As an employee, it can be difficult to strike the right balance between the needs of the company and the needs of the open source Kubernetes project. This can create friction and put significant pressure on employees who participate in Kubernetes on behalf of their company when the needs of the individual, the company, and the community are not aligned. This talk will focus on ways to create this alignment between individuals, companies, and the community required to be successful participants in Kubernetes.

1. ©2020 VMware, Inc. @geekygirldawn
Be a Good
Corporate Citizen
in Kubernetes
KubeCon EU 2020
Dr. Dawn M. Foster
Director of OSS Community Strategy
fosterd@vmware.com fastwonderblog.com
Open Source at VMware @vmwopensource
blogs.vmware.com/opensource

2. ©2020 VMware, Inc. @geekygirldawn 2
whoami
• Geek, traveler, reader
• 20+ yr tech career focused on
community & open source
(Intel, Puppet, Scale Factory, …)
• PhD from the University of Greenwich
focus on Linux kernel collaboration
• OpenUK Board, CHAOSS Board and
Maintainer, Bitergia Advisory Board
• Kubernetes contributor & CNCF
Contributor Strategy SIGPhotos by Mom, Josh Bancroft, Don Park

3. ©2020 VMware, Inc. @geekygirldawn
Collaboration in Kubernetes:
individuals, employers, and
communities

4. @geekygirldawn©2020 VMware, Inc.
Steering Committee
SIG/WG* Leads
Subproject Leads
Approver / Reviewer
Org Member
4
Kubernetes, a Community of Individuals
Contributor Summit Picture CC BY 4.0
https://github.com/kubernetes/community
* Special Interest Group / Working Group

5. ©2020 VMware, Inc. @geekygirldawn
Employees contribute
Recruiting
Resources
5
Employers
Image by the CNCF CC BY-NC 2.0

6. ©2020 VMware, Inc. @geekygirldawn
All contributions
Small world
6
Community = People

7. @geekygirldawn©2020 VMware, Inc.
Individual contributions
Employer requests
Community needs
7
Balancing the Triad
Image by Hans Splinter CC BY-ND 2.0

8. ©2020 VMware, Inc. @geekygirldawn
Contribution Strategy
and Plan

9. ©2020 VMware, Inc. @geekygirldawn
Align with business goals
Execs understand importance
Employees see their impact
9
Strategy
Image by Larry Wentzel- CC BY 2.0

10. ©2020 VMware, Inc. @geekygirldawn 10
Focus

11. ©2020 VMware, Inc. @geekygirldawn
Finding the right people
Grow vs. hire
11
Who do you need?

12. ©2020 VMware, Inc. @geekygirldawn
Contributing to
Kubernetes as a
Good Corporate Citizen

13. ©2020 VMware, Inc. @geekygirldawn
Join
Read the docs
Lurk & understand
Start small
Image by Filip Maljković CC BY-SA
13
Getting Started in a SIG / WG
https://github.com/kubernetes/community

14. ©2020 VMware, Inc. @geekygirldawn
Avoid getting defensive
May need to iterate
14
Learn from Feedback

15. ©2020 VMware, Inc. @geekygirldawn
Discuss changes
Early and often
Lack of control
Image by the CNCF CC BY-NC 2.0
15
Work with the Kubernetes Community

16. ©2020 VMware, Inc. @geekygirldawn
Grow the next wave
of contributors
16
Sponsorship and Mentoring
Image by the CNCF CC BY-NC 2.0

17. ©2020 VMware, Inc. @geekygirldawn
KubeCon
Contributor Summit
Get to know people
Image by The Linux Foundation CC BY
17
Relationships

18. ©2020 VMware, Inc. @geekygirldawn
Reduces your overhead
Benefits the community
Right thing to do
18
Upstream your Patches

19. ©2020 VMware, Inc. @geekygirldawn
Distribution > Centralization
Inclusive > Exclusive
Evolution > Stagnation
Community > Company
19
Kubernetes Community Values
Image by the CNCF CC BY-NC 2.0
https://github.com/kubernetes/community/blob/master/values.md

20. @geekygirldawn©2020 VMware, Inc.
Dr. Dawn M. Foster
fosterd@vmware.com
fastwonderblog.com
Open Source at VMware
blogs.vmware.com/opensource
@vmwopensource
20
Thank You!