With the holiday period looming for many of us, we will have the head-space to reflect – on the year(s) gone and to ponder the one(s) upcoming. I’d like to pose the rhetorical question, “What do you expect to reflect on?”
It’s probably safe to say that a majority of OSS experts are engaged in delivery roles. Delivery roles tend to require great problem-solving skills. That’s one of the exciting aspects of being an OSS expert after all.
There’s one slight problem though. Delivery roles tend to have a focus on the immediacy of delivery, a short-term problem-solving horizon. This generates incremental improvements like new dashboards within an existing dashboard framework, refining processes, next release software upgrades, releasing new stuff that adds to the accumulation of tech-debt, etc, etc.
That’s great, highly talented, admirable work, often exactly what our customers are requesting, but not necessarily what our industry needs most.
We need the revolutionary, not the evolutionary. And that means raising our horizons – to identify and comprehend the bigger challenges and then solving those. That is the intent of the OSS Call for Innovation – to lift our vision to a more distant horizon.
When you reflect during this holiday period, how distant will your horizon be?
PS. Upon your own reflection, are there additional big challenges or exponential opportunities that should be captured in the OSS Call for Innovation?