Updates
Six Lessons in Governance for Intergovernmental Software Collaboratives
Intergovernmental software collaboratives (ISC) — groups of two or more government agencies jointly supporting the development of software for their collective use, operating under some kind of a governance structure — have the potential to address longstanding and seemingly intractable issues in government IT projects. When done right, ISCs can…
Introducing the Anatomy of a Collaborative Series
We’re excited to launch a new series of profiles called Anatomy of a Collaborative. The goal of this series is to provide practitioners in and around government as well as fellow researchers and folks supporting collaborative work with detailed, real-world examples to learn from. In this series, each profile will…
Buying and Selling Collaborative Software across Governments
It’s impossible to escape the topic of procurement when discussing government technology. We hosted a webinar on challenges and opportunities in local and state procurement earlier this year, and in September we dove into the topic at a monthly ISC member meeting. During our meeting, we discussed how both existing…
Language Update: Evolving from 'cooperative' to 'collaborative'
Since its inception, the Intergovernmental Software Collaborative has put names and definitions to the work of government software collaboration where previously there were none. As we try to better understand and make sharing and collaboration in government software development more visible, the language we use is evolving. Earlier this year,…
How intergovernmental cooperatives maintain standards
Standards come up again and again when we talk to government cooperatives about their work. It turns out–maybe unsurprisingly–that having a shared system for data vocabulary and exchange formats is critical for jurisdictions to share data and technology. Often, it comes down to the cooperative itself to come up with…
Sharing Federal Digital Services with Other Layers of Government
Bills are making their way through both the U.S. and Canadian legislatures to make it easier for sub-national governments to access their federal governments’ existing digital services. The Government of Canada, in an omnibus budget bill, has included language enabling the Canadian Digital Service to provide its digital platform services…
Learning from Failure: When Sharing Software Doesn’t Work
When our Intergovernmental Software Collaborative (ISC) set out to learn more about the landscape of cooperatives that share software, we came across dozens of state and local governments actively working together to buy or build software for shared needs. We also heard anecdotes about failed cooperative efforts. Knowing we can…
ISC Community Membership Guidelines
Our hypothesis is that building collaboratively across jurisdictions saves governments time and money while producing better outcomes for the public. As we’ve grown this project, we’ve discovered more and more cooperative organizations doing just that, but they’re often unaware of each other. We’re fostering a community of practice to create…
Introducing the ISC Knowledgebase
Title: Introducing the ISC Knowledge Base We regularly hear members of our software collaborative network express a desire for a shared knowledge base of articles, best practices, playbooks, websites, etc. around software collaboration, especially with an intergovernmental lens. We’re excited to introduce the first version of this collaborative knowledge base!…
Our Hypothesis and Roadmap for 2022
As we enter the new year, we’re entering a new phase for the State Software Collaborative. We have two new fellows, Aaron Snow and Shelby Switzer, dedicated to research and development, and a new community manager, Julia Pan, focused on supporting the growth and success of the cooperative network and…