DynamicsCon 2024: The build vs buy debate for Federal customers

US federal agencies have a reputation for holding onto legacy IT systems that impose wide-reaching consequences across the government landscape. As a major vendor in the federal space, Microsoft wants these organizations to find ways to introduce the new enterprise technology, and that usually means finding ways to embrace those older systems.

Jamie Willis-Rose, a Microsoft Technical Specialist focused on federal customers in the Washington, DC-area, has been spreading the message on Microsoft’s latest business applications and services in government, and he will be sharing his perspective at DynamicsCon 2024, scheduled for May 13-16, 2024 in Denver, Colorado, as a presenter. 

The federal government trails the private sector in many forms of technology adoption, Willis-Rose told MSDW. For many agencies, Microsoft Power Platform is a “game changer” as a low-code toolset to automate processes and overcoming the limitations of legacy custom-built software programs, he says.

We have a lot of customers that have to deal with the reality on the ground, with big legacy systems for human resources that are outside of their control. Many agencies work with other agencies, reporting to higher agencies with systems outside their purview. We can come in with the Power Platform, connect to that system that you have and connect to anything with RPA, APIs, wherever you need us to be. 

What we’re really trying to be is the single pane of glass for the end user to replace the pain point of the user experience.

Because many federal agencies are working with potentially dozens of disparate systems, technical problems arise frequently. Some problems are so bad they result in staff attrition, due to poor user experience and constant context switching. Power Platform can be used to create data-driven websites quickly with Power Apps and Power Pages, while Copilot Studio, formerly known as Power Virtual Agents, can help agencies build low-code chat bots and extend Microsoft 365 Copilots. Additionally, Power Automate allows agencies to be more efficient with limited resources through automation of manual business processes.