Wolf&Grayson EditorialFederal modernization often starts not with shiny new systems, but with the tools agencies already own — and the discipline to use them more efficiently. The most credible form of innovation is measurable improvement, delivered through practical decisions that keep the mission moving.
“Mission-driven leadership in GovTech is about finding the available tools that are ready to use and, in the agency, already exist and then helping them refine the tools they have to get the best or higher productivity out of what they’re already using,” said Michael Valdez Sanders, Founder and CEO of Interactive Government Holdings Inc. (IGH).
Innovation does not always mean adding technology. Sometimes it means subtracting friction. GovTech’s most visible stories tend to spotlight new platforms and novel applications. Sanders is more interested in what is already paid for and underused.
Federal environments come with layers of bureaucracy, performance work statements, and strict security requirements. Agencies are not going to “let you pop something into their environment.”.. The result is a high cost of change, not just in dollars, but in time, training, and operational disruption.
Sanders describes the work as “treasure hunting,” because it often begins with discovering what an agency already has. Sanders, reflecting on years spent advising federal agencies on technology modernization and operational change. Unlocking those hidden assets can produce outsized gains without triggering lengthy procurement cycles.
At its best, that approach meets agencies where they are and builds momentum through measurable progress. “Sometimes getting rid of things is almost as good as getting a new thing because you just free up all sorts of time,” he says. “You can demonstrate innovation by subtracting just as much as you can by adding.”
A Case Study in Speed: Turning an 18-Month Backlog Into Seven Days
Mission-driven leadership becomes real when it changes outcomes. Sanders points to a contract at the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) where IGH, Sanders’ federal services firm focused on technology modernization and change management, inherited an 18-month backlog. When the work was complete, the backlog had been reduced to under seven days.
Part of the lift involved untangling legacy systems. “We migrated something like 3.3 billion records out of Cobalt,” Sanders shares, referring to a long-standing programming language still embedded in many government environments. HUD’s dependence on that legacy code created a talent bottleneck. “It’s so old that they would have to pay somebody like 500 bucks an hour to come fix it because there’s just not that many of those guys around,” he says.
The most effective GovTech work is defined by what it removes, from duplicated steps, manual handoffs, and tasks that quietly consume the capacity agencies need to deliver services. Backlogs shrink when teams map workflows, remove bottlenecks, and design processes around real user behavior rather than around organizational charts.
Adoption Is a Leadership Problem Before It Is a Technology Problem
Even well-built technology fails when the people who meant to use it do not trust it. Sanders traces adoption to three factors: “timing, cost and agency leadership.” In practice, leadership buy-in is the lever that moves the rest.
“Getting buy in from a decision maker is by and far the easiest way to get something that’s adopted,” he says. Not because top-down directives solve everything, but because they create permission to change routines that have calcified over years.
It is important not to romanticize the challenge. Government employees are not huge fans of change and that resistance is often rational as change can mean increased public scrutiny. Adoption improves when teams can clearly show how a shift will make work “better, easier, faster,” and reduce “less work that they hate.”
He has also seen what happens when stakeholder dynamics are misread. On one engagement, Sanders encountered what he called a “very hostile customer” who resisted from day one because the contracting officer had worked with the same vendor for a decade. The lesson he learned came down to good governance. Transformations falter when programs launch without socializing the change, aligning incentives, and securing sponsorship that survives beyond contract award.
Building Teams That Deliver Mission Outcomes Under Pressure
Sanders’ leadership philosophy centers on measurement and accountability. “What you track gets measured,” he says, underscoring that mission outcomes become achievable only when teams agree on what matters and report it consistently.
Measurement, however, is not about control. Sanders pairs it with enablement. Leaders, he says, “have to enable your employees, give them the best tools, the best training, the best support,” and then trust them to do their work. That trust begins with hiring well and continues by creating an environment where staff can surface issues early, before they become program risks.
Clear feedback loops are essential to that environment. Sanders maintains an open-door policy, giving employees direct access to leadership when situations escalate. The goal is not constant intervention, but psychological safety in complex client settings where uncertainty and pressure are common.
That approach also shapes how Sanders responds to conflict. “No matter how thin the pancake, there’s always two sides,” he says, quoting his HR director. When a customer complained that resumes had not been sent, Sanders verified the record and confirmed that 26 had already been delivered. In high-pressure programs, standing by the facts is often inseparable from standing by the team.
Mission-Driven Leadership Matters More in the Next Cycle
GovTech leaders are not operating in a stable market. The turbulence of 2025 underscored how quickly conditions can change, with an estimated 50,000 contracts canceled across the federal landscape. “It devastated a lot of companies,” Sanders says.
Agency priorities can shift rapidly, and contractors that are overconcentrated in a single portfolio can find themselves exposed almost overnight.
Sanders’ response is a discipline familiar to military operators: prepare for volatility and build resilience before it is needed. “Your portfolio and your pipeline need to be not only deep but wide,” he says. “You need to diversify,” including across agencies and across contracting vehicles.
Financial readiness is part of the mission, too. Sanders’ CFO moved quickly to collect receivables when a shutdown was possible, bringing in enough cash to could cover the next 3 payroll cycles. “Your balance sheet needs to be bulletproof,”
This is the connective tissue between mission and innovation. Agencies need partners who can modernize systems without derailing operations, and who can sustain delivery even when external conditions change. For Sanders, that is not just a business strategy. It is a leadership obligation.
Follow Michael Valdez Sanders on LinkedIn or visit his website for more insights.
