What Is DevOps? (And How To Set Your Organization up for DevOps Success)

DevOps is a set of practices that aims to improve collaboration between software development (dev) and operations (ops). It emerged as a response to the inefficiencies and frustrations stemming from the divide between dev and ops teams. DevOps builds on Agile methodology by taking a cross-functional approach to building and releasing applications in shorter cycles, emphasizing automation and continuous feedback loops. The benefits of DevOps include faster software delivery, better performance and reliability, improved security posture, and increased scalability. However, implementing DevOps can be challenging due to factors such as resistance from team members, lack of clear goals or responsibilities, and unrealistic expectations about what it can achieve. To set your organization up for DevOps success, start small with a pilot program, focus on empowering teams with information rather than burdening them with additional responsibilities, invest in platform engineering to enable self-service, document technical and cultural best practices, encourage questions and create spaces for learning, and set inflection points to check in and reflect.