had a wide-ranging discussion about the past, present and future of the internet, network security and what it would take to successfully, safely and reliably merge the digital and physical worlds, a concept known

Posts by Donna Dodson

Jun 29, 2017

Four Challenges of Adopting Team Structures (And How Leaders Can Mitigate Them)

If you’re considering “going agile,” one of the critical components of such a transformation will be adopting team structures. In your current, pre-teaming state, your developers are probably working by themselves, and may be engaging directly with stakeholders. Agile will place your developers into teams. Teaming is important, as it will enable your development staff

Posts by Brian Fox

Jun 15, 2017

The Data Briefing: Design-Driven Enterprise Architecture Creating the New Federal Government Agency

It’s been a while since I’ve checked in on enterprise architecture (EA). My last in-depth work with EA was around 2011 when I was on detail to the Office of Personnel Management’s Open Government Team. The EA model I worked with was the top-down organizational design of information technology assets, data assets, and business processes.

Posts by Bill Brantley

Jun 07, 2017

Webinar Recap: Measuring Your Mobile Users

This Digital Analytics Program and MobileGov Community webinar focuses on using DAP’s analytics tools and best practices for mobile reporting.

Posts by Lisa Bari

May 15, 2017

The Data Briefing: How to Best Prepare Federal Government Datasets for Chatbots

Forbes magazine recently ran an article showcasing six handy mobile apps that were built using federal government open data. The apps range from the Alternative Fueling Station Locator to ZocDoc (a doctor locator). What I especially like about the Forbes article is that the author describes the federal government data sets behind each app. There

Posts by Bill Brantley

May 10, 2017

Cybersecurity: Protecting Manufacturing Technology and Innovation

Recently a segment on my favorite morning news program stopped me in my tracks. The young and attractive hosts (why are they always so young and attractive?) were demonstrating new appliances including a smart refrigerator. The fridge was equipped with all kinds of high-tech features including touch screen displays, a camera inside that allows you

Posts by Pat Toth

May 04, 2017

Improving Stakeholder Collaboration Can Improve Software Development Performance

It’s important for software development organizations to make it as easy as possible to enable improved stakeholder behavior. Development stakeholders can include business development representatives, product managers, and senior project managers, and they are typically carrying the weight of the organization’s mission. They are concerned about the organization’s goals, and are usually focused on ensuring

Posts by Brian Fox

Apr 17, 2017

The Life-Changing Magic of Writing Release Notes

A key part of agile development is constantly shipping new features. The team behind the Federal Election Commission’s (FEC) beta website ships new features at least once every two weeks. Sometimes the features are big, noticeable changes, such as the new home page we recently launched. And other times they’re small (a copy edit, an

Posts by Noah Manger

Jan 19, 2017

Three Small Steps You Can Take to Reboot Agile in Your Organization

This past summer, 18F held an agile workshop for the National Technical Information Service (NTIS), part of the U.S. Department of Commerce. An agency with roots going back to World War II, NTIS is facing a future that requires a strategic realignment towards open data and services. This strategic alignment will also require that NTIS

Posts by Chris Goranson Posts by Michael Torres Posts by Kristy Singletary

Oct 31, 2016

Laying the Foundation for a More Secure, Modern Government

Summary: Building on efforts to boost Federal cybersecurity & as part of National Cybersecurity Awareness Month, today we’re releasing a proposed guidance to modernize Federal IT. America’s spirit of ingenuity and entrepreneurship created the world’s most innovative economy and keeps us dominant in today’s digital age. Indeed, in 1985 about 2,000 people used the Internet;

Posts by Tony Scott

Oct 28, 2016

The Data Briefing: Help Predict the Future of Federal Government Data

In December, I plan to write two postings detailing a scenario analysis for the next ten years of the Federal government’s data technologies. Governments are on the cusp of amazing technological advances propelled by artificial intelligence, blockchain technologies, and the Internet of Things. Also, governments will face new challenges such as the recent global cyber

Posts by Bill Brantley

Oct 26, 2016

Webinar Recap: Snaps and Stripes—Sharing Public Service Stories with Snapchat

Snapchat has quickly become an incredibly effective digital storytelling medium, and content creators across multiple government agencies have adopted it as an important part of their programs.

Posts by Lisa Bari

Sep 27, 2016

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