OSS resilience vs precision

Resilience is what happens when we’re able to move forward even when things don’t fit together the way we expect.[OSS project anyone???]
And tolerances are an engineer’s measurement of how well the parts meet spec.
One way to ensure that things work out the way you hope is to spend the time and money to ensure that every part, every form, every worker meets spec. Tighten your spec, increase precision and you’ll discover that systems become more reliable.
The other alternative is to embrace the fact that nothing is ever exactly on spec, and to build resilient systems.
You’ll probably find that while precision feels like the way forward, resilience, the ability to thrive when things go wrong, is a much safer bet
.”
Seth Godin
here.

Yesterday’s post talked about the difference between having a team of artisans versus a team that paints by numbers. Seth’s blog provides a similar comparison. Instead of comparing by talent, Seth compares by attitude.

I’m really conflicted by Seth’s comparison.

From the side of past experience, resilience is a massive factor in overcoming the many obstacles faced on implementation projects. I’ve yet to work on an OSS project where all challenges were known at inception.

From the side of an ideal future, precision and repeatability are essential factors in improving the triple constraint of OSS delivery and increasing reliability for customers. And whilst talking about the future, the concept of network slicing (which holds the key for 5G) is dependent upon OSS repeatability and efficiency.

So which do we focus on? Building a vastly talented, experienced and resilient implementation team? Or building a highly reliable, repeatable implementation system? Both, most likely.

But what if you only get to choose one? Which do you focus on (for you and your team/system)?

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