100% Agile within a Year – The DevOps Cube

25
SEPTEMBER 2017 by Niall Crawford
An interesting article I spotted on LinkedIn this week:
  • [Bank] to be “100 per cent Agile” within a year, says senior coach
Interesting for a few reasons, one – the post was quickly removed after receiving a battering in the comments section and across general social media and secondly because these “agile at scale” comments are a pet “bug-bear” of mine.
Saying that however, I probably must also assume that the excitable author may have “partially” miscommunicated the intended message of the “agile thought leader” and thus why the article was quickly swept under the carpet. Nevertheless, it did get me thinking. How could a large company, like a bank, be 100% agile? And how could they prove it? I see two fundamental challenges or truisms:
  1. Companies are federated
Companies tend to be federated, by Business Unit or Platform and of course teams. This of course has certain benefits, however, it also means “mileage” can vary. Some teams have good leaders & smart engineers, other poorer divisions less so.
  1. Measuring agile is difficult.
Counting the number of agile coaches is not a realistic method and organizations rarely have the necessary statistics (past baseline information or accurate real-time statistics) to demonstrate they have accelerated delivery timelines, increased change volumes and continue to provide quality. With this objective in mind, I set a challenge for the team to come up with a solution, using our own Enov8 Platform, that our clients might use as a method, in part at least, to measure their IT maturity & agility. The result after some brain storming was the “DevOps Cube”.
DevOps Cube
An approach based on understanding the organization is built upon IT Systems & Platforms. Each system is made up of building blocks that span across:
  • IT Environment Tiers i.e. infrastructure, applications & data
  • IT Environment Operations e.g. build, deploy, test (& maybe secure).
They also have different maturity levels from Chaos to Defined to Automated to Self-Service.
Using this method of measurement, which is already captured with the enov8 platform, an organization can determine at a granular level whether a system instance has CICD (Continuous Integration / Continuous Delivery) capabilities and review it at a more holistic level e.g. by Platform, Business Unit or Enterprise.
Enov8 will be providing the DevOps Cube with their Environment & Release Management solutions. Request a demo, or contact us for more information about the enov8 platform.

Relevant Articles

What Is Release Management in ITIL? Guide and Best Practices

What Is Release Management in ITIL? Guide and Best Practices

Managing enterprise software production at scale is no easy task. This is especially true in today’s complex and distributed environment where teams are spread out across multiple geographical areas. To maintain control over so many moving parts, IT leaders need to...

Test Environment: What It Is and Why You Need It

Test Environment: What It Is and Why You Need It

Software development is a complex process that requires meticulous attention to detail to ensure that the final product is reliable and of high quality. One of the most critical aspects of this process is testing, and having a dedicated test environment is essential...

PreProd Environment Done Right: The Definitive Guide

PreProd Environment Done Right: The Definitive Guide

Before you deploy your code to production, it has to undergo several steps. We often refer to these steps as preproduction. Although you might expect these additional steps to slow down your development process, they help speed up the time to production. When you set...

What is Data Tokenization? Important Concepts Explained

What is Data Tokenization? Important Concepts Explained

In today’s digital age, data security and privacy are crucial concerns for individuals and organizations alike. With the ever-increasing amount of sensitive information being collected and stored, it’s more important than ever to protect this data from...

Steering Committees in Depth: Understanding their Role

Steering Committees in Depth: Understanding their Role

Are you a product owner or technologist looking to understand the role of a steering committee and how it can benefit your organization? Or maybe you're just wandering by and curious about the topic. Either way, we'll explain the steering committee in detail. This...

Everything to Know about Smoke Testing

Everything to Know about Smoke Testing

In the realm of software development, ensuring the reliability and functionality of applications is of paramount importance. Central to this process is software testing, which helps identify bugs, glitches, and other issues that could mar the user experience. A...