Jennifer Swanson, deputy assistant secretary of the Army for data, engineering and software, said the service is adopting a more agile approach to software development and that approach is reflected in the Army’s plan to use software initial capabilities documents and capability needs statements and to work with a team that could help refine the requirements in development sprints.
“That’s really game changing, because instead of giving us a 200-page document, which is kind of how we’ve operated for a long time, it will be a short, pithy high-level ‘this is what we need’ [document],” Swanson told Defense One in an interview published Thursday.
She noted that the service is transforming how it is asking vendors to deliver products, particularly the “show me” aspect in proposals.
“The other thing is that we’re not just evaluating the solution, we’re evaluating the company’s ability to be agile, because that’s where we have stumbled in the past,” Swanson said.
“So, you can show us a shiny solution and a demo. But if we give you new requirements, how fast can you turn those new requirements into a new release?,” she added.
