The Insider’s Dilemma: Employed Open Source Developers’ Identification Imbalance and Intentions to Leave

In corporate-sponsored open source software development, company-employed developers become “insiders” to the OSS community, and therefore have two roles: they serve as a representative of their employing company, but may also identify as a member of the open source community. This study investigates what happens when identification with the company exceeds identification with the community (and vice versa), and also focuses on consequences when these insider roles come in conflict. Informed by social identity theory and organization-profession conflict theory, we report on two studies that predict identification imbalance to affect company turnover intention. Our first study is based on a survey of employed Linux kernel developers and uses polynomial regression to assess the effect of identification imbalance (and congruence) on company turnover intention. The second study extends our investigation beyond Linux and demonstrates that the effect of identification imbalance on turnover intention is mediated by role conflict. The findings suggest that turnover intention is lowest, when company and community identification match at high rather than low levels. We also find developers’ company career ambition influences how role conflict relates to company turnover intention. This study holds implications for theory and for managers in companies who engage with OSS communities.