DevOps is a waste of your time if you aren’t fully committed

Source – techrepublic.com

If businesses aren’t aggressive enough in their DevOps approach, they could be wasting their time and energy, according to a new survey from New Relic. According to the survey, companies that were all-in on DevOps saw better results, while those that adopted the approach with less gusto tended to run into some problems.

“It seems that partial DevOps adoption might be not just ineffective, but actually counterproductive,” the survey stated. Those with higher adoption rates saw a higher level of satisfaction with DevOps as well, the report said.

The real danger zone, according to the survey, was ending up with a moderate level of adoption. High DevOps adopters saw significant returns, the report said, but moderate adopters ended up worse off than those with “limited adoption.” So, businesses should be sure that they either stay in the “testing the waters” phase or dive fully into DevOps—don’t get stuck in the middle.

So, what are some of the key metrics that DevOps aims to improve? For starters, it’s team communication. In terms of improvements in that area, 57% of high DevOps users saw an improvement, compared to 21% of moderate DevOps users, and 23% of low DevOps users.

Of both high and moderate DevOps users, 30% saw an improvement in the length of their development cycle. This was more than double the 14% of low DevOps users who reported the same improvement.

Bug resolution was improved by 44% of high DevOps users, while only 18% of moderate DevOps users and 20% of low DevOps users claimed the same thing. Application uptime was also boosted among 44% of high DevOps users, while only 17% of moderate DevOps users and 22% of low DevOps users saw an improvement in that area.

Proper tools are key, but there is something that is even more valuable to a DevOps deployment: Engineers must be able to see the impact that DevOps is having in order to be fully on board with the process.

“If engineers can’t connect their DevOps efforts to measurable improvements in outcomes that matter for their job and their career, your DevOps initiative may stall, wasting your investment and even leaving you worse off than when you started,” the survey stated.

The 3 big takeaways for TechRepublic readers

1. A new survey from New Relic claims that would-be DevOps practitioners must go all-in, or risk an “ineffective” or “counterproductive” deployment.
2. If a business can’t become a high DevOps user, they should avoid moderate use of the practices, which can be more detrimental than limited use.
3. Engineers must be able to see the real results of DevOps for a deployment to be successful.