This guide was written to support public sector managers at both the state and local levels who are participating in intergovernmental information systems projects. These officials are responsible for defining, delivering, and managing information systems that connect different levels of government in a single service delivery channel or an integrated administrative process. We have tried to design the guide to be useful to management, program, and technical staff in all phases of project activities.

This first chapter and Appendix A set the context for what follows. Appendix A contains brief project summaries and comparisons of the eleven projects we studied. We encourage you to review them now before proceeding to the discussions in Chapters two and three which present principles and practices based on these project experiences. These are presented in rough logical order, but they are meant to be used iteratively. There is no single "recipe" for success in these complex projects. Instead, there are some overarching considerations (we call them principles) that define the context for these projects; and there are a variety of techniques (we call them best practices) that can be used in different situations.

Chapter 2 presents nine fundamental principles that managers of state- local projects should understand and follow. Chapter 3 presents 19 practices that have good track records for success. For each practice, we present two or three vignettes from the New York State projects we studied that illustrate how good managers are adapting these ideas to real- life situations. The appendices contain brief summaries and comparisons of the eleven projects, an annotated bibliography of related reference material, and a list of World Wide Web sites that contain more information on intergovernmental topics.