RESOURCE CENTER

Customer Snapshot

The FDIC and USDA Rural Development are innovating in government.

USDA-RD and FDIC utilize interagency collaboration to modernize congressional interactions.

Time to read: 1.9 minutes

Together, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) and the U.S. Department of Agriculture-Rural Development (USDA-RD)has set the example for inter-agency collaboration. At a time when many government agencies are trying to do more with less, the FDIC and the USDA Rural Development teams have identified similarities in their business operations and congressional interactions, which facilitated a partnership to share strategies and drive technological innovation.

The FDIC launched the Congressional Analysis Unified Correspondence Utility System, or CAUCUS, on the FedRAMP-authorized Salesforce Customer 360 Platform for Public Sector. It is a low-code / no-code, data call and business automation platform that gives the team a comprehensive view of interactions with members of Congress. Thus providing the FDIC leadership real-time, actionable visibility of the concerns and interests of Congress in federal financial regulatory activities.

“We can provide the senior leadership a more comprehensive view of Congress’ real-time interest in the FDIC. We can show patterns, events that served as catalysts for change, and – most importantly – subsequent evolution of a member's position over the course of time, all in a fast and data-driven manner.”

Steve Primrose, Legislative Advisor, FDIC Office of Legislative Affairs

It is this solution that bridged the partnership between the FDIC and USDA Rural Development. By repurposing the FDIC code and the integrated data layer, USDA was able to replicate key criteria to develop the Congressional Announcement Management System (CAMS), also built on the FedRAMP-authorized Salesforce platform. This sharing of knowledge enabled the USDA to go live in just one month incurring both time and cost savings for the team.

Best practices from the FDIC and USDA partnership.

“There are three things that helped us develop our process: The first was finding a technology platform that could support our processes. The second was leveraging the code from FDIC. And the third was the foundational integration data layer,” said Hingtgen.

Read more about this and other best practices demonstrated by this team and use them to create your next to-do list.

“For us (USDA-RD) it wasn’t about being first and it was about being smart,” said Jerry Hingtgen, Software Development’s Delta Branch Chief at the USDA-RD, “I know as a federal agency, we were not the only ones reporting to Congress how we're spending money. Inter-agency collaborations such as these aren’t often seen in government, but it goes to show we (people, organizations, industries, etc.) are more alike than we are different.”

Learn more about the USDA-RD and FDIC journey here