{"id":1098,"date":"2022-09-19T09:29:11","date_gmt":"2022-09-19T09:29:11","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.reactivated.net\/weblog\/?p=1098"},"modified":"2022-11-26T14:17:41","modified_gmt":"2022-11-26T14:17:41","slug":"endless-orange-week-2021","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.reactivated.net\/weblog\/archives\/2022\/09\/endless-orange-week-2021\/","title":{"rendered":"Endless Orange Week 2021"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Originally posted at Endless OS Foundation<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Last year, one of our valued engineers came to the management team with the question of how we could increase time for pursuit of personal interest topics, relevant to the work being done at Endless but falling outside the day-to-day tasks assigned to our engineers. For example, how could our product engineers find some time to field test Endless Key<\/u><\/a> within their local community?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We discussed this within our management and leadership teams and came up with the Endless Orange Week concept, a week-long period dedicated to learning, experimentation and growth, where each participant puts their ordinary responsibilities aside and instead work on a project according to their personal interests and motivations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We communicated the plan to the organisation a couple of months before the scheduled Endless Orange Week dates, requesting everyone\u2019s participation. We then asked everyone to brainstorm project ideas within the following categories:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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  1. Public contributions to community initiatives that relate to your domain of work<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  2. Teaching initiatives where you share your professional skills and knowledge around a particular topic to a group of participants<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  3. Directed study towards skills that are at least tangentially related to the professional skills you employ at Endless.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  4. Advocacy initiatives related to Endless\u2019s work or the technologies used at Endless<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  5. Taking Endless\u2019s work out further into the world<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  6. Advancing one of your team\u2019s interesting, long-neglected projects or ideas<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n

    We encouraged the sharing of a broad selection of project ideas – in addition to sharing personal projects selected by each participant, we requested further ideas to be shared that could act as a source of inspiration for their peers. We encouraged projects to be worked on in teams, as well claimed by individuals. We encouraged projects to be experimental, seeking personal learning & development over successful execution & results.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    As the week arrived, we communicated the final plan, and asked everyone to begin their week-long project focus, additionally requesting the following communications & deliverables:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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    1. \u201cA-ha!\u201d moments & milestones reached shared on Slack, in addition to a progress summary at the end of each day<\/li>\n\n\n\n
    2. Creative assets (code, graphics, etc) produced as part of the initiative shared openly online<\/li>\n\n\n\n
    3. At least one blog post explaining the project and the outcomes, to maximize the community learning aspect.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
    4. A 5 minute presentation or demo, to share the project & results with the whole team.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n

      Projects & results<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

      Selected projects included directed study towards professional qualifications, public writing about Endless-adjacent topics, accompanied by a host of software engineering efforts. Here are a selection of articles explaining our results:<\/p>\n\n\n\n