business

Perhaps you’ve considered migrating your company to an open source desktop productivity suite? There are a host of good reasons for such a move. The most obvious one that comes to mind is to save on license fees, but don’t be fooled. For the migration process to be a success and the full benefits to be reaped, you must invest in the changeover itself. Don’t believe that because you want to save money long term you should skimp short-term. A look at the City of Freiburg’s attempted migration reveals the dangers of treating the new software as a drop-in replacement.

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It should not surprise you that year after year the most common resolution people make is a combination of lose weight, eat healthier, and get in better shape. This, along with my own resolutions, prompted me to think about what it means to get a company in open source shape.

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I recently blogged about making open source software, and the high level steps for how to think about the process. We started with the need for software to seed the discussion, the need for clear motivation as to why to publish as open source software, and then the structural requirements to build a community (license choice, collaboration platform or forge, and governance considerations). » Read more

Each year automobile companies try to predict what new features consumers will want in their cars. If their predictions are right, they are richly rewarded with increased car sales. If they are wrong, they suffer the financial consequences.

But wait, is that the best way to design cars? What if car companies invited consumers to the table as equal partners in the design process? The way I see it, consumers could be buying cars they co-designed—reducing the gigantic financial risk to car companies, not to mention the waste of never-purchased vehicles.

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Most businesses today know that utilizing collaboration tools increases the liklihood success for a project, and for the organization as a whole. When people work together, brain power is multiplied; not only does more work tend to get done, but better work. The loner mentality—whether it's applied to how we think about office space, meetings, or project management—just doesn't measure up.

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The path to collaboration is usually paved with the best intentions. We all know too well that this can happen when a meeting is called. A bad one can completely derail needed work, but a good one can leave a team feeling energized, even excited. 

You can't control every meeting you're in, but you can improve the ones you run. Is anybody thinking about how to do this? Let's Google it: How to have a useful meeting. » Read more

Here is an overview of valuable, free books and reports related to open innovation, co-creation and crowdsourcing. Drop a comment if you know of other books, reports, or longer articles that are available for free and worth sharing.

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The World of Work is changing, but who is driving the change?

Leadership in the the 'New World of Work' should focus your transition efforts on work. Not work/life balance. Not better pay and benefits. Not flextime or telecommuting. Not sabbaticals or volunteering. Not toxic bosses or bureaucracy. Not annual performance reviews. While there’s validity to each of these, and all similar issues, leadership in the NWoW is about the design of work—something that has yet to be fully pulled out of the Industrial Age.

The World of Work is changing, but what is driving the change? » Read more

Winston Churchill and the open source way

Winston Churchill was known as a charismatic leader and statesman, able to rally his country to great things when they needed it most. He was also fond of the occasional salty outburst when needed—I won't repeat one of his more famous ones here, except to paraphrase it a bit:

"Keep Calm and Move On"

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