Mastering the Art of Iteration: The unseen powerhouse of Telco and OSS evolution

Why iteration is the secret sauce for success in modern telecommunications

Jason Fried, a vocal advocate for better approaches in design and management, puts it aptly in his article called Teaching Iteration: 

"I’d begin to teach iteration. Iteration is a subject, equivalent to math, science, history, language, art, music, etc. How do you make something better over time? How do you return to something that you’ve done and see it with fresh eyes? How do you apply new perspective to an old problem? Where do you find that new perspective? What trails do you follow and which do you ignore? How do you smash the familiar and reassemble something new from the same pieces?

Once you’re done with school, and cast out into the world, your job is likely to involve iteration. No matter what you’re doing, you’re probably going to have to do something over. And often times again and again. You rarely simply deliver something and move on."

Interesting isn’t it? When we’re in school, we’re rarely asked to iterate. We get one chance at an assignment and either pass or fail. Yet the world of OSS is vastly different. 

There are other similar disparities between OSS and schooling too. 

For example, being disruptive in school is heavily frowned upon. Being disruptive in OSS, looking for better ways of doing things is encouraged.

In school, most assessments are made on your personal achievements. To an extent this is true in the world of OSS, but almost every OSS project requires working with a team. Often a very large team of collaborators and contributors.

Telcos face multi-faceted challenges—rapid technological advancements, customer expectations for high-quality services, regulatory compliance, ever-changing technology landscapes and the need to build highly reliable solutions. The level of complexity of OSS, and the number of combinations they need to handle, are incredibly large. Instantaneous perfection isn’t an option, so iteration serves as an essential catalyst for quality assurance and improvement. 

Each iteration helps to refine the system and get it closer to impossible perfection - by helping to identify and remedy operational bottlenecks, ineffective service protocols, black-swan events and sub-optimal network configurations. This recurrent improvement process allows organisations to deliver higher value and resilience to stakeholders by continually refining and improving their systems.

The iterative engine: Driving telco and OSS towards impossible perfection

Contrary to common perceptions, iteration can be a cost-saving strategy. In a complex OSS ecosystem, the cost of making large-scale changes to a monolithic system can be exorbitant. However, the widespread adoption of Agile delivery models has shown iteration allows for incremental changes whilst reducing costs and risks. By breaking down problems into smaller, manageable tasks and resolving them with iterative solutions, businesses can deploy quicker and more cost-effective updates without the burden of large-scale, risky rollouts. This approach can also deliver business value earlier than a perfection-seeking big-bang roll-out.

Continual improvement is certainly an important consideration, but iteration is not merely about fixing what's broken. It’s also beneficial for fostering a culture of innovation. When teams revisit past projects or long-standing challenges with fresh eyes, they can leverage new technologies and methodologies to overhaul existing systems creatively. In OSS, for instance, this could mean incorporating machine learning algorithms to optimise network traffic or to re-calibrate the job lists of field technicians when unexpected events arise. Looking even more laterally, when new and relevant technology such as blockchain appears unexpectedly, a commitment to iteration allows for it to be considered for applications that have previously been challenging (e.g. for secure storage of immutable records).

Refining, revisiting, reworking: The three important Rs of iteration in telecommunications

Importantly, iteration places the customer at the heart of the development cycle. With each iteration, telcos and OSS can use customer feedback to adjust services, interfaces, workflows and even network architecture. By continually fine-tuning products and services in response to user feedback, companies ensure that they stay aligned with market needs. Perhaps equally important is being seen to provide an optimised, personalised and ever-improving customer experience.

As Jason Fried suggests, “you rarely simply deliver something and move on." The truth is that you can’t ever just move on without revisitation in the telecommunications industry. It simply evolves too quickly, yet still needs to support and exist within legacy situations at scale. Whether it’s a 5G rollout, edge computing, or IoT device support, new technologies are inserted into the existing technology stack. Iteration allows companies to address systemic issues that could never have been apparent in the initial design of the legacy networks but become crucial as the technology environment evolves.

Our school-system may not readily see iteration as a subject, but in domains like telco and OSS, it is an essential discipline to master and manage. The process of revisiting, reassessing, and reworking solutions does not just make for better systems; it makes for a more adaptive industry.