Monday 9th of May, 25 consultants from different disciplines and seniority levels in Cegal left the Lysaker office to participate in a two-day hackathon at a hotel just outside Oslo. The goal was to create good interdisciplinary collaborations and give the participants the opportunity to learn something new.
The consultants were divided into four groups and were given the task of coding a product to be streamed on Twitch. The only criteria for the task was that the groups had to use OBS (Open Broadcast Software), run the product in Microsoft Azure and integrate it with an optional end-user service.
Some groups created a website that interacted with the streaming, and others connected to the built-in chat feature on Twitch. Here, only the imagination set the limit for how the task could be solved.
This was the first time Cegal arranged a hackathon, but likely not the last, says Manfred Bjørlin who was involved in arranging the event.
"Our consultants often work in small groups with customers. With this hackathon, we wanted to gather them in a social environment to share experiences and knowledge, and collaborate on completely new tasks than what they usually work on."
Why is this important?
"By being thrown into such a project, where you get a task that is completely different from what you usually work with, you must seek out new knowledge. I think it's important for people's motivation to get to work on new and exciting challenges and have the opportunity to learn something new", says Bjørlin.
Why did you choose this task?
"Twitch is a live streaming service for gaming and not really a skill our customers demand, and that is the whole purpose. It represents something completely new. This is about developing the ability to acquire new knowledge and expertise, whether it is Twitch or other new technologies."
"I think everyone agreed that this was a fun, different and exciting challenge. In addition, we had the opportunity to meet colleagues we have not seen in a long time, or never even seen before. All the groups deserve a big round of applause for a fantastic effort and a very good collaboration", Bjørlin concludes.
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