Customer experience (CX) continues to evolve from a corporate buzzword to a permanent federal priority. From the President’s Management Agenda to the most recent Executive Order 14338, the focus on improving the usability and design of public-facing services continues. Journey mapping, service blueprints, and Chief Experience Officers are no longer just a trend, they are concepts and practices we see in action every day.
However, as technology continues to accelerate, especially with AI and LLMS, agencies face new challenges. The next phase of the experience design movement in government will require uniting human-centered design with secure development and AI-driven tools. That’s exactly the challenge, and the opportunity, facing today’s CX leaders.
EO 14338: A Blueprint for Better Design
Executive Order 14338, “Improving Our Nation Through Better Design,” calls for a unified, citizen-first approach to digital experience. The Order builds on earlier CX efforts by creating the National Design Studio, a shared federal service that is focused on improving design excellence and operational standardization across agencies.
The National Design Studio’s mission is to help agencies modernize their design systems, elevate accessibility, and adopt consistent patterns that make it easier for citizens to navigate government services, from filing your taxes to applying for a fishing license. It also signals another fundamental, and necessary shift: rather than each agency reinventing the wheel when it comes to CX, federal requirements will now provide a centralized source of design expertise and standards.
The EO acknowledges previous efforts by continuing to urge agencies to benchmark their services against leading commercial experiences in travel, retail, and personal finance. In short, EO 14338 wants to connect the art of design with the science of performance and continue to push the government toward a more agile, customer-centric model of service delivery.
Experience Design Challenges in the Age of AI
As we discussed in a recent GovCX Collective event, the government’s biggest CX challenges are no longer about goals, they are about execution. Agencies know they need to be more customer centric. The question now is how to operationalize that vision within the constraints of legacy systems, complex regulations, and new AI-driven technologies changing the landscape daily.
Despite the challenges, we can’t ignore that AI offers enormous promise for improving federal digital experiences. “Pre-checks” for citizen services, for example, can help reduce manual workload in permitting or benefits processing. Agentic assistants can guide users through complex forms, improving accuracy and accessibility. Predictive analytics can help agencies identify where citizens are getting stuck and proactively offer solutions.
However, these benefits only become a reality when AI is both aligned with the agency mission and grounded in well-defined user needs. Without that alignment, technology can introduce new friction points rather than removing them.
One of the most common pitfalls we see is treating AI as an “add-on” rather than an integrated element of the design process. For instance, modernizing a permit system with AI without revisiting the underlying process often results in faster but equally frustrating experiences. Similarly, updating workflows without modernizing the supporting technology delivers only surface-level change.
The takeaway is clear: process and technology must evolve together. To achieve true digital transformation, one answer is to combine experience design, secure deployment of technology, and agile delivery. We call this approach DevSecCXOps.
How DevSecCXOps Can Help
DevSecCXOps builds on the proven DevSecOps framework by explicitly embedding customer experience best practices into every phase of technology delivery. It ensures that the same rigor applied to security and compliance is also applied to the citizen experience.
In practice, DevSecCXOps follows a clear approach:
1. Evaluate the Agency’s Mission
Every digital service should tie directly to mission outcomes. CX becomes a performance measure, not a side goal. Discovery workshops help clarify what “success” looks like, from reducing citizen burden to increasing trust and equity.
2. Understand Business Processes and Requirements
Before coding begins, map the end-to-end process from the agency’s perspective. Identify where outdated systems create friction and ensure requirements include not only functional and security needs but also experience metrics like satisfaction and ease of use.
3. Engage Citizen Stakeholders
The EO calls for designing with the customer, not for the customer. Agencies should conduct interviews, journey mapping, and contextual research to understand pain points and co-create solutions. Showing citizens how their input shapes outcomes builds lasting trust.
4. Create a Service Blueprint
Service blueprints connect the “front stage” (citizen experience) to the “backstage” (systems, policies, staffing). They reveal where internal complexity impacts external usability and highlight opportunities to improve cross-agency coordination.
5. Prototype the Ideal Digital Experience
Co-create prototypes with both agency staff and citizens, demonstrating trustworthy design principles, plain language, accessibility compliance, and mobile-first layouts. This phase is where human-centered design meets secure, iterative development.
6. Begin Development with Incremental Testing
Integrate continuous feedback loops. Use agile sprints with citizen usability sessions at every milestone. Test across devices, networks, and assistive technologies. Security and compliance checks happen in parallel, ensuring they don’t degrade experience later.
7. Iterate and Improve Based on Citizen Feedback
Real-world analytics and A/B testing help validate decisions. Agencies can monitor satisfaction, identify drop-off points, and reprioritize backlog items based on voice-of-customer input, not just internal preferences.
8. Establish Long-Term Metrics and Feedback Loops
Finally, CX maturity requires sustained measurement. Dashboards tracking satisfaction, trust, and accessibility metrics keep leadership focused on outcomes that matter. Feedback channels. ensure that iteration never stops.
As a team member recently observed, the government often views services through a process lens, while citizens view them through an experience lens. Reorganizing information by problem sets rather than internal structures, “I need a permit,” not “I need to interact with Department X,” is the key to designing for real life.
DevSecCXOps enables agencies to design secure, compliant systems that citizens enjoy using. It also creates a repeatable structure for scaling innovation, exactly the kind of standardization envisioned by the National Design Studio.
The Path Forward
Executive Order 14338 makes it clear that CX is not a single initiative but a discipline that is here to stay. AI will undoubtedly play a major role in this future, helping agencies predict needs, streamline processes, and scale personalized services. But technology alone will never be enough. The real power lies in how human teams will design, build, and govern these experiences.
Want to discuss further? Join us on October 21 at the GovCX Collective for “From Potholes to Pathways: Digital Experience Design and the Future of Government Services.”
We’ll explore EO 14338, the National Design Studio, and how DevSecCXOps can help agencies deliver the next generation of citizen experiences.
