OSS Transformation is all about managing change – organisationally, functionally and operationally during in-flight projects. This is the most commonly overlooked factor when planning OSS projects
“McDonald’s hit a peak moment of productivity by getting to a mythical scale, with a limited menu and little in they way of customization. They could deliver a burger for a fraction of what it might take a diner to do it on demand. McDonald’s now challenges the idea that custom has to cost more, […]
I hold a somewhat philosophical view of where OSS (and IT in general) fits within its overall timeline. It’s all pretty nascent in the grand scheme of things. Whilst communitications technology is the common thread, I’ve worked in many industries including construction, mining, engineering, government, utilities, emergency services, healthcare, farming and more. Most of these […]
Have you noticed that TM Forum’s eTOM seems to be used in common vernacular when people talk about mapping and/or comparing products. eTOM and TAM are both quite closely linked (you’ll notice the similarities in colour-banding between the two). However, eTOM is more of a standardized mapping of workflows, whereas TAM is more of a mapping of […]
“So, I asked myself, why? Why aren’t businesses taking the opportunity to digitize and improve at the same time? The answer I suspect is because many digitizing programmes sit on a hot-bed of over-engineering. Oftentimes this means adopting”strategic” business platforms which require companies to adapt their processes to fit them rather than the other way […]
In recent times, I did some work at a tier-1 telco where an adjacent project was implementing a major changeover of an essential OSS / BSS platform. The old suite is acknowledged as having lots of legacy data, processes, etc. And when I say legacy, I mean stuff that hasn’t been used for years, just […]
It Took Sheryl Sandberg exactly 2 sentences to give the best career advice you’ll hear today. I want you to ponder the following question for a moment, because it’s one of the most important questions you’ll ever answer… The question was posed to Sheryl Sandberg: “What’s the number one thing you look for in someone […]
On face-value, you’d think that NASA’s Mission Control (MC) would have quite a lot in common with the typical service provider’s Network Operations Centre (NOC), apart from the fact that NASA probably IS largely run by rocket scientists. Both MC and NOCs exist to operate and coordinate a multitude of different, complex systems as well as providing event […]
There’s a myriad of important metrics used across the world of telco, ranging from technical to marketing, to financial to executive. As discussed yesterday, OSS / BSS has an influence on many of these key metrics. Not only that, but the volumes of data collected by most OSS / BSS give scope to slice and […]
“Some simple principles: – Software can change faster than hardware, which means that in changing markets, bet on software. – It’s tempting to treat the user interface as a piece of fashion, some bling, a sort of jewelry. It’s not. It’s the way your user controls the tool you build. Change it when it stops […]
Do you know what the word ossify means? If not, can you guess? No, it’s not another of my made-up words to describe OSS in an obscure way. For those of you who didn’t already know that it’s a real word and what it means, wait for it… it means to cease developing; to stagnate. […]
We’ve recently talked about the two service provider business model extremes – OTT / DSP (Over the Top or DSP) versus REIT / TaaU (Telco as a Utility) are affecting OSS. The fast-twitch OSS that services the OTT / DSP model is bringing about some fascinating changes in the way service providers procure “assets.” They’re […]
Yesterday’s blog covered how exponential growth in ICT industries has been (and will continue to be) a challenge for all of us in OSS-land. We’ve already seen some fundamental changes in OSS in recent years to be able to cope with the massive growth in device counts, bandwidth demands, etc. We’ve seen hyper-scaled hardware/software platforms […]
We’ve all heard of Moore’s Law, which predicts the semiconductor industry’s ability to exponentially increase transistor density in an integrated circuit. “Moore’s prediction proved accurate for several decades, and has been used in the semiconductor industry to guide long-term planning and to set targets for research and development. Advancements in digital electronics are strongly linked to […]
Five nines is a catch-cry in the telco industry. There’s a view that we should measure the up-time of all the devices in our network and they should all reach the gold standard of 99.999% (ie downtime is less than five and a half minutes per year). But how many times have you seen an […]
A recent blog discussed the concept of running fire drills on your OSS to see how your organisation would handle outages. In Monday’s blog, we discussed where OSS customers are going to be and what their requirements are going to look like. The “Telcos as OTT players” model will be hyperscaled and more “transient by […]
“Whilst doing rather than planning has been a hugely successful tactic for entrepreneurs and their investors, before I go any further I want to note that as with everything you can take it too far. To get the best chance of achieving huge success, and avoid getting stuck at a local maxima, a certain amount […]
Today I’d like to share a mistake that I’ve made over and over again in my career. It’s a mistake I’m constantly trying to rectify, and succeeding, but still failing. It’s not just me either. Many of my OSS colleagues fall into the same trap, so there must be something in our nature that makes […]
Time-to-market is an important metric in the Telco vernacular. It’s important because rapid TTM allows one CSP to get an attractive new product out to customers earlier than competitors and all the benefits that go with it (ie rapid revenue turn-on, market share, brand awareness, etc). One of the primary impediments to a product’s TTM […]
“Gartner’s 2016 CIO Survey revealed five key innovation practices that deliver the highest improvement in digital performance: Crowdsourcing, Different metrics, Formal innovation management and work with Startups. Nevertheless according to the same survey, CIOs also indicated that these five innovation were the least used.” Sebastian Barros here. I suspect these CIO findings are also mirrored in the OSS industry. How many […]
“Answers to leading questions under torture naturally tell us nothing about the beliefs of the accused; but they are good evidence for the beliefs of the accusers.” C.S. Lewis. Today I’d like to share a clever strategy used by a clever OSS division head that l once worked with. The team he led was in […]
