At ISM APHSA 2026 (IT Solutions Management for Human Services Education Conference & Expo) in Spokane, WA, one message stood out: agencies are getting results by starting with the outcome they want and taking small, measured steps. Conversations have shifted from big rebuilds to modular, incremental work that delivers value in stages, often by getting more from the systems agencies already run. Success increasingly depends on tying technology choices to caseworkers’ daily work and to how ready the people doing that work are. The agencies and federal partners leading the way treat modernization as a continuous capability rather than a one-time project, building organizations that can adapt as policy, programs, and technology change.
Too many modernization efforts begin with a platform or an RFP. The agencies making real progress begin with a question about the work: where is the bottleneck costing caseworkers and families the most time? For one agency, the answer was paper. As shared at ISM 2026, pairing a document-reading tool it already owned with its eligibility system took about 90 days and returned 6,600 manual hours in a single quarter, the equivalent of about 13 full-time staff.
The pattern repeated across the conference. Agencies set aside full replacements, used what they already had, and aimed small, fast builds at a specific outcome. The leaders behind them also changed how they budget, moving from one-time projects to continuous modernization that improves over time.
Federal speakers noted that about $2.5 billion has been approved for new child welfare system builds, and only about 10% of those builds are fully operational. When asked why projects stalled, speakers ranked technology fit last. The real causes were readiness, alignment between business and technology teams, change management, governance, and procurement.
Data foundations show the same pattern. One agency resolved identities across programs with a single matching service, bringing duplicate records in some programs from as high as 24% down to 2%. A session on data governance showed how another agency built its program by connecting the people it already had and treating the work as a change initiative.
One agency piloted an open-source document AI tool that checks income documents for blur and missing information while applicants are still uploading. Applicants consent first, the feedback is advisory, and caseworkers still decide eligibility. In the first week, 30% of 400 applicants opted in. The pilot now has more than 2,000 users, nearly half of applicants opting in, and no help desk tickets. The key was using AI in an assist role.
Consent and visibility mattered just as much in income verification. Agencies that kept the experience inside a system applicants recognize, and let them see and contest what was shared, built the trust that adoption depends on.
Eligibility workers did not sign up to chase documents. Leaders who took that seriously used automation to give staff time for the complicated cases, and they started by sending program and technology teams to sit with caseworkers and watch the work. Federal speakers added that the strongest projects had a product owner who translated between practice and technology. Workforce capacity, change leadership, and clear communication carried as much weight as the platform.
Nearly every success story began as a pilot with a way to measure it. Agencies compared users against non-users, ramped up in stages, and ran trials for months before committing to contracts. Small, well-measured steps let leaders show results and catch problems before they reached everyone, and they gave oversight partners a clear trail to follow.
The agencies making progress began with an outcome, a narrow first step, and a plan to measure it. Our Health and Human Services team works from that same pattern through transformation management, data and systems modernization, workforce and organizational optimization, and NextGen Testing Services. If a paper-heavy process or a stalled build is costing your teams hours, tell us which one and we will help develop a rapid action plan.
ISM 2026 got people talking candidly, reinforcing what we hear from agencies every day: human services modernization has become an organizational challenge as much as a technical one. Agencies are being asked to respond faster to federal change, use AI responsibly, and give caseworkers their time back. The leaders who succeed will build organizations that adapt as quickly as the environment around them.
If you are weighing an AI pilot, planning a system modernization, or trying to build adoption that outlasts go-live, let’s talk through what that looks like for your agency.