During a recent debrief, state officials shared insight about what vendors did well and could improve on when they submitted working software as part of a process to qualify for California's first "pool" of agile developers.
In July, the California Health and Human Services Agency (CHHS) selected 11 vendors for a prequalified pool of agile developers eligible to work on the Child Welfare Services/Case Management System replacement and other projects.
In order to be considered, companies had to develop a working prototype of open source software that enables parents of foster children to manage profiles online, view children's residential facilities in their ZIP code and communicate through a private inbox.
"We were really impressed by the commitment the vendors made to engage with us in a different format, to show us your work, how you solve problems, how you could help the state solve our most critical challenges, and be willing to try something a little bit different, a little bit new," Peter Kelly, deputy director of Child Welfare Digital Services at the Office of Systems Integration, said during the Aug. 25 briefing.
All submissions demonstrated an understanding of agile, and there was considerable uniformity, officials said. All vendors submitted a working prototype, followed the U.S. Digital Services Playbook as directed, and used at least three "human-centered design" techniques or tools.
For the pool, the state ultimately selected Accenture, Binti Inc., Cambria Solutions, Case Commons, CivicActions, Deloitte, EngagePoint, Exygy, Oliver Wyman, Portland Webworks, and Taborda Solutions.
Those standouts distinguished themselves by creating an intuitive user interface for the prototype they submitted. Others showed creativity in adding extra features, such as a Spanish translation functionality.
Some vendors, though, were held back by a variety of factors. Those problems included submissions that did not adapt well to a variety of devices and screen sizes, submissions that didn't include a database as required, and solutions that weren't open source software, as directed.
The state received a total of 24 submissions.
The 11 that qualified will provide user-centered design and agile software development services, according to the state. Officials believe establishing the pool will help reduce the amount of time it takes to complete a solicitation and deliver working software.
The qualified firms will be eligible to respond to RFOs that the state of California will release going forward. Between now and the end of the fiscal year, there at least six RFOs that will be released by Child Welfare Digital Services for the state's child welfare system modernization. Other California state agencies and departments that are interested in using the pool could release their own RFOs too.
"There was a surprising amount of similarity in the technology stacks posed by the submissions. But still, there were some things that weren't 100 percent clear that we would like to clear up in the next one, to remove any ambiguity," an official said, referring to when the pool is refreshed. The state plans to refresh the agile vendor pool on a periodic basis, as soon as early 2017.
California might be starting a trend among states. On Tuesday, the state of Mississippi issued its own solicitation that will create a pool of prequalified agile developers.
