# The role of UX in an agile team

 

 

Date: Wednesday, January 22, 2020

 By  [CivicActions](/civicactions)

### Examining the challenges and opportunities of bringing good user experience to government

Photo by [M S on Flickr](https://www.flickr.com/photos/mollystevens/5179946914/in/photolist-8TJzKy-5hhMB6-5hhMFM-5Vg9dD-9SaXBB-rH2Rb-8hdhxK-amhht5-5rboY-adyc5E-5RfMF5-6Vbwsz-6Vbwqe-diUmLp-5ffAs2-7frYQF-4jVMr-6iS4W9-9VPPeU-65hib8-prwU9-6b29Dz-tJVYg7-ejSZLE-7cgzLT-rH3nZ-rH2Vn-rH34e-rH35Q-rH3eL-9UqPzL-9immWK-9XQgTC-6BHCnF-bYKLnC-kgUgpq-aMU5Fi-64CFwf-bYKKUE-6H86SD-e5SLAB-ek9vXt-3cxNPj-mxvmJz-o4PNU-dCkrik-bmoEef-fPcQr7-58jWxC-ameuiv)

[Rachel Kroft](https://civicactions.com/team/rachel-kroft), Senior UX Researcher at CivicActions, participated in a panel discussion with government practitioners on bringing good user experience to the public sector. The panel was hosted by [AGL Association](https://www.agilegovleaders.org/), which builds community and resources for modernizing government digital services.

The discussion included the most pressing issues facing the public sector UX community, such as:

- How does UX fit into an agile process?
- How can government recognize and hire good UX talent?
- How can firms compete successfully for agile dev and design contracts?
- How can we remove the walls between users and development teams?

Panelists also included Mike Palmer (U.S. Digital Service), Dana Chisnell (Center for Civic Design), Michael Akindele (UX and Product Innovation Specialist), Christy Hermansen (GSA), and Jagannath Chakravarty (Appian Corporation).

[Watch Rachel Kroft and other government practitioners discuss UX and agile at AGL Live](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uLpReul4aBA)

**Highlights**

- 4:00 — Panelist intros
- 6:05 — How user needs can inadvertently get buried beneath “user” stories
- 9:11 — Anyone who is advocating for user needs can be, in a sense, a “designer”
- 10:55 — Instead of asking “How can we fit UX into agile?” it’s perhaps more helpful to ask “How can agile serve the user experience?”
- 19:23 — What to look for when hiring for a UX role
- 22:13 — How to look inside your own organization for UX talent
- 29:18 — A story about UX and [FLASH](https://medium.com/@EricHysen/lessons-learned-from-the-governments-biggest-attempt-to-fix-tech-procurement-bd2265421211)
- 31:36 — How to build UX capacity iteratively within government
- 41:19 — Two specific things vendors can write into proposals to show their UX chops and win more contracts
- 46:58 — A story about failing fast in a project where 10 websites were taken apart and put back together . . . and what the users had to do with it
- 51:27 — Advice on setting up weekly sessions where sketches and ideas are presented regularly, to get continuous feedback.
- 52:33 — How to bring tools from service design and UX into an agile setting

**Resources**

- [The Evolution of UX Process Methodology](https://uxplanet.org/the-evolution-of-ux-process-methodology-47f52557178b)
- [What makes a good UI/UX-er GREAT](https://blog.prototypr.io/what-makes-a-good-ui-uxer-great-are-they-called-ui-uxers-anymore-835c178accb2)
- [U.S. Digital Service Playbook](https://playbook.cio.gov/)

**Connect with Rachel!**

- [LinkedIn](https://www.linkedin.com/in/rachelkroft/)