Although academics are spending two days a week or more applying for public funding, I have been lucky enough for the last decade or so to spend very little time on that activity. Instead the research center that I lead is funded directly by the companies and they decide whether we deliver value or not. We have organized our work in 6 month sprints and companies can leave at any point, so the moment we slip and stop delivering value, we are at high risk of losing the organizations that support us. That means we are judged by people that have skin in the game: our promise is that we help them adopt new digital technologies faster and if we fail, we will be “fired” for not adding value. The problem with public funding, in my view, is that the people deciding have no skin in the game. Whether a project that received funding delivers value to society or industry or not does not affect the project officers, their career nor their future. Even better, other academics are brought in to judge project proposals, so everyone can blame bad outcomes on someone else. In my research, I receive quite a bit of pressure to be more academic, focus more on the top journals and conferences and apply for more research funding. But I don’t. Instead, I focus my energy on doing what I can to accelerate the adoption of digital technologies in the European software intensive systems industry as I believe that this is where I can add the most value. So, as a reflection for today: who judges you? And is their judgement in line with your values or at odds with it?