Agile Contracting in the Federal Government

Many federal agencies are contracting for agile teams, but how has contracting changed to become more agile in execution. The look at the move to using agile principles and processes within this highly regulated and constrained area has resulted in significant improvements in the contracting world as well as changes in the way that procurement happens within the federal government. This talk will look at the changes that I have been part of making within the contracting and procurement process at USCIS and DHS.

Learning Objectives

• Understanding how to apply agile principles to procurement and contracting.
• Applying agile principles to an area outside of, but related to development - how to change support organizations

Joshua Seckel

Chief Solution Architect – Agile/DevOps @ Sevatec

Joshua Seckel is Sevatec’s Chief Solution Architect for Agile and DevOps. Joshua drives the adoption of business, technical, and management agility both internally and at client sites. He previously led development teams with Agile and DevOps processes to respond quickly to the changing needs of small startup customers, vendors, and partners. Joshua has worked across all areas of development throughout his career to implement and execute Agile programs within various Government agencies including the State of Washington, Air Force, Marine Corps and several Department of Homeland Security (DHS) components. He developed the first Program Accountability and Risk Management (PARM) approved Agile tailoring plan within DHS.

Joshua joined U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) in 2013 to drive USCIS to the forefront of modern development practices within the federal Government. Most recently, his role was the Chief of the Applied Technology Division (ATD) of USCIS, DHS. ATD has a prominent role in the ongoing USCIS transformation to Agile and Continuous Integration/Continuous Delivery (CI/CD) DevOps through Enterprise Architecture, Quality Assurance, Independent Testing, Agile Coaching, Change Control, and Strategic Vendor Management. He started a Federal Agile Birds of a Feather to bring Agile practitioners across the Federal Government together on a regular basis to discuss modern development.

In addition to his BS in computer science from American University, Joshua holds an MBA with a focus in Technology Innovation Management from Pacific Lutheran University. Joshua is an active participant in the Agile community, speaking regularly, including twice at both Agile 2015 and Agile 2016. Joshua is an ICAgile Expert Agile Coach and is active in mentoring other coaches to achieve this as well as serving on certification boards. Joshua is also a strategic advisor for the Government Technology & Services Coalition (GTSC).

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