What steps can you take to align DevOps metrics with business goals?

DevOps is a culture and practice that aims to deliver software faster and more reliably by breaking down the silos between development and operations teams. However, DevOps is not only about technical efficiency, but also about aligning with the business goals and value proposition of the organization. To achieve this alignment, DevOps teams need to measure and monitor the right metrics that reflect the impact of their work on the customers, stakeholders, and revenue. In this article, we will discuss some steps that you can take to align DevOps metrics with business goals.

1 Identify the business goals

The first step is to identify and understand the business goals that your organization wants to achieve. These goals can be related to customer satisfaction, retention, acquisition, revenue, market share, innovation, or any other strategic objective. You should also define the key performance indicators (KPIs) that measure the progress and success of these goals. For example, if your goal is to increase customer loyalty, you might use KPIs such as net promoter score, churn rate, or lifetime value.

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2 Map the DevOps metrics to the business goals

The next step is to map the DevOps metrics that you collect and track to the business goals that you identified. DevOps metrics can be categorized into four types: process, product, people, and performance. Process metrics measure the efficiency and quality of the software delivery process, such as lead time, deployment frequency, change failure rate, or mean time to recover. Product metrics measure the functionality and usability of the software product, such as feature usage, user feedback, or defect rate. People metrics measure the engagement and collaboration of the DevOps team, such as team satisfaction, communication, or learning. Performance metrics measure the availability and reliability of the software product, such as uptime, response time, or error rate.

You should select the DevOps metrics that are relevant and aligned with your business goals and KPIs. For example, if your goal is to increase customer loyalty, you might use process metrics such as deployment frequency and change failure rate to ensure that you deliver value faster and more reliably, product metrics such as feature usage and user feedback to understand what your customers need and want, people metrics such as team satisfaction and communication to foster a positive and productive culture, and performance metrics such as uptime and response time to provide a smooth and consistent user experience.

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João Brito

CTO at Getup
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Mapping metrics is the first step to defining where you want to get to and as the saying goes "what cannot be measured, cannot be improved", so after mapping you must start measuring, D.O.R.A. metrics can be a great place to start, whether with development teams or operations teams, after years they have developed great methods and start with the 4 pillars (Lead Time for Changes, Deployment Frequency, Change Failure Rate, Mean Time to Recover) is a great start to understanding where you can focus and improve the performance of your teams and processes.

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3 Visualize and communicate the DevOps metrics

The final step is to visualize and communicate the DevOps metrics that you mapped to the business goals. You should use dashboards, reports, or other tools that can display the data in a clear and concise way, and that can highlight the trends, patterns, or anomalies that need attention. You should also share the DevOps metrics with the relevant stakeholders, such as the business leaders, the product owners, or the customers, and explain how they relate to the business goals and KPIs. You should also solicit feedback and suggestions from the stakeholders on how to improve the DevOps metrics and the business outcomes.

By visualizing and communicating the DevOps metrics, you can create a feedback loop that can help you monitor and improve the performance and value of your software delivery process and product. You can also demonstrate the impact and contribution of your DevOps team to the business goals and value proposition of your organization.

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João Brito

CTO at Getup
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After mapping and measuring, it is necessary to communicate, share and then you can work together with your team to improve the main points, aligned with the company's strategy and that bring more results. For example, an IaC initiative can bring very good results for MTTR, but also for team efficiency and more standardized deliveries. Speaking of development integration, implementing a clear CI/CD process can bring efficiency, agility to deliveries and even improve or increase the use of these processes by integrating security and good practices.

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4 Here’s what else to consider

This is a space to share examples, stories, or insights that don’t fit into any of the previous sections. What else would you like to add?

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João Brito

CTO at Getup
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Something interesting to consider is communication, creating an environment that favors good communication within teams and between them is very important as well as nurturing a "blameless" culture as it will favor the growth of internal ideas and the understanding that if someone did something wrong could be bad process issues, lack of documentation and training, or other factors and not just the simple-minded "your fault."

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What steps can you take to align DevOps metrics with business goals?

1

2

3

4

1 Identify the business goals

2 Map the DevOps metrics to the business goals

3 Visualize and communicate the DevOps metrics

4 Here’s what else to consider

System Architecture

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What steps can you take to align DevOps metrics with business goals?

1

2

3

4

1 Identify the business goals

2 Map the DevOps metrics to the business goals

3 Visualize and communicate the DevOps metrics

4 Here’s what else to consider

System Architecture

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