Cross-program team health

[widal001]

Summary

Internal stakeholders feel like they are valued members of a collaborative team that is able to achieve its goals quickly and effectively.

Press release

The SimplerGrants program has launched a cross-program initiative focused on team health, ensuring that internal stakeholders from Nava, Agile Six, Boom Works, and HHS feel valued, supported, and connected. This initiative prioritizes a collaborative environment where team members can work effectively across organizational boundaries to achieve shared goals.

Our approach centers around fostering trust, psychological safety, and continuous feedback loops to surface and address challenges early. By promoting transparency, respect, and alignment across the program, we aim to create a high-performing, motivated team that drives sustainable success for the Grants.gov modernization.

Acceptance criteria

• [ ] Team feedback loops: Regular cross-program health surveys are conducted with key themes shared transparently across the team to inform improvements.
• [ ] Collaboration practices: Retrospectives are held every month, with structured action items to address any emerging issues or frustrations.
• [ ] Visible recognition: A shared recognition program is created (e.g., “team shoutouts” in Slack or meetings) to highlight individual and group contributions.

Metrics

• Engagement: Quarterly survey results show at least a 75% favorable response to questions about feeling valued and supported.
• Action closure: 70% of actions from retrospectives are completed within one month.
• Retention: Internal turnover remains below 10% across vendors during the first project year.

Assumptions and dependencies

• Assumptions
  • All program stakeholders (Nava, Agile Six, Bloom Works, and HHS) are committed to investing time in sync meetings and retrospectives.
  • Psychological safety can be achieved and maintained through consistent feedback loops.
  • Leadership across the program supports visible recognition efforts for team contributions.
• Dependencies
  • Participation from all key teams and individuals in health surveys and sync meetings.
  • Availability of survey tools (e.g., Google Forms, Typeform) and reporting dashboards to analyze survey feedback.
  • Cross-program alignment on meeting schedules to accommodate all participants.

Related goals

• Foster team collaboration and alignment: Building a sense of shared purpose across all participating vendors and stakeholders ensures that everyone feels invested in the success of the modernization effort.
• Develop sustainable delivery practices: A healthy team culture ensures long-term success, reducing burnout and promoting continuous engagement across vendors.
• Improve delivery velocity: High levels of team health and collaboration accelerate decision-making and execution, enabling the team to meet goals more efficiently.

Additional information

N/A

[widal001]

Sprint 1.1 updates

Status: 🟢 On track

Sprint goal

The main goal for this deliverable in Sprint 1.1 was to onboard the team and prepare for the first onsite.

Accomplishments

• Completed (initial) onboarding steps for HHS.
• Added new team members to the wiki.
• Confirmed the dates and location of the first onsite.
• Drafted an agenda for the first onsite.

Rollover

N/A

Risks

N/A

Next sprint

Finalize and host first onsite

[widal001]

I just added Agile Six's first draft of the deliverable spec. We may adjust the approach, ACs, or metrics after discussing further with the other vendor teams (Nava and Bloom Works).

[widal001]

Sprint 1.2 updates

Status: 🟢 On track

Sprint goal

Finalize onsite plans and conduct first onsite

Accomplishments

• Hosted first onsite
• Facilitated retrospective on the first 6 weeks of the program

Rollover

N/A

Risks

• Only potential risk is that we may need slow or pause work on this deliverable in Sprint 1.3 to catch up on #2348

Next sprint (Sprint 1.3)

• Retrospect on the onsite and implement lessons learned