winning technical-challenge based procurements
TRANSCRIPT
www.stsiinc.com
WINNING TECHNICAL CHALLENGESAugust 17, 2017Ben Morris
www.stsiinc.com
CONTENTS
2
PART 1: The ProcurementHow the DHS FLASH procurement was executed
PART 2: Our Approach
How Team STSI successfully competed and won a slot
www.stsiinc.com
PART 1How the DHS FLASH procurement was executed
www.stsiinc.com
WHAT’S DIFFERENT?
TRADITIONALRFP FLASHRFIprocessaskingforcapabilitystatements,writtencommentsandfeedback
3 minutevideosubmissionsbyvendorsfor‘advisorydown-select’
12+ monthstocompete&awardlarge(~$1.5b)IDIQ
6months fromindustrydayannouncementtoIDIQaward
Evaluationbasedoncomprehensivewrittentechnicalandmanagementapproach,possiblyoralpresentations
Technical evaluationbased on3pagesofapproachplusa4-hourin-persontechnicalchallengewith30minuteoralpresentationcomponent
4
www.stsiinc.com
OVERALL TIMELINE
5
MAY JUN SEPAUGJUL OCT NOV2016
May 26: FBO announcement with draft content and video instructions
June 29: Industry day with 300 registered attendees
July 1: Video submissions due
Videos were 3 minutes, addressing 3 questions, with an emphasis on low-production
July 19: Draft RFP Package
August 3: Final RFP
August 22: RFP Submissions
DraftComments&VideoPrep
WriteProposal
PrepareforChallenge
TechChallenge
Evaluation
November 28:Award
Announcement
www.stsiinc.com
CHALLENGE LOGISTICS
6
Setup30min
MVPDevelopment4hrs
Prep30min
Orals30min
Q&A30min
LOCATION/ROOMTeamisgivenamedium/largeconferenceroominagovernmentsite,andisabletocustomizeit(movefurniture,putstuffonwalls,etc.)
TEAMUpto10participantsfromthecontractorteam.
GOVERNMENTPOCTherewereacoupleoflogisticsPoCs (everythingfromrunningthescheduletobathroomescorts).OnegovernmentemployeeplayedtheroleofProductOwner/User,andwastheonlysubstantiveinteractionwiththeteam.
TECHTeamschooseanymodernsoftwaredevelopmentstackandtools.
GOVERNMENTEVALUATORSSeveralmoregovernmentevaluatorswereabletowalkin/outoftheroomandmonitorprogress,strictlyasobservers.Severalwerepartoftheoralspresentation.
VIDEOTheentirechallengewasrecordedforevaluatorreference.
PROCESSAtchallengestart,thegovernmentPoC providesabacklogtotheteam.Theteamworkswiththeproductownertocreateaminimumviableproduct(MVP)fora“peerkudos”applicationwithin4hours.Evaluationisonagileprocess,engineeringquality,andsolutiondesign.
www.stsiinc.com
PART 2Team STSI’s approach to successfully compete and win a FLASH award
www.stsiinc.com
FORMING A TEAM
8
540
ü ROBUST MANAGEMENTü CMMI LEVEL 3ü JAVA & OSS DEV.ü AWS & DEVOPS
ü UX & PROTOTYPINGü AWS & DEVOPS ü API STRATEGY & DESIGNü ELASTICSEARCH EXPERTISE
ü UX/CONTENT STRATEGYü WEB/MOBILE DESIGNü DASHBOARD DESIGNü USABILITY TESTING
ü DHS EXPERIENCEü SW DEVELOPMENTü TESTING ü STAFFING REACH
PSI
prady
We settled on a team that combined forward-leaning skills (agile, open source) and shared values (delivery focus, startup attitude). The team was small-business centric, with one smaller large business that brings some scale and some DHS experience.
www.stsiinc.com
WIN STRATEGY
9
We paid close attention to the evaluation criteria to craft our tech challenge approach.
www.stsiinc.com
PREPARING FOR THE CHALLENGE
§ Aug 5-15:– A few initial approach calls
§ Aug 15-Sep 7– 1 sprint planning meeting
– 1 walkthrough dry run and tech work session
– 2 partial rehearsals (focus on parts)
– 2 real 4-hour rehearsals
§ Sep 9: Challenge Day!
10
www.stsiinc.com
PREPARING FOR THE CHALLENGE, CONT.
11
Exampleartifactsfromrehearsalsessions.
www.stsiinc.com
EXECUTING THE CHALLENGE
We focused on a forward-leaning approach:
§ Team: 10 people – Scrum Master, Business Analysis, UX, Dev, DevOps– Initially less, but 4 hours presents some constraints
§ Methodology: Scrumban– Incorporated business value and lean startup concepts– Drove UX via design sprint framework
§ Stack: Node/express, Angular.js, PostgreSQL– Ended up w/ very high coverage & quality scores
§ CI/tools: Github, Travis, CodeClimate, Runscope§ Deployment: AWS EC2, RDS, S3/CloudFront
12
www.stsiinc.com
PROCESS “BOOK SHELF”
BUSINESS VALUE FOCUSUser needs are important to designing a feature, but a rigorous focus on business value helps determine which features to build.Guiding Text: The Art of Business Value, Schwartz
MEANINGFUL MVPA Minimum Viable Product (MVP) has a specific purpose: to gather validated learning about the product via testable hypotheses.Guiding Text: The Lean Startup, Ries
ENGAGING DESIGN PROCESSExercises from Google Ventures’ 1-week “design sprint” process help us zero in on critical features within the challenge timeframe.Guiding Text: Sprint, Knapp, Zeratsky, Kowitz
DIGITAL SERVICES APPROACHOur approach follows the playbook (see appendix for mapping)Guiding Text: Digital Services Playbook, The U.S. Digital Service
13
The following sources heavily shaped our process:
www.stsiinc.com
WINNING!
14
Team STSI was honored to be one of only 11 teams selected from 114 proposals.
www.stsiinc.com
ADDITIONAL RESOURCES
Open Letter to DHS https://github.com/DHS-FLASH-Awardees/Open-Letter
“What the FLASH?” – STSI PoV bloghttps://pov.stsiinc.com/
15
@bengm
www.stsiinc.com
THANK YOUQUESTIONS?
16