Ashley Owens

When I graduated with my Masters, it was in the middle of the recession. At first, I was just hoping to get a good job with my degree. My MBA is in agribusiness, which is a more unique MBA to have, but I always wanted to do something where I was helping people, too.

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I ended up landing at the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) because they were a big sponsor of a conference I went to: Minorities in Agriculture, Natural Resources, and Related Sciences (MANRRS). I thought, “Okay, this is a way to have a great career with good stability and helping people at the same time.” It felt like a win-win. I could pay off my student debt while making a difference.

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My focus is on technology. Most people interact with the government digitally now, mainly via websites, and the work I do helps make those interactions better. When people complain about a government experience or that they're trying to get a benefit and it's hard, My goal is to make that experience easier.

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A lot of people I encounter are already in a harder space in life, or they wouldn't be going to a government website. They're going there because they actually need something from their government to help them. That experience should be easy.

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I remember this one time, I was getting my lashes done in Vegas for my birthday. The girl doing my lashes asked what I did, and I mentioned a website we had worked on about opioid addiction. She told me she had used that site to help a friend who was addicted to opioids. I wouldn't have thought a 20-something would be saying that to me, but it made me feel so good. Those are the stories that keep me going.

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I really do believe in our government. But for it to live up to what it's supposed to be, it has to work. When people complain about the government not working for them, it's not like they can roll up to one place called “the government” and complain. At most their only conduit to complain is an email or a number on a website.

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The government is the world's largest buyer. The federal government spends about $90 billion annually on information technology. That's a lot of taxpayer dollars. Fortune 500 companies don't spend that annually on their tech. On the other end, that's a lot of funds for small businesses. The government could be an economic beacon for small businesses when we structure our contracts the right way and make sure that our contracts are structured for users of government services. We owe it to the citizens to be using those dollars right.

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Everything is acquisition adjacent. I always say that. There are about 2 billion visits to federal websites each month. Through my passion to make procurement user-centered, I'm able to help citizens in a twofold way: by improving their experience with government services and by creating opportunities for small businesses.

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I specialize in real talk because I think if we had more of that in the government, a lot of decisions would be different. When you are nervous or scared, that's when mistakes happen. It's a fundamental principle around Agile to have a blameless culture. If you look at the case studies of major websites that had issues, a lot of it was people scared throughout the organization to say something. But had they said something, a citizen wouldn't have suffered later. That's why I say, “No, we have to bring honesty to the table and make it a safe space.” Every problem that you bring up is on a roadmap. But there's a citizen that doesn't have that roadmap or time to wait. They need to put dinner on the table tonight, or they need their Social Security benefits now. We should always act with a sense of urgency.

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Public service is evolving toward a more digital-first public experience. The government is at a place where it understands what customer experience means to citizens, not just what it means technically. We're always going to have to check off regulatory or legislative boxes, but there's a human at the end of these things.

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It's nice to see that in the procurement and acquisition space, we are shifting to making sure that the dollars we spend are focused on those user needs.

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For anyone looking to start in government, I'd say that whatever you're passionate about, the government has a role for you. You just have to seek it out and find it. Public service is very rewarding, especially when you encounter people that have a better idea of what government does or appreciates government more because of something you did.

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Sometimes it's an invisible job. Nobody's going to walk down the street and recognize me for my work on a website. But just knowing that when they get home, they're going to have a better experience - it makes it all worth it.

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I'd tell anyone, especially those coming from a small town like I did, that a role in public service can take you to heights you probably wouldn't even think of. The government is agnostic to who you were before you got there. It really cares about the work you're doing and what you show that you can do for others.

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Public service means being a steward of the taxpayer dollar and treating citizens as our customers. It's about asking, “How can we make things better?” and acting with urgency around that. Because at the end of the day, we're here to serve the public, and that's a responsibility I take very seriously.

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