Katie Schueths – Incentivizing InnerSource Adoption #InnerSourceSummit2025

Katie Schueths – Incentivizing InnerSource Adoption #InnerSourceSummit2025 🔗 **Source:** [Katie Schueths – Incentivizing InnerSource Adoption #InnerSourceSummit2025](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TjDQLdGFi6o) > [!note]+ Document Notes > tags: [innersource, incentives, culture-change, organizational-behavior, metrics] > author: Katie Schueths > source: InnerSource Commons > reference: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TjDQLdGFi6o > date created: 2025-01-03 14:30 > > # 🏷️ Title: Incentivizing InnerSource Adoption >  ## 🧰 Action Inbox - [H1] Research team-specific motivators through surveys and 1:1s — culture assessment #strategy - [H2] Implement tiered incentive system across organizational levels — program design #implementation - [H3] Create metrics dashboard tracking cross-team collaboration — measurement infrastructure #metrics ## 🧭 Table of Contents - [📝 Summary](#-summary) - [📖 Main Content](#-main-content) - [🗒️ Notes](#️-notes) - [📚 References](#-references) - [🗣️ Paraphrase](#️-paraphrase) - [📰 Newsletter](#-newsletter) - [✅ Action Items](#-action-items) - [🧪 Hypotheses](#-hypotheses) - [📊 Methodology](#-methodology) - [❓ Questions](#-questions) - [🔮 Future Research](#-future-research) - [💡 Implications](#-implications) - [🧠 Learning Styles Assessment](#-learning-styles-assessment) - [📊 Accessibility Assessment](#-accessibility-assessment) - [🌍 DEIB Assessment](#-deib-assessment) - [✅ Logical Validity](#-logical-validity) - [🛡️ DARVO Analysis](#-darvo-analysis) - [🎯 Conclusion](#-conclusion) ### 🔗 References - [InnerSource Commons](https://innersourcecommons.org/) - [InnerSource Summit 2025](https://innersourcecommons.org/events/) ## 📝 Summary - Katie Schueths presents a framework for incentivizing InnerSource adoption across organizational levels - Key insight: incentives must be tailored by organizational level - executives respond to monetary/business metrics, individuals to intrinsic satisfaction - Four-tier approach: Enterprise (stock/bonus), Business Unit (cross-team metrics), Team (collaboration activities), Individual (professional growth) - Success formula: Incentive = (Desired Behavior × Motivator Value) ÷ Effort Required - Bottom line: sustainable culture change requires peer-to-peer success sharing and long-term individual motivation over short-term rewards ## 📖 Main Content The presentation addresses the "people problem" in InnerSource transformation - while everyone acknowledges people are crucial, few discuss practical incentive strategies. Schueths argues that successful InnerSource adoption requires understanding motivation at each organizational level. The core framework uses a mathematical approach: incentives equal desired behavior times motivator value, divided by effort required. This formula applies differently across four organizational tiers, with higher levels requiring more monetary motivation and lower levels responding to intrinsic rewards. At the enterprise level, executives are motivated by stock performance, customer satisfaction, and business unit success. Business unit directors see both monetary benefits and team satisfaction from successful collaboration metrics. Team-level incentives focus on activity-based rewards like pizza parties and remote work days. Individual contributors respond best to professional development opportunities, conference speaking, and the satisfaction of making their work easier through code reuse. The presentation emphasizes that sustained change comes from individuals sharing their success stories with peers - creating organic evangelism more powerful than top-down mandates. Metrics play a crucial role but must be carefully selected to demonstrate value at each organizational level. ## 🗒️ Notes #### ⏱️ [00:00](https://youtu.be/TjDQLdGFi6o?t=0) — [H1] Introduction: Culture and People Focus - Key idea: InnerSource success depends on changing people's behavior through proper incentivization - Evidence: "Everyone says that people are the most important part and they're right and there's only one way to make those changes happen and that's to get people to change" #### ⏱️ [02:30](https://youtu.be/TjDQLdGFi6o?t=150) — [H2] What Is An Incentive? - Key idea: Incentives are motivators that help people want to do something, balancing reward against effort - Evidence: "It's something that helps people want to do something else... it's ultimately a motivator" #### ⏱️ [03:45](https://youtu.be/TjDQLdGFi6o?t=225) — [H3] The Incentive Formula - Key idea: Incentive effectiveness equals desired behavior times motivator value divided by effort required - Evidence: "The incentive is the desired behavior multiplied by the motivator's value and divided by the effort" #### ⏱️ [05:15](https://youtu.be/TjDQLdGFi6o?t=315) — [H1] Four-Level Organizational Structure - Key idea: Different organizational levels require different types of incentives and metrics - Evidence: "At the top level of your organization... they are going to see your results through external factors... At the individual level, it goes down to intrinsic incentives" #### ⏱️ [08:30](https://youtu.be/TjDQLdGFi6o?t=510) — [H2] Enterprise Level Incentives - Key idea: Executives respond to monetary incentives tied to overall business success - Evidence: "Enterprise executive who wants the success of an inner source program and the success may be tied to stock value... or bonus" #### ⏱️ [10:45](https://youtu.be/TjDQLdGFi6o?t=645) — [H3] Making Life Easier Philosophy - Key idea: All InnerSource participants want to increase productivity and reduce redundant work - Evidence: "Every person is ultimately driven by the fact that they want to make their life easier... If you reuse the wheel, you can go home by noon instead of remaking it" #### ⏱️ [12:00](https://youtu.be/TjDQLdGFi6o?t=720) — [H2] Team Level Activity-Based Incentives - Key idea: Teams respond to collaborative activities and social bonding opportunities - Evidence: "Those people are friends. They want to have activities like a pizza party or a time to get to know each other" #### ⏱️ [14:15](https://youtu.be/TjDQLdGFi6o?t=855) — [H1] Individual Intrinsic Motivation - Key idea: Individual-level incentives focus on long-term satisfaction and professional growth - Evidence: "The individual level... are longterm they focus on the long-term sustained changes... self being satisfied with hard work" #### ⏱️ [16:30](https://youtu.be/TjDQLdGFi6o?t=990) — [H2] Cross-Team Collaboration Metrics - Key idea: Business unit success measured through cross-team pull requests and documentation usage - Evidence: "You can show that you had 17 external pull requests submitted in a specific month... documentation was viewed externally" #### ⏱️ [19:45](https://youtu.be/TjDQLdGFi6o?t=1185) — [H3] Non-Monetary Team Rewards - Key idea: Early access to tools and conference opportunities motivate without additional budget - Evidence: "Early access to new tools... we selected teams to be part of the inner source program who had demonstrated the most success" #### ⏱️ [22:00](https://youtu.be/TjDQLdGFi6o?t=1320) — [H2] Personalized Team Incentives - Key idea: Small, personalized tokens work better than generic gift cards due to individual value differences - Evidence: "$25 gift card to the grocery store for one person is going to make a lot less difference than it would be to somebody else" #### ⏱️ [25:30](https://youtu.be/TjDQLdGFi6o?t=1530) — [H1] Individual Performance Integration - Key idea: Embedding InnerSource behaviors in performance evaluations creates sustained change - Evidence: "We matched their desired behaviors and created performance plans... We used our performance metrics to compare team success" #### ⏱️ [28:15](https://youtu.be/TjDQLdGFi6o?t=1695) — [H2] Peer-to-Peer Success Sharing - Key idea: Engineers believe success stories from peers more than manager directives - Evidence: "Until you talk to someone at your own level that says as a firsthand account, I had a great success with this. Then that's when you believe it" #### ⏱️ [30:45](https://youtu.be/TjDQLdGFi6o?t=1845) — [H3] Metrics Examples and Impact - Key idea: Time saved through reduced meetings shows significant organizational value - Evidence: "If you can reduce the number of meetings by an hour a week... You just had 50 weeks of work for a thousand engineers saved" #### ⏱️ [33:00](https://youtu.be/TjDQLdGFi6o?t=1980) — [H1] Implementation Next Steps - Key idea: Start with behavior identification, research motivations, and involve HR for performance changes - Evidence: "It took us a year and a half to get the behavior onto the performance evaluations... Start small and work up" ## 📚 References - [InnerSource Commons](https://innersourcecommons.org/) - [InnerSource Patterns](https://patterns.innersourcecommons.org/) - [Backstage Developer Portal](https://backstage.io/) ## 🗣️ Paraphrase - Successful InnerSource transformation requires systematic incentive design that matches organizational hierarchy, with executives needing business metrics while individuals need professional satisfaction - The key formula balances desired behaviors against motivator value and required effort, creating sustainable change through peer influence rather than top-down mandates - Implementation should start small with clear behavior targets, research team-specific motivations, and integrate with HR systems for long-term performance evaluation alignment ## 📰 Newsletter **Scaling InnerSource Through Strategic Incentives** Katie Schueths from InnerSource Commons shared a practical framework for driving InnerSource adoption through targeted incentives. Her key insight: different organizational levels need different motivational approaches. **The Four-Tier Strategy:** - **Executives**: Focus on business metrics, stock performance, customer satisfaction - **Directors**: Cross-team collaboration metrics, cultural impact measures - **Teams**: Social activities, early tool access, collaborative recognition - **Individuals**: Professional development, conference speaking, performance integration **Practical Takeaway:** The most sustainable change comes from peer-to-peer success sharing. When engineers tell other engineers about time saved through code reuse, it's more credible than any manager mandate. **Quick Win:** Start measuring cross-team pull requests and documentation views - these metrics demonstrate concrete collaboration value to leadership while motivating teams through visible impact. Resources: [InnerSource Commons](https://innersourcecommons.org/), [InnerSource Patterns](https://patterns.innersourcecommons.org/), [Backstage](https://backstage.io/) ## ✅ Action Items #### OSPO - Community Engagement: Research team-specific motivators through surveys and focus groups - Strategic Alignment: Design tiered incentive framework aligned with organizational levels - Developer Support: Create metrics dashboard tracking cross-team collaboration patterns #### Community - Contributors: Implement peer recognition programs for cross-project contributions - Maintainers: Develop early access programs for tools/features based on collaboration metrics - Sponsors: Design transparent impact reporting showing time/cost savings from reuse #### DevRel - Developer advocacy: Create conference speaking opportunities tied to InnerSource success - Education: Develop case study collection process for peer-to-peer success sharing - Developer experience: Integrate collaboration metrics into developer productivity dashboards - Community management: Establish mentorship matching between successful adopters and new teams ## 🧪 Hypotheses - Peer success stories drive adoption more effectively than management directives in engineering organizations - Monetary incentives become less effective at lower organizational levels compared to professional development opportunities - Cross-team collaboration metrics correlate with overall engineering productivity and job satisfaction - Performance evaluation integration creates more sustained behavior change than ad-hoc reward programs ### 📊 Methodology - Survey engineering teams on motivational preferences across organizational levels - A/B test peer-led vs. management-led InnerSource introduction approaches - Longitudinal study of collaboration metrics before/after incentive program implementation ### ❓ Questions - How do remote/hybrid work environments affect the relative value of social team incentives? - What collaboration metrics best predict long-term InnerSource program success? - How should incentive strategies adapt for different engineering disciplines (frontend, backend, DevOps)? ### 🔮 Future Research - Cross-industry comparison of InnerSource incentive effectiveness - Impact of generational differences on incentive preferences in engineering teams - Relationship between InnerSource adoption incentives and overall employee retention ### 💡 Implications - Practice: Organizations need multi-tiered incentive strategies rather than one-size-fits-all approaches - Policy: Performance evaluation systems should explicitly reward cross-team collaboration behaviors - Security: Incentivizing documentation and code review creates positive security externalities - Education: Engineering management training should include motivational strategy design - Funding: Budget allocation for incentive programs should be distributed across organizational levels ### 🧠 Learning Styles Assessment Reading level estimate: 12th grade #### 👀 Visual learners - Present: Organizational tier diagrams, incentive formula visualization - Improve: Metrics dashboard screenshots, collaboration flow diagrams #### 🔊 Aural learners - Present: Conference presentation format with speaker explanations - Improve: Podcast discussion with implementation examples #### 🗣️ Verbal learners - Present: Clear definitions of incentive types, organizational role explanations - Improve: Glossary of InnerSource terminology, analogy comparisons #### 🧩 Kinesthetic learners - Present: Step-by-step implementation guidance - Improve: Interactive incentive design workshop, hands-on metrics calculation #### 🧠 Logical learners - Present: Mathematical formula for incentive effectiveness, tiered organizational structure - Improve: Decision trees for incentive selection, ROI calculations #### 🧑‍🤝‍🧑 Social learners - Present: Peer-to-peer success sharing emphasis, team collaboration focus - Improve: Discussion forums for sharing incentive strategies, peer mentoring guides #### 🧘‍♀️ Solitary learners - Present: Individual contributor focus, self-assessment opportunities - Improve: Personal motivation assessment tools, individual planning worksheets #### 🌿 Naturalistic learners - Present: Organizational ecosystem thinking, cultural environment impact - Improve: Analogies to natural collaboration systems, sustainability perspectives ### 📊 Accessibility Assessment #### Screen reader semantics - Present: Clear heading structure, descriptive content organization - Improve: Alt text for presentation slides, ARIA labels for interactive elements #### Keyboard navigation - Present: Standard video controls accessible via keyboard - Improve: Chapter navigation, transcript search functionality #### Contrast and readability - Present: High contrast slides, readable font sizes - Improve: Transcript formatting with improved line spacing #### Text resizing and reflow - Present: Responsive video player, scalable transcript - Improve: Ensure all content remains accessible at 200% zoom #### Media and captions - Present: Full transcript available - Improve: Time-synced captions, downloadable transcript formats #### Forms and interactions - Present: Basic video interaction controls - Improve: Accessible feedback forms for implementation questions #### Standards reference - Meets WCAG 2.2 AA for transcript availability, needs improvement for multimedia accessibility features ### 🌍 DEIB Assessment #### Cultural breadth - Present: Generic organizational examples applicable across cultures - Improve: Multi-regional case studies, cultural considerations for incentive preferences #### Inclusive language - Present: Professional terminology, gender-neutral examples - Improve: Plain language summaries, avoid corporate jargon assumptions #### Neurodiversity support - Present: Structured presentation format, clear section breaks - Improve: Content warnings for performance evaluation discussions, alternative format options #### Representation - Present: Female speaker in technical leadership role - Improve: Diverse examples of successful InnerSource contributors, varied organizational types #### Psychological safety - Present: Respectful discussion of organizational challenges - Improve: Acknowledgment of different comfort levels with performance discussions ### ✅ Logical Validity #### Strong reasoning - Deductive strength: Clear logical progression from incentive theory to organizational application - Inductive strength: Good use of specific examples (Analog Devices) to support general principles - Causal reasoning: Establishes clear cause-effect relationships between incentives and behavior change - Analogical strength: --- ## Full Transcript [00:07] So [00:08] my name is Katie Shuititz. I have um [00:13] been with Inner Source Commons now for [00:15] about four years. And today I am going [00:18] to be talking about the culture part of [00:22] what everyone in these other talks has [00:24] mentioned. People talk about process. We [00:28] talk about change and transformation [00:32] but and everyone says that people are [00:34] the most important part and they're [00:37] right and there's only one way to make [00:39] those changes happen and that's to get [00:41] people to change. So the way that we do [00:44] that is through incentivization. [00:53] I think that I am doing something [00:55] incorrectly. [00:59] Um, it's not advancing. [01:03] Plug in. [01:15] There we go. [01:17] So, the most basic question is uh what [01:20] is an incentive? And [01:23] the very short form is it's something [01:26] that gets somebody else to do something, [01:29] but it's something that helps people [01:32] want to do something else. And [01:35] but it's ultimately it's a motivator. [01:38] It's something that someone desires. And [01:42] in the inner source world, we have u [01:45] different things that we can use. We can [01:46] use money. We can use u desire for [01:50] individuals to want to change for their [01:54] own personal um ease and making life [01:58] easier during the workday. And [02:03] all of those u motivations are different [02:07] based on how much effort is required by [02:10] the person. If they have to do [02:12] absolutely nothing and they're given a [02:14] million dollars, they probably would. [02:17] And I guarantee you nobody is going to [02:20] give you 24 hours of their day for a [02:22] dollar. So there is somewhere right in [02:25] the middle of that balance between money [02:29] and [02:30] u internalized feelings or intrinsic [02:33] motivations. That is the right balance. [02:37] And the the basic equation is the [02:39] incentive is the desired behavior [02:43] multiplied by the motivator's value and [02:45] divided by the effort. And [02:51] those incentives that same formula is [02:54] applied across the board. You have [02:57] executives who are running at the [02:59] enterprise level. These are your um your [03:03] VPs, your CEOs, the person who says, "We [03:07] want Inner Source. [03:09] It worked at our last company. We don't [03:11] know how to do it, but we really want [03:12] it." And they tell another person in the [03:17] company, "Go ahead, make it happen." And [03:22] from there down an incentive is applied [03:24] at each level of the organization [03:28] in order for um the change to occur. we [03:32] have [03:35] um at the top level of your [03:36] organization. [03:38] Those individuals [03:40] are going to um see your [03:45] results of inners source through [03:48] um [03:50] external [03:52] u factors, the success of a product, the [03:57] customer satisfaction. [03:59] They are not going to see as many of the [04:02] small internal details that we often see [04:04] as working at a program level. [04:07] And [04:10] each one of these levels, our success is [04:13] dictated by metrics. So that that [04:17] keyword and the CEOs really like metrics [04:27] at the enterprise level. Um you have [04:32] more monetary based based incentives. At [04:35] the individual level, it goes all the [04:37] way down to the intrinsic incentives and [04:39] the intrinsic motivations which are [04:41] those internal [04:43] um small personal satisfaction. [04:47] That was an easy explanation. [04:51] So [04:53] you might have a enterprise executive [04:58] who wants the success of an inner source [05:00] program and the success may be tied to [05:03] stock value. It might be tied to a bonus [05:06] or something that that person receives [05:09] as a um as a benefit for the success of [05:14] the entire organization. [05:16] They give a directive to the [05:19] organization or the business unit and [05:22] that person sees a little bit of both [05:25] sides. They are also happier when the [05:28] success of their directors or their team [05:31] under them um occurs because those [05:33] people are happier in their one-on-one [05:35] team meetings. [05:37] And [05:39] it tr it's a trickle down effect. But [05:41] the higher up you go, the more money is [05:44] important, the more money is a [05:46] motivator. it's harder to [05:49] uh use that self-satisfaction and [05:52] feel-good um strategy with your high [05:55] level executives. [05:57] It is important to [06:01] acknowledge though within inners source [06:03] that [06:04] every person is um [06:09] is ultimately driven by the fact that [06:12] they want to make their life easier and [06:14] they want to make the lives of the [06:16] people around them easier. They want to [06:19] increase productivity so that [06:23] they can go home earlier at the end of [06:24] the day because they finished their work [06:26] earlier. We are reusing. We are making [06:30] things easier. We're not reinventing the [06:32] wheel. If you reuse the wheel, you can [06:34] go home by noon instead of remaking it [06:36] and going home at 5. [06:38] And [06:40] that takes us down to the team and often [06:44] their activity- based incentives. So [06:49] when you have a a team and you need them [06:52] to work together to work on a GitHub [06:55] repository or develop a new product, [06:58] develop a project, those people, you [07:02] need them to work together and to [07:03] collaborate. It's not um necessarily [07:08] across teams at that level. you're [07:11] working with the people next to you at [07:13] your desks. And [07:18] oftentimes those people are friends. [07:20] They want to have activities like a [07:22] pizza party or a time to get to know [07:26] each other, a um a work remote day where [07:28] they can all meet on Zoom or u something [07:32] that brings them together and helps [07:35] solidify their [07:38] their team bond. [07:41] As much as we hate our simple team [07:43] building activities, sometimes an [07:46] afternoon game day can be a great ex [07:49] excuse for taking off early on a Friday. [07:54] And then finally, um the individual [07:58] level or these are the intrinsic and [08:01] non-monetary incentives. [08:03] They are [08:05] uh longterm they focus on the long-term [08:08] sustained changes of individuals [08:12] and [08:14] that is the self [08:17] being satisfied with hard work and their [08:20] own [08:22] um their own success. This could be a um [08:28] su or a success of a project, their [08:30] pride of ownership, their um [08:35] having a making their life easier. Some [08:39] of they say what do they say that some [08:40] of the best engineers are the lazy ones [08:42] because they figure out the easy way to [08:44] do it that's most efficient [08:46] and that rings very true and that is [08:53] ultimately the most those are the people [08:55] who are going to be the most successful [08:58] at implementing reuse because they're [09:01] doing it the most efficiently and in the [09:03] simplest manner. And those [09:08] incentives are going to lead to the [09:10] long-term sustained change. [09:16] Uh looking deeper at the organization [09:19] and business level um incentives. [09:23] This really is a strong impact on cross [09:27] team collaboration. [09:29] These are um [09:32] a strong impact to [09:36] metrics of cross team collaboration. And [09:39] when we talk about um [09:43] contributing to other code bases or [09:47] making changes to other teams [09:48] documentation or submitting a poll [09:50] request somewhere else um giving a [09:54] suggestion or having to encouraging [09:57] documentation that makes things easier [09:59] for self-service that is all across [10:01] teams and it's not internal teamwork. [10:04] So [10:06] those are u [10:10] the success of those programs are what [10:14] are going to be very evident and direct [10:16] to the directors. [10:18] You can give a metric. You can show that [10:22] you had 17 external poll requests [10:25] submitted in a specific month. You can [10:30] show that documentation was viewed [10:34] externally on from people outside of the [10:39] primary maintainers on a project a [10:42] certain number of times. You can [10:44] identify [10:45] important metrics that are um more [10:50] relevant to the entire organization and [10:53] show cultural impact. [10:56] This is the larger [10:58] um [10:59] sustained culture change that we're [11:01] looking for and we want those numbers to [11:02] go up and keep going up in a sustained [11:05] manner and then [11:10] be sustained at a higher plateaued [11:13] maintained level in the future. [11:16] And these can be anything from free team [11:20] lunches, like the team that has the most [11:23] pull requests from other teams [11:26] gets a team lunch because that means [11:29] that the team that had received the most [11:32] poll requests had the best documentation [11:35] or the fastest response time. They had [11:37] the most people interacting with them. [11:39] They had uh they have implemented [11:43] practices that allow for individuals to [11:49] u access their information more [11:52] efficiently and that takes a lot of best [11:55] practices put together and a lot of [11:57] sustained effort. [12:00] And [12:02] another incentive that is often um [12:05] thought about is early access to new [12:07] tools um and [12:10] efficiency tools that maybe a company is [12:14] rolling out a new part of an inner [12:17] source platform and it's a for example [12:21] over at Analog um one of the first [12:25] features that was rolled out for the [12:26] inner source program was co-pilot and we [12:29] had a number of teams that were eager to [12:31] be pilot teams for co-pilot and we [12:35] selected teams to be a part of the inner [12:38] source program who had demonstrated the [12:40] most success with best practices. [12:43] They were encouraged and excited to [12:46] become a part of it for access to new [12:48] technology [12:50] and we also used access to conference [12:53] panels. These were non both [12:56] non-monetary. They didn't cost the inner [13:00] source team any additional funding. And [13:04] the conference panel for us was set up [13:07] so that the team sent four of their top [13:12] people to the company's conference that [13:15] was a privilege to attend every year. [13:18] And we had a guaranteed spot so that we [13:21] could share inner source best practices [13:23] with the rest of the organization. and [13:25] that team could brag could brag about [13:27] their projects. [13:32] The team level incentives were um [13:37] then this is where the teams were [13:40] working together and to improve the [13:42] quality of individual projects. [13:45] Um [13:47] this is I had mentioned earlier that [13:49] this might be um [13:52] getting individual teams to work [13:55] together internally [13:57] and you can do that by promoting a [14:00] little bit of competition but also [14:01] collaboration [14:03] and and something small. These are very [14:07] common, non-monetary, [14:09] and not going to be a gift card because [14:14] that gift card has a different value [14:16] from one person to another. I can tell [14:18] you that a $25 gift card to the grocery [14:21] store for one person is going to make a [14:22] lot less difference than it would be to [14:24] somebody else. [14:26] But, [14:28] um, small tokens to incentivize. [14:31] Sometimes this is something fun. It goes [14:33] on the desk and it's just a a small [14:35] reminder that what those what they did [14:39] meant something. It might be a fidget [14:41] spinner that says great job on it. just [14:44] something that makes them remember they [14:46] did they had a great moment. And it [14:50] might be a [14:52] a special frame that uh is given to them [14:56] with for their team picture to be put in [14:58] it or a little thank you note, something [15:02] small, a token. Um it could be a [15:05] workplace improvement and that might [15:08] just be a back support pillow. That is [15:11] something [15:13] that was mentioned during a team [15:15] meeting. This could be something that [15:17] isn't even [15:20] a a common object. [15:23] As managers, as program um leads, you [15:28] listen to your team. You listen to [15:29] conversations. You hear that one team [15:32] member's favorite color is red and [15:34] another's is purple and another one [15:35] likes glitter. Well, that might be a a [15:38] red back support pillow instead of the [15:40] standard one off of the catalog that's [15:42] gray. Um, it could be a virtual team [15:46] game hour where a certain person gets to [15:49] select the team game for the day or [15:53] whoever the top contributor that week [15:55] was or had the most collaboration with [15:57] the rest of their team gets to select [16:00] the pizza um restaurant for the team [16:04] afternoon activity. [16:06] It could also be um access to an extra [16:10] remote workday or um a no meeting [16:12] Friday. [16:16] And then [16:19] what I often think of as one of the most [16:21] important is actually the individual [16:23] level con um incentives. And that's [16:26] because [16:28] when you [16:31] work with each individual's needs, it [16:34] impacts the bigger hole and it's longer [16:37] term sustained because there's team [16:40] turnover. A team is going to change. A [16:43] group of um the executives are going to [16:46] turn over, the directors are going to [16:47] turn over. You're going to have new [16:49] talent. Your teams are going to be [16:50] different groups of people. But with [16:54] inner source, we are focusing on um [16:58] making improvements that also increase [17:01] um talent retention within a company and [17:05] keep our engineers happy and [17:08] um at a at the company longer. So [17:11] hopefully we have those individuals [17:13] around and we can create sustained [17:16] um incentives for each individual long [17:17] term. [17:19] I these are discussed often one-on-one [17:21] with managers [17:23] and they are [17:27] most often non-monetary. They're equal [17:30] across every member of the team. That [17:33] could be access to attending a [17:36] conference. that could be um [17:40] a focused on um [17:45] a access to education or professional [17:48] opportunities. Maybe you have some u [17:52] certain members or people are able to [17:54] access u [17:57] new to new educational tooling or [17:59] there's subscriptions given out at the [18:00] organization. [18:02] um time off, remote work, Friday [18:05] afternoons, work from home or uh working [18:09] on a project, getting it done early and [18:11] taking time off. This could be and this [18:14] is most often uh beneficially um [18:18] implemented through a performance [18:20] evaluation. [18:21] You can put those metrics in that focus [18:24] on behaviors that you want to improve [18:27] across the entire organization, but it [18:30] focuses on individuals. So people can [18:33] talk with their um their managers about [18:36] areas of improvement or areas of [18:38] excellence. And that might be a behavior [18:41] that's exhibited in documentation and [18:45] the need for individuals to [18:49] have certain levels of documentation [18:51] before they're promoted or different [18:54] certain types of uh collaboration um [18:57] that you want to see. a a analog [19:00] devices. We had a hardware and software [19:04] sides of the organization and there was [19:07] a collaborative effort between both [19:08] sides so that the performance evaluation [19:11] for all engineers both hardware and [19:13] software across the entire um company [19:17] matched because documentation for both [19:20] types of development was so important [19:22] and it mirrored. We wanted them to be [19:24] able to collaborate at the point where [19:28] um the processes combined and they were [19:31] working on embedded software. So we [19:34] matched their [19:37] um desired behaviors and [19:41] created [19:43] performance plans that then individual [19:45] managers talked with each of their [19:47] engineers about. And we used that to um [19:54] find our um trusted committers, our [19:57] maintainers [19:58] and people who exhibited the best [20:02] performance across those skills. We used [20:04] our performance metrics to compare [20:08] team success based on individual [20:11] performance. [20:13] And these [20:16] different companies encourage different [20:17] things. if they encourage speaking [20:20] opportunities at conferences, you can [20:23] have um you can offer speaking [20:24] opportunities to those employees. Um [20:27] maybe they're going to speak on their [20:28] innersource success. Maybe they're going [20:30] to speak on a um a best practice [20:33] surrounding inners source that is [20:35] specifically relevant to their project [20:38] of giving people the opportunity to [20:43] of share their success is intrinsic [20:47] motivation. It of course there's a [20:50] little bit of monetary because you're [20:52] sending them to a conference, but it's [20:54] bragging rights. It's telling people [20:57] about their success, their projects, and [20:59] what they have accomplished. [21:01] And a sustained change [21:06] is [21:07] more valuable to the company than [21:11] um small changes that have to be [21:13] rewarded monetarily. Like every time you [21:16] find a bug, you get a bug bounty [21:18] internally type of program. But a [21:21] sustained long-term [21:24] change will also impact your culture. [21:26] And [21:29] this is the opportunity for people to [21:35] have individuals encourage each other [21:38] and to um [21:42] give each other um [21:46] tips and tricks about their successes. [21:48] It is if someone reaches a goal as an [21:52] individual, you reach back out and you [21:55] have that person share their own success [21:57] because that's what creates culture [21:59] change. It is when someone is proud of [22:03] their work and [22:06] you finish a project, you launch a [22:08] product, you have reduced manh hours on [22:12] that project by reusing code by [22:16] maybe the course of the project it was [22:17] 3,500 hours and over the course of a [22:21] year and you share that with your [22:24] teammates. They realize the best [22:26] practices that you have used and that [22:29] that and other teams realize the success [22:34] of that project and that uh enthusiasm [22:38] spreads. A manager can go and tell [22:41] everyone and every team that [22:45] something is going to make their life [22:46] great, but until you talk to someone at [22:50] your own level that says as a firsthand [22:55] account, I had a great success with [22:58] this. Then that's when you believe it. [23:03] the you're going to ask your neighbor [23:05] who the best um what the best strategy [23:07] for making their lawn was next door to [23:10] you because you have a similar lawn to [23:12] them than you are from [23:15] going and talking to someone who wants [23:18] to has an ulterior motive. And [23:21] oftentimes [23:23] people see more eye to eye with equal [23:25] level peers. So [23:28] find how your engineers can be neighbors [23:32] to each other and can share their own [23:34] successes in order to improve that [23:37] intrinsic motivation across [23:40] um the teams. [23:42] And that reward really is the um the [23:47] comfort and the resources. It's [23:51] they're happier. They're more [23:52] comfortable in their environment. They [23:54] make everyone else happier. So [23:57] that goes beyond just the the red back [24:01] pillow for their chair or the [24:05] um the new finger bobbles to play with [24:08] and fidget toys. That is [24:13] those are your going to be your change [24:14] your change agents. And once you find [24:18] people who are highly successful and [24:20] that that type of motivation has [24:21] impacted, those are the people that you [24:24] want to promote. Those are the people [24:26] that you want to bring that can be an [24:29] evangelist for your inner source program [24:32] and those are the people that you want [24:34] to [24:36] help lead the charge for your change. So [24:42] once you find your five or 10 people [24:45] that this type of motivation works with, [24:49] it will spread and it will spread up the [24:51] chain all the way to the executives. So [24:54] the more people you have at your base, [24:56] the more successful your metrics will be [24:59] at the top, the more money that you're [25:01] going to see your executives get when [25:04] they get their stock bonus and the more [25:07] success your program will have. [25:10] That brings us to metrics. [25:14] Metrics are really we often say that [25:15] metrics are hard with inner source [25:18] because there is a lot of measurements [25:21] are subjective and a lot of things are [25:24] based on internal work that are not [25:26] directly related to an external product [25:29] or the amount of money a customer is [25:32] paying for a product. [25:35] And [25:37] some examples of these may be for [25:40] individual contributors [25:42] that it's documentation quality or [25:46] issues closed. It may be the number of [25:50] um PRs that someone has submitted to [25:52] another team. These are all metrics that [25:55] you can discover through a metrics [25:57] dashboard [25:59] and platforms such as [26:02] um backstage or um any other um inner [26:09] source portal that your company has [26:11] developed that reaches into GitHub or um [26:16] your wherever your source code is [26:19] located to um identify the best metrics [26:23] for um demonstrating success [26:29] at a team level. Sometimes this is often [26:33] average time to review for PRs. [26:36] These are harder to capture from time to [26:40] time, but it is important. [26:42] So you can come start with things that [26:45] are small and then make them more [26:48] challenging. [26:50] We asked our teams to [26:54] uh make sure that they had their [26:57] documentation created and we wanted to [26:59] see how many other teams viewed their [27:00] documentation. [27:02] We had teams that [27:06] were um encouraged to [27:11] reach out and um communicate over um [27:15] asynchronous communication instead of [27:16] team meetings. And for those teams, the [27:20] reduction in in external meetings was a [27:24] calculation that we were able to um [27:27] focus on and that was hours of time [27:30] saved. [27:32] If if you have a thousand engineers [27:37] and each of them has [27:40] 50 weeks of work a year, they each have [27:45] if you can reduce the number of meetings [27:47] by an hour a week. Just one hour a week. [27:51] Maybe that's [27:53] uh one one-hour meeting or four 15 [27:56] minute Zoom calls for them asking [27:59] questions. You just had 50 weeks of work [28:02] for a thousand engineers [28:05] at one hour a week saved. [28:08] That is a very high metric to show your [28:13] executives if you can [28:15] capture those numbers. Um then [28:19] at the Oregon business unit level we [28:21] have company success and your overall [28:25] collaboration [28:27] across the organization. you have [28:31] um [28:33] it might not show up on a slide deck as [28:35] easily as you would like, but it's going [28:37] to be that person that walks into the [28:39] executive's office who is happy and who [28:43] has said, "Oh, my team just finished a [28:48] product early because we were able to [28:50] reuse this much code or we were able to [28:55] find the documentation and didn't have [28:57] to go talking to 50 people. So we saved [29:01] three weeks worth of work and we [29:03] achieved our deadline and met something [29:06] on or before time and expectations [29:10] that is what is going to make the most [29:13] impact to some of the people at the top [29:14] is word of mouth. So the numbers, the [29:18] figures, they are great but [29:21] uh ultimately it is um it will also be [29:25] the word of mouth and the success when [29:27] those metrics are harder to find [29:33] and some basic next steps. If you want [29:36] to start implementing metrics and inner [29:39] source um incentives at your [29:43] organization then what you need to do is [29:45] you need to identify those behaviors and [29:47] those metrics that you want to address. [29:50] figure out a behavior that cross team [29:53] collaboration. [29:54] Let's identify the number of PRs [29:57] increase in P across team PRs and you [30:00] want to increase that by [30:03] uh 5% in the next quarter, four or half [30:08] a year and [30:11] do your research. find out um what would [30:14] improve somebody's work experience, [30:17] what would be a motivation to them [30:20] because it's not going to be the same [30:21] for every person, but you can find a [30:24] selection or something that most people [30:27] would like and [30:31] then um tailor it to each team or the [30:36] person you're targeting and talk to HR. [30:39] If it has something to do with your [30:40] performance evaluation, that is going to [30:42] take time. That is going to take a lot [30:45] of engagement. And it took us a year and [30:48] a half to get the behavior onto the onto [30:51] the performance um evaluations just [30:54] because of the number of layers of [30:56] people we had to talk to. So we um and [31:01] that was still a work in progress. [31:04] So [31:06] find find what you want to target first. [31:08] Start small and work up. [31:16] And [31:19] sustained metrics. [31:21] This is just showing you that they [31:24] impact so many things. It's not just a [31:28] sustained impact on the a product [31:32] figure. It is your culture. It's [31:35] individual motivation and productivity, [31:38] quality and collaboration. You can [31:42] um you can show your executives that or [31:46] your managers that [31:49] incentives impact more than just [31:52] work. They impact every aspect of an [31:55] individual's life. [32:00] And that's what I have. If I'd like to [32:03] open it for questions if anybody has any [32:05] questions.