I am reading this while sitting in a coffee shop, and there’s quite a bit of staring now because I am laughing out loud. So true.
Reminds me of what I saw this morning while walking on the beach. A pod of dolphins was working together to turn a shoal of baitfish into a buffet, and dozens of gulls and pelicans were randomly bombing in to pick up the bits and pieces left behind.
In my experience, the communities of practice you mention do exist, but they’re relatively small pods of highly evolved individuals who have the curiosity, flexibility, patience, skills, and confidence to work as if the solution to any meaningful problem requires decades of clever collaboration with many diverse contributors across arbitrary organization boundaries. Which it does.
In the short run, the birds seem to have found a relatively easy strategy. But, their strategy is actually derivative of and dependent upon the richer collaborative work of others…who are interested in more than scraps.
Nov 13, 2023·edited Nov 13, 2023Liked by Donald Farmer
Donald, you're dead on. The reason I'm in this industry is because, not in spite of, collaboration. It's the community, and as you state, we're all the better when we reconnect with our friends across the industry and share insights and questions in spontaneous, random conversations. Two (or more) heads are better than one.
A beautiful post and a great reminder. Also, I think, age plays a role as we mature in life and have less need for those immediate connection, we savor just pure human connection.
My daughter is an artist and I can attest to your observations.
Isn’t this just human? Most of the people who you meet at conferences you will never meet again, so you will seek out those who will be of advantage to you in the short term. I remember attending the Microsoft Partner conference in 2005 - it was enormous. Way too big to create any long term relationships with anyone.
When I got to the Qlik Qonnections conference in 2008 in Miami, I knew some of the UKI people so could “hang” with them. I did meet one American who had been part of the SalesLogix community (still on Facebook with him!) but made no significant other contacts there.
At subsequent Qlik conferences I had started to blog and was then drawn into a “Community” group sponsored by Qlik, and started to make connections with people that I still have today. Next came the books and the Qlik “Luminary” group at various conferences. Building stronger connections (including with yourself Donald!)
So, vendor-forced groups have a role in creating connections, but there is a finite limit to that. Repetition also has a big contribution, and people who regularly the attend the same conference will tend to make more long lasting connections.
Interested to hear your ideas on how it can be any other way!
I would see collaboration as the driver in the older open source communities, though open source has changed. There was a lot of sharing of ideas (and code), and giving of time, with the goal of advancing the state of the art. Think of the underlying projects for Jasper and Pentaho, or the dynamics of Eigenbase.
I am reading this while sitting in a coffee shop, and there’s quite a bit of staring now because I am laughing out loud. So true.
Reminds me of what I saw this morning while walking on the beach. A pod of dolphins was working together to turn a shoal of baitfish into a buffet, and dozens of gulls and pelicans were randomly bombing in to pick up the bits and pieces left behind.
In my experience, the communities of practice you mention do exist, but they’re relatively small pods of highly evolved individuals who have the curiosity, flexibility, patience, skills, and confidence to work as if the solution to any meaningful problem requires decades of clever collaboration with many diverse contributors across arbitrary organization boundaries. Which it does.
In the short run, the birds seem to have found a relatively easy strategy. But, their strategy is actually derivative of and dependent upon the richer collaborative work of others…who are interested in more than scraps.
Donald, you're dead on. The reason I'm in this industry is because, not in spite of, collaboration. It's the community, and as you state, we're all the better when we reconnect with our friends across the industry and share insights and questions in spontaneous, random conversations. Two (or more) heads are better than one.
A beautiful post and a great reminder. Also, I think, age plays a role as we mature in life and have less need for those immediate connection, we savor just pure human connection.
My daughter is an artist and I can attest to your observations.
Thanks Donald, well said.
Isn’t this just human? Most of the people who you meet at conferences you will never meet again, so you will seek out those who will be of advantage to you in the short term. I remember attending the Microsoft Partner conference in 2005 - it was enormous. Way too big to create any long term relationships with anyone.
When I got to the Qlik Qonnections conference in 2008 in Miami, I knew some of the UKI people so could “hang” with them. I did meet one American who had been part of the SalesLogix community (still on Facebook with him!) but made no significant other contacts there.
At subsequent Qlik conferences I had started to blog and was then drawn into a “Community” group sponsored by Qlik, and started to make connections with people that I still have today. Next came the books and the Qlik “Luminary” group at various conferences. Building stronger connections (including with yourself Donald!)
So, vendor-forced groups have a role in creating connections, but there is a finite limit to that. Repetition also has a big contribution, and people who regularly the attend the same conference will tend to make more long lasting connections.
Interested to hear your ideas on how it can be any other way!
I would see collaboration as the driver in the older open source communities, though open source has changed. There was a lot of sharing of ideas (and code), and giving of time, with the goal of advancing the state of the art. Think of the underlying projects for Jasper and Pentaho, or the dynamics of Eigenbase.