defeat-hierarchical-constraints.md

Title

Defeat Hierarchical Constraints

Patlet

In strongly hierarchical organizations, developers want to contribute to InnerSource projects but are blocked by direct managers who prioritize their own team's goals and fear losing their team's time to cross-team work. Making InnerSource contributions a recognized part of individual performance goals and helping managers see concrete benefits for their own teams can empower developers to participate despite these constraints.

Problem

Corporate culture constrains people to hierarchical goals.

Context

In strongly hierarchical organizations, developers want to please their managers. Their managers may not support their people spending time on inner sourcing even if someone higher up does. In some countries, there is a strong cultural force to respect and obey authority.

Forces

To make inner sourcing work, you need to allow some developers outside your org to participate in your development. Managers have deadlines and they don’t see how having their people will help them achieve their goals and objectives. They may feel it slows them down. Even if there is nominal higher support for the goals, developers may still feel afraid to take that step.

Solutions

TBD

Resulting Context

Developers feel empowered to spend at least 20% of their time on inner sourcing

Status

• Initial (Donut)

Author(s)