When Vision Meets Reality
June 14, 2008 by kastorff.
I’m involved in the Open Source community. This week the official openSUSE Forums went live. I’ve been working on making this vision become a reality since January 2007, over 16 months. It’s not been easy.
I’ve learned a few things, not all of them for the first time, but during the project they all felt brand new. ☺
- I’ve learned that working with volunteers to accomplish anything with due dates will make you crazy.
- I’ve learned that working with people you’ve never met to accomplish a shared goal gives one an amazing sense of accomplishment.
- I’ve learned that vision and perseverance trump resistance to change and skepticism.
- I’ve learned that if you lead, and people don’t understand your vision, folks will hate you.
- I’ve learned that commitment means different things to different people.
- I’ve learned that doing something, and not caring about who gets credit enables success.
- I’ve learned that if you don’t do something, folks will criticize you.
- I’ve learned that if you do something folks will criticize you.
- I’ve learned that criticism fades away when you succeed.
- I’ve learned you can bridge language, distance, and time to make new friends.
- I’ve learned who my friends are.
- I’ve learned that when you reach the goal, none of the shit matters.
Thanks to everyone who helped make this happen.