#mainframe chat question 2

Greg Bledsoe
Aug 8, 2017 · 3 min read

Where is the industry, as far as the evolution of DevOps?

I would answer this story in two ways: theory and application, but I’d answer them in reverse, application first.

We’re still in the infancy of applying DevOps theory in all but a tiny minority of digital business (and essentially all business is digital business now.) We’re just now achieving mainstream penetration of the term, but the underlying principles and concepts are still mysterious to most. There’s also no standard definition of DevOps, so most people have invented their own limited idea which revolves, usually, around tools for automating, which drastically limits the utility of DevOps.

I like to say there is a progression in DevOps application: 1. We’re aware of DevOps and that it brings benefits, we want the benefits. 2. We install some tools and encourage people to automate. 3. We realize we still aren’t doing DevOps so we put some process in place. 4. We realize we still aren’t doing DevOps, except now we don’t know what to do.

Once people get through step 4, this is usually when I come in. The basic answer to “Why we can’t do DevOps” is essentially always the same. “You have unintentionally removed all incentive to collaborate.” Coming to terms with this self-inflicted injury is step 1.

This isn’t really our fault, we inherited “scientific management” and “Taylorism” which grew our current vertical command and control structures that misalign incentives, which we’ve now been investing in and trying to perfect for hundreds of years. The net effect is we’re stuck in a cultural box we don’t even realize exists that stymies all our efforts to realign our organization. If we don’t begin here we’ll have a tough time getting where we want to go.

For the theory side, DevOps is already a very sophisticated set of principles and methodologies that is more about how to solve problems and identifying what problems to solve than it is about telling you what to do. Because most organizations share a lot of sets of problems people come to believe the solutions to those problems *are* DevOps, but this misses the mark. There is nothing prescriptive about DevOps, and the moment it becomes so in application, it loses most of its power.

Applying those principles and methodologies rigorously with flexibility in method and process allows us to use the feedback loops we seek to identify and utilize to DevOps Devops itself.

This is the most unique and powerful part of DevOps, is that as we as an industry share what is working and what isn’t, we continue to add to and refine DevOps on a daily basis. The sharing culture of DevOps combined with the ultra-wide collaboration of the Internet lets us essentially learn from the experience of the entire rest of the world, and we feed that back into DevOps itself.

From experience we derive principles. From principles we derive strategy. To implement strategy we invent tactics. Implementation of those tactics provides us with new experience, from which we deduce new principles.

Because of this, DevOps will only grow more powerful.

All answers here: https://medium.com/@geek_king/answers-from-idgtechtalk-mainframe-chat-on-devops-d853cf3d786e

Greg Bledsoe

Written by

With @accenture, #Linux #devops #cybersecurity writer, speaker. Disruptor-In-Chief. Gentleman Barbarian, Peaceful Nerd Warrior. Views=mine rts != endorsements

Welcome to a place where words matter. On Medium, smart voices and original ideas take center stage - with no ads in sight. Watch
Follow all the topics you care about, and we’ll deliver the best stories for you to your homepage and inbox. Explore
Get unlimited access to the best stories on Medium — and support writers while you’re at it. Just $5/month. Upgrade