_posts/2015-06-16-fast-company-story.md
---
title: "Making sense of Washington’s tech landscape"
date: 2015-06-16
layout: post
authors:
- andre
tags:
- u.s. digital service
- digital services movement
excerpt: "The cover story in this month’s Fast
Company
offers a great metaphor to better explain the relationship of 18F, the U.S. Digital Service headquarters, and the digital teams inside various agencies."
description: "The cover story in this month’s Fast
Company
offers a great metaphor to better explain the relationship of 18F, the U.S. Digital Service headquarters, and the digital teams inside various agencies."
image: /assets/blog/fast-company/jumpshot.jpg
hero: false
---
*Photo by Daniel Shea for Fast Company*
We often get asked to explain how 18F fits in with the larger U.S.
digital services family. While we’re all working to improve the way the
federal government builds and buys digital services, 18F, the U.S.
Digital Service Headquarters team (USDS), and the digital teams inside
various agencies are tackling this problem from different angles and
with different goals.
The cover story in this month’s [Fast
Company](https://www.fastcompany.com/3046756/obama-and-his-geeks)
offers a great metaphor to better explain the relationship of all these
digital teams.
> What the designers of this effort actually want to create is something
> more dynamic—in effect, a technology ecosystem that long outlasts
> their stints in government. In that regard, you might consider
> Washington’s tech landscape, as it currently exists, as a kind of
> brown and barren field. And on that field, consider each agency as
> having a fenced-in plot of land. The USDS works now as landscape
> architects—the ones who design what kind of trees and plantings will
> go in each plot, and who will do the work. The people at 18F function
> like a nursery and contractors—they’ll provide the healthiest trees
> and do the plantings, either on their own or via someone they trust.
> They’ll even teach you how to be a good gardener. Meanwhile, the tech
> teams at agencies like Education and Veterans will take what USDS and
> 18F advise to make their plot flourish.
>
> The overarching goal here is to get everything to grow together—very
> tall, very fast, inevitably joining up into a forest canopy so as to
> create a functional and interconnected system.
Learn more about our mission and the projects we are working on in the
[Fast Company article](https://www.fastcompany.com/3046756/obama-and-his-geeks).