Data Enablement: Accelerating Outcomes Through Data

The U.S. government can and must do a better job of using technology to support its missions and achieve improved outcomes for the nation. This has been true for a long time. Still, in recent decades, vast amounts of data have become available for potential analysis and operationalization, creating broad new opportunities for federal missions to leverage technology for more impactful and efficient service to the public.

As data grows in quality and quantity, and technology grows in power and sophistication, a positive feedback loop has emerged. On one end of the loop, data—in forms like metrics used to measure quality and progress and training sets used to teach AI how to perform more advanced tasks—is powering the rapid advancement of various technologies. On the other hand, these same technologies enable data to be used in increasingly consequential ways.

With the full power of their data unlocked, federal agencies can identify and address inefficiencies; identify, model, and mitigate against a broad range of threats; expose and combat fraud, waste, and abuse; improve decision making from leadership to the frontlines; and speed and improve a broad range of services.

Achieving full data enablement will require most federal agencies to wholly transform their approaches to IT—a major undertaking that will present many complex challenges. Through extensive experience helping agencies modernize and transform their technology portfolios, Booz Allen understands that the most critical work in this arena falls into three high-level categories: Digital transformation, software development at scale, and data strategy and governance. Let’s take a closer look at each. 

Digital transformation provides the essential foundation for achieving data enablement by making it possible to adopt advanced technologies and processes that streamline data collection, management, and analysis. Managing transformation at the enterprise level carries several key advantages.

By offering cloud, AI-assisted software delivery, security, and other enabling technologies as centrally managed, shared services, agencies can prevent duplicative spending and disparate architectures arising from more siloed, program-by-program approaches. High-level management also helps to ensure that cloud-native capabilities are consistently leveraged to replace legacy approaches with modern practices.

Transparency is another benefit of a shared-services-centered approach to transformation. When technology operations are consolidated, CIOs have the enterprise-wide visibility to track costs, identify waste, and maximize efficiency.

Mission-driven data strategies focus on realizing data’s full potential as a mission enabler. To enable mission, data must be secure, precisely governed, and readily available and consumable to the mission leaders and operators who need it. Security is best achieved by applying zero-trust principles to enforce fine-grained access control. Availability can be addressed through open architectures and integrated data platforms that utilize automation and AI to speed clean-up, standardization, and delivery. With these foundations in place, data can be treated as a product—optimized for convenient mission use—and refined into the fuel necessary to build advanced AI-based tools.

Mission software must be purpose-tailored and delivered at scale to meet modern performance expectations and address evolving mission requirements. It must also instantly and reliably deliver relevant data and functionality to leaders, managers, and frontline operators. Success requires a software delivery partner with elite technical expertise and a deep understanding of the mission.

Leveraging AI for software design and delivery is rapidly becoming the industry standard. Integrating AI throughout the software development lifecycle allows teams to focus on delivering value and resolving complex challenges swiftly, improving time-to-market. This strategy minimizes overhead, maximizes delivery confidence, and ensures that agencies and their missions remain at the cutting edge of technology.

The transformation necessary for data enablement can’t happen instantly, but it must happen fast—there’s no time to lose. Focused on outcomes and trusted to help our clients transform for the future, Booz Allen is ready to help missions across government realize data enablement’s power to advance the nation.