Making It Look Easy: Top Tips for Your DevOps Projects

At the intersection of development and operations, you’ll find DevOps. The term, though loosely defined, refers to a methodology used as a set of tools and practices to facilitate cooperation between software developers and IT operations in a company. The ultimate goal is to optimize the systems development life cycle by reducing friction and assuring quality across the board.

Development and Operations teams collaborate to build, test, and deploy software, despite their disparate core functionalities within the organizational structure. So, what are the best ways to get these two teams to work together productively? Here are five of our top tips:

1. Get Clear: In order to achieve a goal, that goal must first be clearly defined. Both teams need to understand the project’s final goal and their role in reaching it. Doing so will make assigning and prioritizing tasks easier and prevent project drift.
2. Stay Agile: Agility isn’t just for gym class. Agile methodologies, including Scrum and Kanban, provide a framework for collaborative efforts and ongoing optimization. These will help both teams stay on top of issues and resolve challenges quickly.
3. Sharing is Caring: There’s (almost) never a good reason to reinvent the wheel. By sharing tools or code via a platform or repository, cooperating teams can improve access to save time and streamline their efforts.
4. Step Out of the Box: It can be tempting to let team members settle deeply into their comfort zone. Why not let them do what they do best? While we certainly wouldn’t want to abandon individual strengths, encouraging team members to learn more about the work and roles of their colleagues can be beneficial. When we know more about what others need and experience, it is easier to support the smooth execution of project tasks.
5. Stop, Collaborate, and Listen: Collaboration can’t be just a buzzword. Make communication, transparency, and teamwork central to your organizational culture, and you’ll find that the rest flows so much easier.

DevOps will play an increasingly important role as business goals and technologies become more complex and multifaceted. These skills and tactics will improve DevOps projects and are useful for many situations. Want someone to walk you through the specifics of establishing a DevOps strategy for your organization? Talk to us today.