The “three C’s” of a successful DevOps journey

Just because something is trendy, and appears to be working for someone else doesn’t mean you should run out and do it–at least not without doing some homework and preparation. It’s true of weight loss, and fitness plans, and it’s true of DevOps.

DevOps is hot, so companies want to make sure they’re not missing out, but it’s sort of like the Dot.com boom when companies all ran out and bought domains, and set up websites with no understanding of what the Web is, or how or why they wanted a website. The same thing happened again with mobile apps.

I wrote a blog post about why DevOps may not be for everybody, and some of the things organizations need to consider before jumping in:

There’s always a sexy new tech buzzword flying around, and it’s easy to fall into the trap of assuming that if a concept or technology is hot you need to hurry up and jump on board so you don’t miss anything. DevOps is hot, and seems to be almost ubiquitous these days. But that doesn’t mean that every organization should rush out and embrace DevOps.

Defining what it is exactly that you think you’re embracing can be a challenge. The concept of DevOps is a bit broad and ethereal in the first place. The number of vendors calling their products or services “DevOps” just because it’s sexy marketing muddies the waters and makes it more difficult to figure out what DevOps is, and how it’s supposed to benefit your organization.

Even if you think you have a fair grasp on what DevOps is, though, it still isn’t necessarily right for every organization. It CAN be right for most organizations, but there’s some introspection, and due diligence that has to come up front. More precisely, it isn’t necessarily right for every organization without a solid foundation of the right skills and resources, and an understanding of what you hope to accomplish, and how you plan to get there.

Nathen Harvey, community director at chef, shared some insight on this topic. “Through immense feedback from our community, customers and contributors we’ve learned a lot about how and when an organization should begin a DevOps transition. In short, everyone should not immediately jump on the DevOps bandwagon.”

Read the full post at DevOps.com: Enter at your own risk: DevOps isn’t for everybody.