Viewing offline content

Limited functionality available

Dismiss
Deloitte South Africa
  • Services

    What's new

    • Deloitte Digital

    • Deloitte Africa Centre for Corporate Governance

      The Deloitte Africa Center for Corporate Governance offers a number of resources for executives, directors, and others who are active in governance.

    • Corporate Reporting Reform

      View our latest events on corporate reporting reform.

    • Audit & Assurance

      • Audit & Assurance Insights
      • Centre for Corporate Governance
    • Consulting

      • Strategy
      • Customer and Marketing
      • Core Business Operations
      • Human Capital
      • Enterprise Technology & Performance
      • Managed Services
      • Growth Platforms
    • Financial Advisory

      • Mergers & Acquisitions
      • Turnaround and Restructuring
      • Forensics
    • Risk Advisory

      • Internal Control & Assurance
      • Regulatory Risk
      • IT & Specialised Assurance
      • Cyber Risk
      • Analytics
    • Tax & Legal

      • Outsourced Tax Compliance
      • Tax Technology Consulting
      • Tax Advisory and Transactions
      • Mobility, Payroll, Immigration
      • Workforce, Analytics
      • Reward, Employment Tax
      • Legal Services
      • South African Budget
      • Tax News and Trends
    • Deloitte Private

  • Industries

    What's new

    • Deloitte perspectives

      Leadership perspectives from across the globe.

    • Future of Mobility

      Learn how this new reality is coming together and what it will mean for you and your industry.

    • Deloitte Africa Insights

      Access the latest thought leadership on industry insights, country reports and economic developments in Africa.

    • Consumer

      • Automotive
      • Consumer Products
      • Retail, Wholesale & Distribution
      • Transportation, Hospitality & Services
    • Energy & Resources

      • Energy & Chemicals
      • Mining & Metals
      • Power, Utilities & Renewables
      • Industrial Products & Construction
    • Financial Services

      • Insurance
      • Banking & Securities
      • Investment Management
      • Actuarial & Insurance Solutions
      • Real Estate
    • Life Sciences & Healthcare

      • Life Sciences
      • Health Care
      • The Africa Deloitte Health Equity Institute
    • Government and Public Services

      • Infrastructure, Transport & Regional Government
      • Central Government
      • Defence, Security & Justice
      • Health & Human Services
    • Technology, Media & Telecom

      • Technology
      • Media & Entertainment
      • Telecom, Media & Entertainment
      • Predictions
  • Insights

    Deloitte Insights

    What's new

    • Deloitte Insights Magazine

      Explore the latest issue now

    • Deloitte Insights app

      Go straight to smart with daily updates on your mobile device

    • Weekly economic update

      See what's happening this week and the impact on your business

    • Strategy

      • Business Strategy & Growth
      • Digital Transformation
      • Governance & Board
      • Innovation
      • Marketing & Sales
      • Private Enterprise
    • Economy & Society

      • Economy
      • Environmental, Social, & Governance
      • Health Equity
      • Trust
      • Mobility
    • Organization

      • Operations
      • Finance & Tax
      • Risk & Regulation
      • Supply Chain
      • Smart Manufacturing
    • People

      • Leadership
      • Talent & Work
      • Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion
    • Technology

      • Data & Analytics
      • Emerging Technologies
      • Technology Management
    • Industries

      • Consumer
      • Energy, Resources, & Industrials
      • Financial Services
      • Government & Public Services
      • Life Sciences & Health Care
      • Technology, Media, & Telecommunications
    • Spotlight

      • Deloitte Insights Magazine
      • Press Room Podcasts
      • Weekly Economic Update
      • COVID-19
      • Resilience
      • Top 10 reading guide
  • Careers

    What's new

    • Job search

    • Experienced Hires

    • Executives

    • Students

    • Life at Deloitte

    • Alumni

  • ZA-EN Location: South Africa-English  
  • ZA-EN Location: South Africa-English  
    • Dashboard
    • Saved items
    • Content feed
    • Profile/Interests
    • Account settings
    • Subscriptions

Welcome back

Still not a member? Join My Deloitte

Agile by the numbers

by Peter Viechnicki, Mahesh Kelkar
  • Save for later
  • Download
  • Share
    • Share on Facebook
    • Share on Twitter
    • Share on Linkedin
    • Share by email
Deloitte Insights
  • Strategy
    Strategy
    Strategy
    • Business Strategy & Growth
    • Digital Transformation
    • Governance & Board
    • Innovation
    • Marketing & Sales
    • Private Enterprise
  • Economy & Society
    Economy & Society
    Economy & Society
    • Economy
    • Environmental, Social, & Governance
    • Health Equity
    • Trust
    • Mobility
  • Organization
    Organization
    Organization
    • Operations
    • Finance & Tax
    • Risk & Regulation
    • Supply Chain
    • Smart Manufacturing
  • People
    People
    People
    • Leadership
    • Talent & Work
    • Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion
  • Technology
    Technology
    Technology
    • Data & Analytics
    • Emerging Technologies
    • Technology Management
  • Industries
    Industries
    Industries
    • Consumer
    • Energy, Resources, & Industrials
    • Financial Services
    • Government & Public Services
    • Life Sciences & Health Care
    • Tech, Media, & Telecom
  • Spotlight
    Spotlight
    Spotlight
    • Deloitte Insights Magazine
    • Press Room Podcasts
    • Weekly Economic Update
    • COVID-19
    • Resilience
    • Top 10 reading guide
    • ZA-EN Location: South Africa-English  
      • Dashboard
      • Saved items
      • Content feed
      • Profile/Interests
      • Account settings
      • Subscriptions
    05 May 2017

    Agile by the numbers A data analysis of Agile development in the US federal government

    05 May 2017
    • Peter Viechnicki United States
    • Mahesh Kelkar India
    • Save for later
    • Download
    • Share
      • Share on Facebook
      • Share on Twitter
      • Share on Linkedin
      • Share by email
    • Federal projects getting shorter and smaller
    • Improvements not tied to Agile methods
    • Are contracting officers asking for Agile?
    • Federal IT procurement was changing before Agile

    ​The US federal government has been encouraging agencies to adopt faster, leaner software development approaches for several years. But to what extent have Agile and other iterative methods actually taken root within the federal IT community?

    Learn More

    Explore our Agile in Government series

    Download the full report or create a custom PDF

    There is little question that the Agile approach has been making inroads in government. Originally developed as an approach for building software in the private sector, government has also embraced Agile, at least in concept.

    In 2012, the US Office of Management and Budget (OMB) issued guidance that “encourages agencies to shift away from the bloated, multi-year projects so common in the past” and to adopt a more modular approach.1 The US federal government's Digital Services Playbook” urges officials to build the service using Agile and iterative practices.”2 Indeed, Agile Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC) textbooks have been seen on employees’ desks at the highest levels of the US government.3

    But how deep-seated and fundamental is this shift? Have Agile methods taken root within the federal IT community? How much IT procurement is Agile-based, and how much is still based on the traditional waterfall approach?

    These are the questions that the Deloitte Center for Government Insights set out to investigate by analyzing hard numbers. We used a variety of federal data sources to dig deep into what is taking place with respect to Agile and federal IT. (See sidebar, “Data sources: The hard numbers that describe Agile’s reach.”)

    What we found is that the Agile movement coincides with a long-standing trend toward less expensive and more nimble IT projects, but most likely did not itself cause those trends. For example, between 2004 and 2015, the duration of major federal IT projects went from an average of nine years to less than two years. But most of this shift took place prior to the embrace of Agile approaches. In fact, in 2011, fewer than 10 percent of major federal IT projects described themselves as “Agile” or “iterative.” This number, however, has grown rapidly in the past few years: In 2017, fully 80 percent of major federal IT projects are now describing themselves as “Agile” or “iterative.”4

    Data sources: The hard numbers that describe Agile’s reach

    Rather than rely on anecdotes, our investigation of Agile combined data from four major federal sources.

    • OMB: To understand how much money the federal government is spending on its IT projects and how long they last, we analyzed data on 1,029 major IT projects compiled by the Office of Management and Budget on its ITDashboard.gov portal. These projects included only those that agencies listed in their Exhibit 300 submissions, approximately several hundred projects per year.
    • USASpending.gov: To get a more complete view of run-of-the-mill federal IT purchases, we analyzed contract transactions from the Department of Treasury’s USASpending.gov portal, restricting our analysis to transactions with product service code (PSC) 70.
    • OPM: To understand the makeup of the federal contracting workforce, we used the Office of Personnel Management’s Fedscope data cube from March 2016.
    • FedBizOpps: Finally, to understand how the language of federal IT procurement is changing, we pulled the full text of solicitations from the FedBizOpps portal, again restricting ourselves to procurements coded as PSC 70.

    One explanation for the increase in self-reported adopting of Agile and/or incremental approaches could be a desire to appear compliant with leadership rather than an actual underlying shift in IT procurement approach. While an openness to Agile, incremental IT procurement seems real, there continues to be a strong role for traditional waterfall practices as well. We conducted an analysis of more than 3,000 procurement documents, and found evidence that both waterfall and Agile approaches are currently reflected in federal IT projects.

    In the following pages, we’ll review the evidence in more detail and offer some insight about what the future may hold for the Agile movement and federal IT acquisitions.

    Major federal software projects have been getting shorter in duration and smaller in cost for more than a decade

    The Agile movement is all about flexibility through iterative approaches—which often entails breaking large projects into smaller and shorter chunks. But we find that the trend toward smaller, cheaper, and more iterative projects in federal IT development actually started years ago, as far back as 2004, before “Agile” was widely recognized as a distinct software development methodology in government. According to our analysis of data from the OMB, major software projects5 have been getting both shorter and smaller in value every year (figures 1 and 2). In fact, the average cost for line-item projects in constant dollars6 fell from $143.5 million in 2004 to only $1.72 million in 2015. Average project duration fell over the same period, from 108 months to 7.9 months.7 Shorter IT development projects are widely perceived as less risky,8 matching one of Agile’s core tenets, “fail fast.”

    Major federal software projects are getting smaller

    Major federal software projects are also getting shorter

    Improvements in IT procurement timelines and prices are not tied to Agile methods

    To what extent are Agile methodologies responsible for the trends we see towards less expensive and shorter major projects? Self-reported use of Agile or iterative methods is definitely on the rise among major federal IT projects (figure 3). By 2017, some 80 percent of these major systems were reporting using Agile or iterative SDLC methods.

    Major federal IT projects are now overwhelmingly characterized as “Agile” or “iterative”

    Since they self-report their choice of SDLC method, the owners of these projects may be responding to encouragement from OMB to use Agile methods. Or the reporting may reflect guidance and high-profile success stories from projects by the United States Digital Service (USDS) or GSA’s 18F division.

    But it’s not possible to determine with confidence the extent to which Agile methods caused the reductions we’re seeing in IT development times and costs for major IT projects.9

    Are contracting officers asking for Agile in their solicitations?

    Are contracting officers (COs) requesting Agile methods in IT solicitations? Do the procurement solicitations that are now routinely self-described as “Agile” or “incremental” truly reflect a fundamentally different approach?

    To find out, we analyzed statements of work from FedBizOpps, the primary source for federal contracts over $25,000. Our analysis shows that the majority of solicitations do not currently specify a particular SDLC, although some solicitations do specifically request Agile methods. We see no evidence of an increasing preference for Agile methods in solicitations at the expense of waterfall.

    Using text analysis, a form of artificial intelligence, we studied more than 3,000 solicitations for software procurements between October 2015 and October 2016.10 Figure 4 shows the similarity between the language in those solicitations and a separate set of reference documents about the Agile method. For comparison, we also measured the similarity of the solicitations’ language to the language in reference documents about waterfall methods. The amount of “Agile language” included in solicitations is stable over time. Importantly, our analysis found no apparent decline in terminology related to waterfall methods.

    Agile and waterfall coexist in solicitations

    Simply put, the majority of current solicitations appeared broad enough to cover both Agile and waterfall methods. Few and far between were “pure” Agile solicitations, though they did fit within the Federal Acquisition Regulations (FAR) and our text analysis method could detect them. Our finding is consistent with statements from proponents of Agile methods who point out that the flexibility of the FAR as they stand today allow for the use of Agile approaches.

    The Agile movement came to government when IT procurement was already changing

    It seems clear that Agile techniques have taken root in parts of the federal IT ecosystem, but they are by no means ubiquitous or exclusive. While we have seen a spike in self-reporting projects as “Agile” or “incremental,” there is no evidence that COs are specifically requesting Agile methods in solicitations, and waterfall continues to play a significant role in IT procurements. How can we make sense of these seemingly contradictory indicators?

    The most likely explanation is that high-profile delays, cost overruns, and cancellations11 of major federal IT systems in the 2000s, coupled with the 2008 economic downturn, led to a general avoidance of lengthy projects with huge price tags. Somewhat later, the Agile methodology became popular inside the core of the federal government—the White House and agencies closely tied to its policy agenda, such as OMB, US Digital Service, and 18F. Both policy leaders and federal contracting officers appear to have become more open to new approaches to software contracting. These separate trends coincided, and with encouragement from the White House, more and more owners of major government systems began labeling their methods as “Agile,” even though they had been moving toward shorter, smaller projects since at least 2004. In addition, there has been a proliferation in the “flavors” of Agile, meaning that aspects of Agile methods can be (and are being) incorporated into traditional procurement vehicles.

    Regardless of what label is applied, the fundamental trends toward smaller, shorter IT projects is undeniable. As the federal contracting workforce continues to refine more Agile approaches to IT procurement, we are likely to see, at the very least, the fundamental principles of Agile continue to play an important role in federal IT.

    Credits

    Written By: Peter Viechnicki, Mahesh Kelkar

    Acknowledgements

    A number of colleagues within Deloitte member firms generously contributed their time and insights to this report. In no particular order, the authors would like to thank Howard Byrd and Eric Uhlir for their contributions to this research. We would also like to extend a special thanks to Gregory Marlow, whose assistance was critical to the analysis of data on federal solicitations scraped from FedBizOpps. Thanks also to Manu Choubey from the data sciences team for helping us pull and analyze data from USASpending data portal. William Eggers and John O’Leary from the Deloitte Center for Government Insights provided valuable inputs and critical editorial help at important junctures.

    Endnotes
      1. The OMB guidance is available at https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/blog/2012/06/14/greater-accountability-and-faster-delivery-through-modular-contracting, and the description is from the June 14, 2012 OMB blog announcing it, available at https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/blog/2012/06/14/greater-accountability-and-faster-delivery-through-modular-contracting. View in article

      2. The US Digital Service, Digital services playbook, https://playbook.cio.gov/, play no. 4, accessed April 6, 2017. View in article

      3. Robert Tross (senior manager, Deloitte Consulting LLP), interview with the authors, 2016. View in article

      4. Deloitte analysis of data from ITDashboard.gov, https://www.itdashboard.gov/drupal/data/datafeeds. View in article

      5. Data from OMB’s ITDashboard.gov, which only tracks major IT projects—that is, those receiving a line item in the annual US federal budget. We restricted our analysis to projects whose status was “completed” and were coded as primarily software projects. View in article

      6. We use 1994 (the first year of the ITDashboard time series) as the base year and then depreciate subsequent years using the consumer price index. View in article

      7. Deloitte analysis of data from ITDashboard.gov, https://www.itdashboard.gov/drupal/data/datafeeds. View in article

      8. See, for example, Chris de Leon and Philip Petrina, The road to Agile: PennDOT’s transformation to iterative and Agile methods, Pennsylvania Department of Transportation, 2016, http://Agilesummit.harrisburgu.edu/lib/pdf/2016-05-09-AgileSummit-RoadtoAgile-ChrisandPhilFinalVersion-NoNotes.pdf. View in article

      9. From the available data on ITDashboard.gov, we do not see clear evidence that Agile projects have significantly shorter durations and costs than waterfall or other SDLC projects. Nor did we find any data that correlates success rates with software methodology in federal IT. View in article

      10. Text analysis of documents attached to 3,063 solicitations from FedBizOpps.com for products coded “70” between October 2015 and October 2016. The lines in the graphic show the degree of similarity by month of solicitation to reference documents about Agile development and waterfall development (the Agile and waterfall pages on Wikipedia). View in article

      11. Government Accountability Office, Implementation of reform legislation needed to improve acquisitions and operations, November 4, 2015, http://www.gao.gov/assets/680/673508.pdf. View in article

    Show moreShow less

    Topics in this article

    Public Sector , Government , Technology , Technology Industry

    Deloitte Center for Government Insights

    View
    Download Subscribe

    Related

    img Trending

    Interactive 3 days ago

    Peter Viechnicki

    Peter Viechnicki

    Manager | Deloitte Services LP

    Peter is a strategic analysis manager and data scientist with the Deloitte Center for Government Insights, where he focuses on developing innovative public sector research using geospatial and natural language processing techniques.

    • pviechnicki@deloitte.com
    • +1 571 858 1862
    Mahesh Kelkar

    Mahesh Kelkar

    Research Manager | Deloitte Services India

    Mahesh Kelkar is the smart cities research leader for the Deloitte Center for Government Insights. His research focuses on understanding the impact of technology, innovation, and policy on the future of cities. He closely tracks the federal and state government sectors and focuses on conducting in-depth research on the intersection of technology with government operations, policy, and decision-making. Connect with him on Twitter @Mahesh_Kelkar and on LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/in/mahesh-kelkar-9468a87/.

    • mkelkar@deloitte.com
    • +1 678 299 7142

    Share article highlights

    See something interesting? Simply select text and choose how to share it:

    Email a customized link that shows your highlighted text.
    Copy a customized link that shows your highlighted text.
    Copy your highlighted text.

    Agile by the numbers has been saved

    Agile by the numbers has been removed

    An Article Titled Agile by the numbers already exists in Saved items

    Invalid special characters found 
    Forgot password

    To stay logged in, change your functional cookie settings.

    OR

    Social login not available on Microsoft Edge browser at this time.

    Connect Accounts

    Connect your social accounts

    This is the first time you have logged in with a social network.

    You have previously logged in with a different account. To link your accounts, please re-authenticate.

    Log in with an existing social network:

    To connect with your existing account, please enter your password:

    OR

    Log in with an existing site account:

    To connect with your existing account, please enter your password:

    Forgot password

    Subscribe

    to receive more business insights, analysis, and perspectives from Deloitte Insights
    ✓ Link copied to clipboard
    • Contact Us
    • Submit RFP
    • Media enquiries
    Follow Deloitte Insights:
    Global office directory Office locations
    ZA-EN Location: South Africa-English  
    About Deloitte
    • Home
    • Newsroom
    • Code of Conduct
    • Report unethical conduct
    • Office locator
    • Global Office Directory
    • Press releases
    • Submit RFP
    • Contact us
    • Deloitte Insights Blog
    • Social Media
    • About Deloitte in Malawi
    • About Deloitte in Zimbabwe
    • About Deloitte in Mozambique
    • About Deloitte in Botswana
    • About Deloitte in Zambia
    • https://sacoronavirus.co.za
    Services
    • Audit & Assurance
    • Consulting
    • Financial Advisory
    • Risk Advisory
    • Tax & Legal
    • Deloitte Private
    Industries
    • Consumer
    • Energy & Resources
    • Financial Services
    • Life Sciences & Healthcare
    • Government and Public Services
    • Technology, Media & Telecom
    Careers
    • Job search
    • Experienced Hires
    • Executives
    • Students
    • Life at Deloitte
    • Alumni
    • About Deloitte
    • Terms of use
    • Privacy
    • Cookies
    • PAIA Manual
    • About Deloitte Africa
    • Avature Privacy
    • Standard terms for the provision of goods and services to Deloitte & Touche

    © 2023. See Terms of Use for more information.

    Deloitte refers to one or more of Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu Limited, a UK private company limited by guarantee (“DTTL”), its network of member firms, and their related entities. DTTL and each of its member firms are legally separate and independent entities.  Please see www.deloitte.com/about for a detailed description of DTTL and its member firms.