How to Go Agile in State and Local Government: Scrum vs. PMBOK

In the past few years, as state and local governments sought to modernize and release more digital services to meet the needs of citizens during the coronavirus pandemic, they have embraced an agile approach to government service delivery.

In some cases, government agencies have partnered with nonprofit organizations such as Code for America to become nimbler in their development of government services.

“Adopting agile, iterative technology can solve some of government’s biggest challenges and have a transformative impact on people’s lives — building more equitable systems, improving outcomes and reducing the poverty gap,” Alexis Fernández Garcia, a senior program director of Code for America's social safety net portfolio, writes in a StateTech blog.

Agile methodologies have been on state and local governments’ radars for several years. A 2021 report from the IBM Center for the Business of Government explores how agencies have been using agile not just for software development but for a wide range of use cases.

Those include project management, human resources management, policymaking, and contracting and procurement. Agile builds and tests iteratively to ensure that what is developed is what the organization wants.

As agencies look to Strengthen their development and delivery of government services to be more responsive to citizens’ needs, they will increasingly — but not exclusively — need to rely on agile approaches and frameworks such as scrum, experts say. At the same time, they face cultural and organizational hurdles to adopting agile methodologies.

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Diego Lo Giudice, vice president and principal analyst at Forrester Research, says it’s important to align with the Agile Manifesto, or the statement of principles that make up the agile methodology, when thinking about how it could apply to government and how scrum fits into that.

For example, in agile, the highest priority is “to satisfy the customer through early and continuous delivery of valuable software,” according to the Agile Alliance.

Another key principle is that agile processes harness change for the customer’s competitive advantage.

Within agile, scrum should be seen as a framework geared toward change, Lo Giudice says. Scrum is a way for software development and other teams to execute and adhere to these principles.

“Scrum is about the way that a software team or a blended cross-functional team operates tactically” in day-to-day operations, says Mike Case, director of growth and delivery operations at Nava, a consultancy and public benefit corporation that works to make government services simple, effective and accessible. “How do they figure out how they’re going to prioritize and divvy up the tactical work at a task level?”

Scrum involves several key concepts, Lo Giudice and Case note, including ceremonies such as quick stand-up meetings to check in on the progress of work and ensuring that updates are focused on what team members need from each other and what the key impediments or blockers there are to progress.

Additionally, scrum is focused on autonomy for teams and delivering value for the business or agency. “It privileges communication between people” rather than one person writing a document that is handed over stating what the person requesting a project wants. In a traditional “waterfall” approach to project management, another person would read those requirements.

“Scrum says, sit down and work directly — face to face or through collaboration tools — and communicate,” Lo Giudice says. “It’s communication over contracts.”

Another key element of scrum is to focus on making progress in increments, or sprints. In a sprint, Case says, teams focus on “dividing projects up into smaller chunks so that you don’t have this one giant deliverable in four months; you have a lot of different two- or three-week sprints to break up the project and also assess your progress as you’re going along.”

During that cycle, teams will go through the analysis, design, coding and testing, operating in a fashion of continuous iteration and continuous delivery. This allows teams to start delivering features that are valuable instead of the full product, Lo Giudice says.

“Instead of thinking about the full product, they start thinking about smaller features that can be delivered and added over time to build the product,” he says. “Instead of taking four months and having a big deliverable after four months, you start delivering every two to four weeks.” 

In contrast to scrum sits the Project Management Institute’s Project Management Body of Knowledge, a project management framework that is more prescriptive than scrum. PMBOK emphasizes a significant amount of upfront planning and a high level of detail early on in the development process.

PMBOK defines roles more clearly, Lo Giudice says. It also emphasizes documentation as well as the role of the project manager, who is tasked with maintaining and updating project schedules. In scrum, there is no similar organization and updating of project schedules because teams are self-managed.

In the PMBOK approach, project managers interface with the business and stakeholders and report on the project status. The scrum approach is more transparent and everyone tends to know what is going on because they can look at the progress being made on sprints.

There is no one-size-fits all approach to government service delivery, Case says. In cases where there are strict timeline constraints mandated by a legislature, it may be more difficulty to apply a scrum framework. “You have to pick and choose depending on your requirements,” Case says.

Most government agencies have not full adopted scrum or PMBOK, Case says, “so, even if you’re fully committed to agile, you need to be able to translate and connect that to other methodologies being used in other dependent agencies or systems so that you’re not totally separated.” 

In government, where the creation and launch of new services has historically taken significantly longer than in the private sector, agile approaches allow government software developers, project managers and program certified the opportunity to iterate more quickly, pivot on projects and get new services out to citizens faster.

Case says it lets them “see the progress, not hear theoretical updates about percent complete, but to see, ‘What does that front-end user interface look like today? OK, they understand it’s not done, but great, you’re heading in that direction. They expect you’re implementing user research that they hadn’t considered. Great, keep going.’”

Agile allows government officials involved in policy creation to get involved in the development of services and make comments that can be easily incorporated into software or service development, Case says. “And if you’re waiting until the end to see working software, you’re more likely as a policy or program expert to hear, ‘Well, that would be too hard now to change or implement,’” Case adds.  

Lo Giudice says that with agile, government officials “will find out sooner rather than later” whether services are shaping up as expected. “You can make mistakes. And the mistakes that you’ll make are much smaller because you’re breaking the problem of it to sub-problems,” he adds. “You won’t find out six months later that this is not what the business wanted.”

LEARN MORE: Find out about how state and local agencies are moving forward on agile.

While state and local government agencies have made progress in adopting agile methodologies and frameworks such as scrum, they face obstacles to doing so, Lo Giudice and Case say.

One major impediment is the structure of government procurement, where contracts tend to adhere to the PMBOK approach for project delivery. Requests for proposals tend to be anti-agile, Lo Giudice says. A better approach might be to, for example, break up a $2 million contract into 10 $200,000 contracts so that the process can be more flexible. “It’s crucial to change how the work is given out to the vendors,” he says.

Doing so is difficult, Case acknowledges, since changing contract development processes that have been in place for years is institutionally difficult. But, Case says, it’s crucial to fund and “make the space for these different ways of working and let new good habits form in those spaces.”

Another big challenge is changing government agencies’ cultures to embrace agile, according to Case. “Doing organizational change like this can be a pretty massive undertaking,” Case says. “And to do it successfully, I think you have to scale it back and start small.”

Government IT leaders who want to implement agile should start small by identifying the most valuable opportunities where they can experiment, whether through procurement circumstances or having the right personnel in place. 

It’s important to not go all-in at first, Case says, and instead try agile on a small scale. “If it’s successful, we’ll introduce this new concept,” Case says.

Cultural changes and changes in the way teams collaborate pave the way for the introduction of new technologies and project management tools that can make approaches like scrum easier to implement. “I think you have to start with the culture and the intent and the change management of processes,” Case says.

Best Scrum Software for Project Management in 2023

Scrum is one of the most popular agile methodologies, so many teams naturally want a project management software that has features to support a Scrum approach. In this software guide, we’ve rounded up eight of the best product management platforms that can be used by Scrum teams. They compare their pricing, features and more to help you decide which Scrum project management software is the best for your team.

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Besides affordable pricing, you want to make sure that your project management software has certain key features. Here are some of the features to look out for when comparing Scrum project management software:

Owned by Atlassian, Jira remains one of the best project management solutions for IT teams on the market today. Its issue tracking features makes it easy to log bugs and assign them to members of your team. It offers multiple project views and templates to support agile methodologies, including Scrum. Jira also integrates with over 500 other tools and offers more than 3,000 extensions, so you can take the platform’s functionality to the next level.

For more information, read the full Jira review.

SEE: The 9 best agile project management software for 2023

While a relative newcomer to the project management space — it only launched in 2017 — ClickUp has quickly made a name for itself thanks to its combination of affordable prices and excellent project management features. With paid plans starting at only $5 per person (billed annually) this is a great choice for Scrum teams of all sizes who want the most popular project management tools without breaking the bank.

For more information, read the full ClickUp review.

Wrike is one of the most full-featured project management solutions on the market. While it can be overwhelming for small teams, Wrike is an excellent choice for power users who are looking to manage a portfolio of complicated Scrum projects and want more niche functions such as risk predictions. Those willing to master the advanced learning curve will find it a powerful solution with a high degree of customizability.

A free trial is available for each of the following plans:

For more information, read the full Wrike review.

Whiteboards are a key element of Scrum project management and agile methodologies, but they’ve been difficult to replicate in a digital space — until Lucidspark. This virtual whiteboard replicates the experience of posting sticky notes and freehanding drawings on a board in a physical meeting. Because it’s designed specifically for brainstorming and ideating, Lucidspark will work best when used in conjunction with a dedicated project management solution such as the other products listed in this article.

A free trial is available.

SEE: 6 best mind mapping software for project management in 2023

Basecamp is a project management solution that was designed with freelancers, startups and other small teams in mind. It offers a unique flat rate pricing option that will appeal to many businesses looking to standardize their project management budget. Basecamp has a friendly, simple interface that will appeal to teams looking to get started with Scrum project management.

For more information, read the full Basecamp review.

Purchased by Atlassian in 2017, Trello originally gained traction for its intuitive Kanban boards but has since developed into a full-fledged project management tool. Its simple, visual approach makes it a good choice for people who are new to Scrum and/or project management. Its free plan supports unlimited users, so the whole team can try it out before you decide if you want to upgrade to a paid plan.

For more information, read the full Trello review.

Asana is another project and task management tool that is a good choice for Scrum beginners. Asana is best suited for simple and straightforward Scrum projects that don’t require very complex project management. This is because the platform lacks certain features, such as native time tracking and complex dependencies, that more robust alternatives have.

For more information, read the full Asana review.

Most project management platforms offer prebuilt templates to make it easier and faster to create a new project. However, not all of them offer a wide range of templates that are specific to agile and Scrum methodologies. Check each platform to see if it offers templates that will be useful for your specific project management methodology.

Scrum methodology involves very specific workflows, and these should be reflected in whatever project management software you choose. The workflows should also be customizable to fit the individual needs and timelines of your team, especially if you’re managing complex projects over a long period of time.

Switching to email, Slack or Team every time your team needs to discuss a task wastes time and splits the conversation across multiple platforms. The best project management software keeps everything in one platform with collaboration tools such as comments, notifications and messaging.

Automation helps teams reduce repetitive, manual tasks so they can focus on getting more valuable work done. Automation rules can do things such as assigning all tasks in a certain section to one person or setting up a workflow when a new task is added to a project. Each platform approaches automation in a slightly different way, so make sure your top choices use automation in a way that works for your team.

Most project management platforms offer some integration, but this can vary widely from a couple dozen apps to hundreds of other software solutions. It’s always a good idea to check each app in your software stack to make sure that your chosen project management system will integrate with all of them. Otherwise, you’ll have to use an outside solution such as Zapier or build a custom integration using an open API.

Before you select a new Scrum project management software, consider your current project management solutions and how they succeed or fall short of your requirements. Once you identify the shortcomings, you can look for a new project management solution that solves them.

Take advantage of free trials and forever-free accounts so that you can test drive the software for yourself. Most of the platforms listed in this guide offer both of these options, so make the most of them before committing to a paid plan. If you have questions about a platform’s capabilities, scheduling a live demo with the sales team may be more efficient than trying to poke around on your own. Also, seek out reviews from other users who are currently using the software to see what they have to say.

If you still aren’t 100% committed after the trial period and demo, consider paying for a month-to-month subscription rather than signing up for an annual plan. Although this may be a little more expensive up front, it might save you from signing up for an entire year of a service that ultimately doesn’t work for you.

The entire team should be involved in choosing a project management software. Ask the people who are using the software on a daily basis what their need-to-have and nice-to-have features are. Involving them in the process will also make them more motivated to use whatever new Scrum project management software you ultimately choose.

We reviewed this project management software based on a number of criteria, including pricing, ease of use, user interface design, and the difficulty of the learning curve. They also weighed additional features such as automation, project views, templates, and time tracking. They evaluated these platforms by consulting users reviews and product documentation.

England’s unusual scrum-half situation raises questions over its talent pool

The fact that Care, at the age of 36, was there in the dressing room as a team-mate to console Van Poortvliet is incredible in some ways. That’s not a comment about Care’s form; he absolutely deserves to be in the squad for France. It’s incredible because England are heading to France with two of the scrum-halves, Care and Ben Youngs, who would have been selected 12 years ago had it not been for Care’s ill-timed foot injury.

The third member of that hypothetical 2011 group would have been Richard Wigglesworth, who of course is now England’s attack coach. Care’s spot ended up being taken by the uncapped Joe Simpson, who retired last December.

Youngs, now 33, and Care were certainly young enough back in 2011 for this to technically happen, but the odds of it were unlikely. Injuries, loss of form and rival emerging talents are all supposed to develop over that long a span.

Take some of the scrum-halves of a similar age to Youngs (then 22) and Care (24) who went to that World Cup in New Zealand. Only Conor Murray is still actively playing with Ireland, and notably not as the first choice scrum-half behind Jamison Gibson-Park. Morgan Parra (France) has retired, Will Genia (Australia) retired from internationals, while Nick Phipps (Australia), Fumiaki Tanaka (Japan), Edoardo Gori (Italy), Francois Hougaard (South Africa), Tavis Knoyle and Lloyd Williams (both Wales) are all in the international wilderness.

England, therefore, are an anomaly. Van Poortvliet had started nine of England’s last 10 Tests, and his selection in what felt closer to a first-choice side against Wales last Saturday was perhaps a sign from Steve Borthwick that Van Poortvliet was his preferred choice to start in France. Van Poortvliet had succeeded where so many other scrum-halves had failed under Eddie Jones and before him, Stuart Lancaster.