Building Agile Ecosystems and User-Centered Product Teams @ BESPIN
Overview
Unison Solutions has worked alongside BESPIN to stand up, grow, and sustain a software factory in the DoW using commercial best practices:
BESPIN was a concept to modernize the Air Force’s business systems through teaching Airmen agile practices and user-centered design to build software for their own mission sets.
We were hired as the Ecosystem Coordinator, helping the Air Force stand up BESPIN, bring commercial best practices to the organization, and build user-centered product teams.
The organization has grown over the years, and we remained the ecosystem coordinator responsible for onboarding new teams and sustaining existing teams in agile practices.
We also ran PI planning events at the product and organizational levels every 4 months; ensuring alignment and prioritization across the entire organization.
Challenge
In a complex ecosystem like BESPIN’s, successfully developing and aligning all stakeholders to a new strategy is only the first step. The true challenge lies in sustaining alignment across constant leadership changes and organizational churn. Without this alignment modernization slows, readiness suffers, and trust erodes.
Approach
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Established a recurring alignment cadence using Gallup engagement data to ensure strategy reflected real workforce needs and priorities.
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Redesigned communication and planning rhythms to reduce duplication and create consistent, mission-focused execution cycles.
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Clarified roles and responsibilities during reorganization to improve accountability, adaptability, and team morale.
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Supported agile maturity through assessments, coaching, and rituals that improved delivery speed and adaptability to user needs.
Conclusion
Unison Solutions’ ability to integrate strategy, culture, and delivery ensured that BESPIN didn’t just modernize once; it built the capacity to sustain modernization through inevitable churn. This is the difference between shipping software and securing enduring mission impact.