The open-source software phenomenon has many facets, among them the ability to manage large software projects of globally distributed, individual contributors with virtually no management overhead. As open source increasingly blends with the commercial software industry, this facet may have an even higher impact on engineering jobs than IT offshoring. But this time, the news is not bad for those engineers who embrace the change.
Working on a major open-source project from a basement in Estonia and pairing with a guy in the pampas of Argentina via Skype? No problem. Office, infrastructure, communication, cost? Close to zero. Paid by RedHat, IBM, or MySQL? Reality.
Open-source projects change the fundamental economics of software production, traditionally based on collocated teams. The main benefits include the:
- Ability to hire the right talent for the right job, anywhere on the globe rather than locally (and often at lower cost).
- Productivity increase from flat and asynchronous Internet-based commu- nication (instead of costly hierarchical/ synchronous face-to-face interaction).
- Power of collaboration—everybody can contribute to solve a given problem.
- Adoption of more agile and iterative software development models (rather than the waterfall approach), eliminating misallocations of traditional software projects.
Although most conventional companies find it difficult to work with distributed teams due to the decrease in managerial influence, the incompatibility with current incentive systems, the dependency on face-to-face communication, and—for closed-source companies—the fear of losing control over intellectual property, it is a highly competitive production model.
Huge cost savings are realized. Companies must adopt these practices or lose to their competition.
MySQL, RedHat/Jboss, and db4objects, to name a few, are early and radical commercial adopters of global open-source practices pioneered by noncommercial projects such as Linux, Apache, and Wikipedia.
Most of their engineers work from their homes. They were hired over the Internet, without ever showing up for a job interview. Their home location is irrelevant. What matters is their skill set and affiliation to the respective project; that is, as a user or key contributor, their ability to effectively communicate in English over the Internet, and their ability to work in collaborative environments using tools like Eclipse, Ant, Subversion, and Jira. A broadband connection is also a must.
Open-source companies have extremely flat hierarchies, are very user-driven in strategic discussions such as the product roadmap, and are agile in their project management. This new business structure changes the role of software engineers.
With open source, users and software engineers have more power than their counterparts in traditional companies. More decision making rests with the software engineers than with the gatekeepers in marketing and sales. With engineers in the driver's seat, there are higher proportional budget allocations for engineering. That's good news for engineers.
The challenge for some software engineers is how to compete globally. Local market rates, driven by living standards, lose their significance if a company can select its employees from a fast growing, global pool of talent.
A common response to globalization (at least among job holders in the Western world) is to reject it, because it means increased competition and is often equaled to downward pressure on one's pay.
However, this would only be true if people were a "commodity," a product where all units are equal. As we all know, people differ by education, culture, skills, habits, language, location, and more.
Therefore, open-source globalization is more of an agent for increased specialization, which is usually a path to higher incomes. And, in fact, most software engineers embrace open source—not surprising, given that it was they who started the movement in the first place. These are some major benefits for engineers:
- Open source is a career builder. You don't need to be an MIT graduate to join key IT projects.
- Globalization also brings global opportunities to you. Why not work on a movie animation project in New Zealand?
- There is a looser affiliation to a project. Being less locked-in with your current employer creates a better "market" for your services.
- Empowerment, values, and fun. Open-source projects recruit their contributors and then get out of their way.
Managers and investors must understand and embrace this paradigm change. Once managers adapt their practices, shifting from what Thomas Malone calls "command-and-control" to "coordinate-and-cultivate" environments, open-source globalization is poised to have an even higher impact on the industry than IT offshoring.
