Dynamics of Government Collaboration: Insights from a Specialized Agency - Benjamin Morris -S2 Ep.12

In this episode, we are joined by Benjamin Morris, Chief Delivery Officer & Co-owner at Pluribus Digital. With extensive experience in government collaboration, Ben is a seasoned professional well-versed in navigating the complexities of working with government agencies. He is passionate about driving impactful change in the public sector and offers valuable insights into strategies, processes, and best practices for successful collaborations between government entities and external partners.
Discussion Points -

~ What sort of bogus strategy, or misconception do you want to set the record straight on? 1:59
~ What led Pluribus Digital to specialize in the government sector? Could you share a brief overview of your journey and any key experiences that influenced your company's focus on government-related projects? 3:26
~ How does the business process of working with technology in the government sector typically operate? Could you shed some light on the types of approvals or processes involved in an agency like yours, and how you navigate them? 5:16
~ What's the team structure in government tech projects? Explain the project lifecycle, challenges, and opportunities when working with government agencies.13:26
~ How hard does the government negotiate on pricing? 20:38
~ What was the motivation behind starting a nonprofit organization consisting of a select few companies driven to accelerate the government's digital transformation? 26:31
~ Tell us a little bit about the trucking and traffic management industry. 30:27
~ What’s your perspective on AI? What’s the government doing with it? 33:18
~ Could you provide insights into the company policies or checks in place that strike a balance between utilizing AI for learning and innovation, while avoiding potential risks and safeguarding sensitive information? 37:48
~ Where do you hang out and talk about and discuss the best practices in the government space for the agencies? 40:57
~ What are you looking forward to? 43:34

Show notes -

~ The process is pretty standard to be operating in Agile methodology, you have something like a scrum flavor of Agile, that's the mainstream of government right now. 11:55
~ Sometimes the government can move a little bit slower, but often, that's for very legitimate reasons. Because you're not just talking about “let's improve this process or something else”, you're talking about “Hey, maybe we need to consider a policy change or work with a wider stakeholder group to get that bigger thing done”. 16:53
~ If you hear about big government project failures, it's probably because the policies are maybe a little too convoluted. And then you're trying to build a solution that meets all the requirements of a somewhat convoluted policy. And if you could only do some small things to simplify the policy, then you could make everything just work better, cost less and be simpler for people to use. 18:08
~ One of the programs that we support is login.gov. And, that is a mechanism for people to log in and gain access to services. So you can't just say, “Oh, well, let's not worry about that, the 1% over in this corner”, you have to find some way to service those people. 24:23
~ There's a lot of excitement in government, certainly a lot of signals about using AI in various government use cases. And so that we see that as a need, something that our customers are asking for, and something that we've had a chance to apply in some areas. 33:56
~ There's also the defensive side of it (AI), how might it be used or misused in interactions with the government? So if someone is filling out an application for benefits, and there's some kind of written description portion, then there may be issues if there may be ways to use Chat GPT, that would not be ideal. It could be a tool for fraud or other things. 39:09
~ People value coming together and, just engaging as owners in practical professional support groups and sometimes almost like an emotional support group. 42:48
~ That's really that open space now. How can we not just have technology in government or automate some things, but how can we make things much more natively digital and therefore, scalable and fast and cheaper to operate, and more reliable? 44:17

Myth-Busted - Government and technology are either super advanced with futuristic interfaces or stuck with outdated systems.

Links -
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/bengm/
Company’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/pluribusdigital/
Company website: https://pluribusdigital.com/

Show Credits -

Host - Varun Bihani & Jessie Coan
Produced by Bobby Soni
Edited by Priyanka Sharma
Content by Aakash Damani, Yashika Neekhra, and Juhie Bhardwaj

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