Alice Sowerby
Co-Host of CHAOSScast
Alice is a friendly and thoughtful person whose career is centered around operational leadership in tech.
She's currently on a sabbatical but previous jobs include Program Director for Developer Relations at Equinix, COO at an MLOps startup, and a range of roles in product, engineering, and marketing teams in B2B tech.
What she loves most about work is raising people up through collaborating, coaching, mentoring, and servant leadership. Her strategic and problem-solving skills mean she is valued as a key member of many groups. She is active in the TODO group in the OSPO Book project, in the AI working group in OpenChain and in comms with the CHAOSS project.
Alice is based in the UK, in a small village near Bath. She enjoys travel, dancing, gardening and astronomy.
Alice Sowerby has hosted seven Episodes.
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Episode 93: Guest Episode - Sustain meets CHAOSScast to talk about Practitioner Guides
19 September 2024 | 40 mins 12 secs
In this episode of CHAOSScast, it’s a crossover with Sustain, host Richard Littauer is joined by three guests, Dawn Foster, Elizabeth Barron, and Luis Cañas Diaz, to discuss the CHAOSS Project's recent development of Practitioner Guides. The show delves into the purpose of these guides, which are designed to help open source projects interpret and utilize metrics to improve community health and sustainability. The guests explain the significance of metrics in open source projects, the challenges of defining and making them accessible, and how the guides can benefit different types of projects, from large corporations to individual developers. Topics covered include the background and format of the guides, specifics on the metrics discussed, and the practical applications and improvements these guides aim to facilitate. Go ahead and download this episode now!
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Episode 92: ISO Standards for Open Source Community Health Metrics
5 September 2024 | 28 mins 41 secs
In this episode of CHAOSScast, host Alice Sowerby is joined by Sean Goggins, Georg Link, and guest Divya Mohan, to discuss the importance and process of establishing ISO standards for open source community health metrics. The panel delves into how ISO standards ensure interoperability and aid in establishing credible industry practices. They highlight existing ISO standards in open source and share how these efforts are being translated into the CHAOSS Project's metrics, particularly focusing on security and community activity. The conversation includes insights on the current state of the project, the feedback process, and how interested individuals can get involved. Press download to hear more!
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Episode 89: Practitioner Guides: #3 Organizational Participation
25 July 2024 | 32 mins 25 secs
In this episode of CHAOSSCast, host Alice Sowerby is joined by panelists Dawn Foster, Elizabeth Barron, and Harmony Elendu, to discuss the importance and complexities of organizational participation in open source projects. They delve into how the CHAOSS Practitioner Guides help users make sense of CHAOSS metrics and provide insights on improving open source project health. The conversation covers the significance of diverse organizational participation, the role of community managers, and the challenges of accurately measuring organizational contributions. Additionally, they highlight tools like Augur and Grimoire Lab that aid in data collection and analysis as well as offer practical advice for both individuals and companies to foster healthier, more inclusive open source communities. Press download now to hear more!
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Episode 88: Practitioner Guides: #2 Contributor Sustainability
11 July 2024 | 33 mins 23 secs
In this episode of CHAOSSScast, host Alice Sowerby, along with Dawn Foster and Elizabeth Barron, discuss measuring and improving open source community health through contributor sustainability. The conversation highlights the importance of documentation, the balance of contributor roles, and proactive community building. They share insights and examples on how projects can avoid single points of failure, the significance of onboarding processes, and the impact of asking for help. The discussion also underscores the human aspects of open source contributions and provides practical strategies for long-term project viability. Press download now to hear more!
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Episode 86: The Turing Institute: Using AI ethically with the power of Open Source
13 June 2024 | 44 mins 51 secs
In this episode of CHAOSScast, co-hosts Alice Sowerby and Dawn Foster welcome guests Aida Mehonic, Malvika Sharan, and Kirstie Whittaker from The Alan Turing Institute. The discussion begins with delving into the Institute's strategic vision, focused on using data science and AI to address global challenges in environment, health, and security. They examine the role of open source contributions in enhancing the ethical, accessible, and impactful uses of AI. The episode highlights various projects, such as The Turing Way, and the importance of community building, inclusive research practices, and the ethical considerations of AI. They also discuss the integration of CHAOSS metrics in their work and explore future projects and initiatives at The Alan Turing Institute. Press download now to hear more!
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Episode 85: Introducing CHAOSS Practitioner Guides: #1 Responsiveness
30 May 2024 | 31 mins 51 secs
In this episode of CHAOSScast, host Alice Sowerby is joined with Dawn Foster and special guest, Luis Cañas-Díaz from Bitergia. Today, they delve into the Practitioner Guide series created by CHAOSS, particularly focusing on the Responsiveness Guide authored by Dawn. The conversation highlights the challenges people face in interpreting data and metrics within their projects and how the guides aim to provide actionable insights for improvement. Additionally, they touch on the potential risks of misinterpreting metrics and stress the importance of context and direct involvement from project teams to effectively address responsiveness issues. The episode also covers future directions for the guide series and ways the community can contribute and provide feedback. Press download to hear more!
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Episode 84: Community Viability - how Verizon thinks about OSS risk
16 May 2024 | 34 mins 46 secs
In this episode of CHAOSScast, Dawn Foster, Matt Germonprez, Alice Sowerby, and guest Gary White, Principal Engineer at Verizon’s OSPO office, delve into the world of viability metrics models developed for assessing the risks associated with using open source software components. Gary explains the creation process of these models, their application within Verizon for software evaluation, and the significance of engaging with the open source community to enhance project viability. The conversations also explore the challenges and considerations in deploying these metrics within organizations, emphasizing the blend of policy enforcement and cultural influence to manage open source software dependencies effectively. Press download now to hear more!