Administrative Conference of the United States

After spending 6 intensive months supporting a prime contractor, we decided to explore direct federal government contracting. So, we went to FBO.GOV (back then, it was called FedBizOpps but has since been replaced by SAM.GOV).

The first request for proposal (RFP) we identified was for a new agency that the Obama Administration had just stood up, with a 6-week deadline. Having served dot-com startups for several years, we were confident we could do it. So, we submitted a proposal for $85,000 to design, develop, test, and deploy a WordPress website for the Administrative Conference of the United States (ACUS.GOV). 

Ours was the lowest bid, by far, and the only one that guaranteed a successful site launch in less than 6 weeks. The larger, more established GovCons in the area protested our winning proposal. "It's impossible," they claimed, "to build a government website that fast for that price." But, the ACUS didn't have a lot of options. They were under a federal mandate to stand up the agency and the website by October 2010.  So, they went with Agileana.

6 weeks later, they had a shiny, brand-new website powered by WordPress.

Agileana continued to support ACUS.GOV in an operations, maintenance, and management (O&M) mode, occassionally adding new features and changes from time to time. But then there was a change in the guard. A new administration, a new communications director, and with that, ACUS had outgrown their startup website.  

So, we worked with ACUS once again to redesign, redevelop, and redeploy the website but this time, it would be in Drupal - a content management system (CMS) favored by the federal government. Not known at the time for being easy to use, we were surprised when we were told that the new Drupal site was easier to manage than the previous WordPress website. This is because we invested as much time on the content management experience as we did on the website visitor experience.

Since 2010, Agileana has partnered with the Administrative Conference of the United States (ACUS), beginning with a rapid six-week website launch and evolving into a full-service digital partnership. Key efforts included migrating the site from Drupal 7 to Drupal 9 to enhance content management flexibility and scalability, modernizing the design and user experience, and ensuring full accessibility compliance to serve all users. Agileana also achieved and maintained FISMA compliance to meet stringent federal security standards, strengthening the site’s security posture. 

Through an agile and collaborative approach, Agileana conducted thorough audits, vulnerability assessments, and continuous testing while providing ongoing operational support, including hosting, maintenance, and timely enhancements. This sustained partnership has resulted in a secure, accessible, and scalable web platform that meets federal standards, supports ACUS’s mission effectively, and ensures responsiveness to evolving user needs and digital challenges.