“Very few people or companies can clearly articulate WHY they do WHAT they do. By WHY I mean your purpose, cause or belief – WHY does your company exist? WHY do you get out of bed every morning? And WHY should anyone care?”
Simon Sinek.
In earlier posts (eg Selling the Why?), I’ve discussed the importance of identifying benefits rather than functionality for the users of an OSS.
I still hold this to be true, but I’ve realised that it’s only part of the story. It’s one thing to identify the benefits of the OSS for the CSP that will use it, but it’s essential that those benefits also correlate with what their customers really need. This is the second-order benefit that needs to be understood first.
Most OSS are bought on functionality, some are on first-order benefits, but rarely is the second-order benefit top of mind when capturing requirements for a new OSS.