DevOps is not an engineer
We’re looking for a passionate DevOps Engineer who can…
DevOps is not an engineer. It is a mindset. It is an idea. One that intends to tear down the walls between developers and operations.
When we throw software over the wall to a “DevOps Engineer” to deploy and run, we defeat the very idea of DevOps.
To do DevOps right, we need to enable developers and operations to work together, or better yet, enable developers to do operations. For the latter to work, operational workflows need to be simplified. Otherwise, teams may end up reinventing workflows or get bogged down by the responsibilities of two expansive domains.
Having a platform team that enables developers to do operational work is a common path organisations take. To label that team as a “DevOps Team” or its team members as “DevOps Engineers” can be considered a minor glitch – a misnomer just calling for the labels to be corrected. But to throw code over for a “DevOps Engineer” to deploy, that calls for more to be corrected than just naming.
Relevant
-
Why are some better at math than others?
If we want to know who is good at math, we may not need to ask any math questions at all. An educational researcher was going through the results of...
-
What we can learn from airplane crashes
From 1978 to 1988, Korean Air had a “loss” rate of 4.79 planes per million departures. In contrast, United Airlines had a loss rate of 0.27 per million – 94%...
-
How to suck less at meetings
[Some organisations] hold meetings that have little purpose and no clearly defined end-state. At the other extreme, some organisations are so fearful of the waste of meetings that they refuse...
-
No meeting Thursdays? No, thank you.
Some organizations are so addicted to meetings that work has to take the backseat. A quick and easy solution is to bar meetings during certain hours of the day, or...
-
Why conventional management doesn't work for knowledge work
Conventional management is based around the idea of coercion. When people don’t naturally enjoy their work, conventional management makes sense. Motivation (or fear?) has to be induced in order to...
-
Beyond carrots and sticks
As he grew older, Douglas became more and more disturbed by the negative attributions his father ascribed to the unemployed and homeless (that they’re shiftless and lazy, etc., much the...
-
If we get rid of performance appraisal, what do we do instead?
Peopleware lists a set of management techniques that are detrimental to teamwork. Every one of those is a technique that we’re likely to associate with an appraisal system.
-
Management practices that counteract teamwork
The ‘icide’ suffix indicates the killing of something, e.g. pesticide, the killing of pests, and homicide, the killing of a person. Tom DeMarco, in the context of a team, coined...
Recent posts
-
A worked example of Value-Stream Mapping
Value-stream maps can be daunting at first glance like these maps on Google Images. ValueTech (a made-up software company for the purpose of our example) thought so too until they...
-
Test pyramid and ice-cream cone
The test ice-cream cone is a strategic anti-pattern. It indicates excessive reliance on expensive and flaky forms of testing, such as manual and end-to-end, especially for components that could otherwise...
-
Notes on Value-Stream Mapping
A value stream is the sequence of activities required to design, produce, and deliver a good or service to a customer. – Value Stream Mapping by Karen Martin and Mike...