Agile Public Policy: Transforming Policy Development, Implementation, and Evaluation

Agile Policy

Background

To solve the nation’s most pressing challenges, leaders need to embrace new ways of developing and implementing policy across all levels of government. Agile Government is more mission-focused, customer-centric, and adaptive. Agile utilizes dynamic cross-functional teams and active customer participation, with leaders empowering these teams to take swift action and deliver timely, meaningful results.

Project Description

The National Academy of Public Administration (the Academy) is pleased to announce a new study funded by the Freeman Charitable Trust to deepen the understanding and practice of how Agile Government principles, concepts, and best practices can be incorporated into policy development, implementation, and evaluation at all levels of government.

Our working hypothesis is that Agile Policy includes:

• Bringing together those who develop policy with those who implement policy earlier and more frequently.
• Involving human-centered design and mechanisms to capture user feedback during policy development and implementation.
• Leveraging behavioral insights about how the public interacts with policy and programs to ensure they are designed and delivered in ways that meet the needs of the public.
• Creating iterative processes for continuous learning throughout implementation to be updated in real-time to meet user needs.

The project is expected to conclude in Summer 2025.

Study Fellows