Understanding the CALMR Approach to DevOps

DevOps is a set of techniques and procedures used to close the gap among the operations and development teams. The objectives of DevOps are to promote a culture of collaboration, automation, and continuous delivery of value. Typically, developers create code, while operations deploy and operate code. This division causes delays and miscommunication. DevOps aims to bring the two together for better, faster, and more reliable software delivery through collaboration. DevOps uses automation tools (deployment tools, CI/CD, and multiple other tools) for managing tasks such as testing, integrating, and deploying. Automation makes less room for human error and faster processes. DevOps focuses on continuous feedback, allowing teams to learn from each release and failures, so that improvements can be made quicker.

The CALMR approach DevOps is a method that is focused on the key principles that can improve each of these elements: collaboration, automation, Lean, measurement, and recovery. It aims to create a smoother work process in the office, reduce waste, and improve collaborative teams (up, down, and across development, operations, etc). Let's look at each of these elements and how they contribute towards successful DevOps. 

1. Culture

DevOps is about a culture based around Lean-Agile principles, practices, and mindsets. Whenever possible, it enables certain operational work to be shifted upstream and also to carry the development work downstream into deployment. In a CALMR based DevOps, the solutions are delivered and managed for the purposes of continuous improvement.

Key Cultural Values in DevOps include

• Customer Focus: Success is defined by an organisation's ability to truly understand and meet the wants or needs of customers. Everyone participating in the value stream, including but not limited to the customer, must understand and be focused on serving the customer.
• Teamwork: Effective teamwork by, with, and between production, management, security, and various departments, is a necessity. The people involved must collaborate regularly to produce a solution that adapts to the evolvement of the business demands.
• Risk Acceptance: DevOps has an understanding that every release is a test until it is validated by the customer. A culture of calculated risk-taking, learning, and developing is essential in order to develop into something more than just a project.
• Sharing and Transparency: Openly sharing knowledge within and between teams and the entire enterprise strengthens the organisation. It enables not only the shift of knowledge and skills in a more up-stream fashion, but resources - physical and otherwise - in a more proactive manner.
• Continuous Improvement: The culture develops into a mindset and attitude of continuous improvement. It is in the ethos of everybody to continually be improving themselves.

Example‍

An example of cultural change in DevOps is regular team sessions, including the participants (developers, operations, and security) that will each provide input for the team's planning. This collaboration builds trust and creates transparency between the silos as they aim to achieve shared goals. This constant collaboration creates efficiencies, thus saves time, which is imperative when we need quick response times. 

2. Automation

Manual processes are generally slow and tedious to perform, and prone to errors, which ultimately prevent organizations from delivering value and increasing overall productivity. As stated in the previous section, manual processes can be inefficient, and the CALMR DevOps safe approach will apply automation to bring fast and secure operations. A manual process to deliver value increases the chances of making an error which will slow down the opportunity to complete the project and negatively impact productivity. The CALMR approach to DevOps uses a variety of approaches to automate and streamline workflows, but mainly through the use of Continuous Delivery Pipelines (CDPs). The automated pipelines become part of the tool chain and often improve processing times and provide quicker feedback.

Key Components of Automation include

• Value Stream Management: Shows real-time metrics of the entire value stream performance, measures the process flow, and tells us where our current bottleneck/delay is in the delivery pipeline.
• Version Management: An additional tool used to locate and manage changes to configurations and source files of the systems in place. It helps ensure we continue to run very well in our applications and systems.
• Infrastructure as Code: A way to treat all of our systems as customisable and disposable resources, and automates the management of infrastructure.
• Automated Testing: Automation increases the speed of delivery by automating various testing stages. There are several types of testing, such as usability, integration, and unit testing.
• Security Monitoring: Discovers any weaknesses throughout the pipeline, contributing to security related to code, infrastructure, and networks.
• Continuous Integration: Automatically runs tools, like when developers commit code. Plus, the CI tool can run the build, test, and deployment phases.
• Analytics and Monitoring: A means to collect data to quantify the performance, quality, and efficiency of the pipeline while creating insight that enables continuous improvements.

Example‍

In a project where a team was creating a cloud-based application, they built an automated CDP. The CDP covered all stages from code integration through to deployment process while automatically testing at each stage. This automaton took away considerably amount of wasted manual effort, significantly reduced errors and sped up release cadence while increasing productivity and better able to respond to feedback.

3. Lean

Ineffective Agile practices focus on maintaining a continuous flow, and it is also a core principle of CALMR SAFe Agile. It emphasises delivering software in smaller batches and restricting Work-in-Progress (WIP). Therefore the process has real-time visibility into the software development process.

The CALMR scaled Agile promotes a smoother flow of work, resulting in higher release frequencies. So, it has reduced costs and improved predictability. It also accelerates feedback cycles, minimises rework, and builds uninterrupted service delivery. By optimising flow, it leads to faster delivery times without compromising on quality.

Key Elements that Support the CALMR SAFe Agile Approach to DevOps include

• Reducing Work-in-Progress (WIP): A Kanban program provides visibility into WIP and helps stakeholders to be able to see problems. With this visibility, the team can look at the WIP and how it relates to the available capacity, allowing to maintain a steady flow of progress.
• Reduce Batch Sizes: Smaller batches pass through the system quickly, allowing for faster learning and faster change.
• Manage Queue Length: We can predict how long inspections or work are going to take by observing queue lengths or time in a queue. Short queues mean faster flows; however, longer queues mean longer and slower flows.

Example

If we think about a large e-commerce project, development teams can utilize Lean Flow under the CALMR (Culture, Automation, Lean, Measurement, and Sharing) DevOps framework. Teams can decrease the time of feature releases using Lean Flow provided we are managing WIP and focusing on smaller batches. With the use of a kanban board, a team may see how their work is progressing in relation to WIP and can detect bottlenecks to address them quickly. This offers the ability to integrate features and deploy code faster, derive better value from feedback cycles and reduce operational costs.

4. Measuring

It is essential to monitor the delivery pipeline continuously in order to understand how a team operates in DevOps. By creating telemetry tools in DevOps for delivery monitoring, we can identify what specific bottleneck is affecting our dev and it offers insight about whether the level of quality we delivered is indeed what the customer expected. KPIs for pipeline flow metrics are also really important for monitoring progress and optimising processes.

Key Metrics to Track in DevOps

• Pipeline Flow Metrics: A variation of metrics that can be used, meant to capture the time spent in flow and the time between ideation and delivery into the development and production flow.
• Lead Time: This metric identifies the time the development team takes to go from initiating development until a Working product is delivered to the customer.
• Deployment Frequency: The rate at which a development team will deploy a version or new code into production, or the delivery speed.
• Change Volume: Tracks the number of changes for each deployment. In the world of agile delivery, smaller and more frequent changes will provide reduced risk and easier troubleshooting.
• WIP Volume: Tracks the amount of work-in-progress (WIP) you have at any point in time. The lower WIP volume means you'll have to better focus your effort, making tours quicker and more efficient to deliver.
• Solution Quality Metrics: These metrics measure the quality of the solution by capturing defects, failures, and overall system stability. Assuring we have solutions that are stable, reliable, and performant.
• Solution Value Metrics: These metrics measure business value and impact of the solution. They are used to answer the question: Did the product deliver the value assumed for the benefit?
• Return on Investment (ROI): Measures the value created from your DevOps investments to determine the business value of the benefits delivered.
• Net Present Value (NPV): Assesses the long term business benefit value of a project with ROI, plus future returns that will be coming in.
• Customer Ticket Volume: The volume of customer support tickets each month tells a story about the quality of the product and potentially the user experience.
• Customer Satisfaction: Measuring customer satisfaction as a percentage is an indication of how happy customers are with the product or service delivered and will tell you how well the product is performing.
• Time to Restore: On average, how long it takes the organisation to restore service once it has been identified and resolved is a key metric for productivity, customer experience ,and uptime.

Example

In a software development project, teams should track their progress using key metrics such as Lead Time and Deployment Frequency. Tracking metrics makes it easier for teams to identify delays and optimize their flow and, in the example of the Time to Restore, creates faster protocols for investigating, diagnosing, and fixing issues when there are interruptions in service. Tracking Customer Satisfaction means that when something falls below expectations, it is detectable, and the team can then find ways to improve so they can deliver a quality product that users expect when using the product they deliver. Each time they analyze these KPIs, they become intimately aware of the state of their delivery pipelines, and they make progress toward improvement.

5. Recovery

Without defined recovery methods, speed comes with risk and organizations are almost always vulnerable. When it comes to addressing failures, organizations must ensure they are always ready with a clear plan as soon as a condition occurs that could be mitigated, but changes how the user obtains value. With solid recovery tactics, the organization always sees itself in the choice of either rolling back to a stable state or moving forward with all common sense principles of minimizing value loss.

Note that this delivery pipeline was carefully structured to be able to release slowly and riskily or with the intention that they will be able to recover fast if operational failures occur, which means that with every engagement, you deliver value in a more rapid manner.

Techniques for Swift Recovery in DevOps

• "Stop-the-Line" Approach: This model indicates that when there is a problem that poses a threat to the value of the solution or its delivery, the organizations involved will choose to enter a "stop-the-line" operation. This would indicate an arrangement to stop the operation altogether and move towards applying problem-solving until the situation is rectified so that long-term solutions are enacted.
• Prepare for Deployment Failures: Deployment fallback should not be surprising. DevOps teams should prepare for them to happen and construct detailed recovery plans for when they occur. They will benefit from dry-running these in real or close to real production situations to develop greater robustness to problems and quicker response times.
• Rollback and Repair: Production failures are, occasionally, unavoidable, but teams must know ways to repair forward quickly. If they cannot repair forward, the team will need to rollback to an earlier stable version as a last resort to avoid long downtimes if the goal is continuous delivery.

Example

In a large e-commerce platform with a sizable dev team, a "stop-the-line" approach is taken whenever a serious bug prevents customers from checking out. The team halts all work to fix the issue, documenting it in a fix log for future reference. They regularly practice rolling back to the last stable version, allowing quick reversion after problematic deployments. This strategy helps them maintain a balance between rolling back when issues arise and continuing to address bugs, enabling the team to stabilize operations while moving quickly.

The diagram below summarises the CALMR Approach

The CALMR approach to DevOps is like using a well-planned recipe for cooking. You may have all the right ingredients but without the right steps and timing the dish won't turn out as expected. Similarly, CALMR gives a clear structure to your DevOps process such that every part works together smoothly. It guides teams to collaborate better, automate tasks smartly, and keep things running efficiently even when challenges arise. Here are 5 reasons to use the approach:

1. Enhanced Collaboration

CALMR promotes open communication and cooperation across all areas of the organization, which of course is across both development and operational functions. CALMR will eliminate siloed support so that teams can work together to achieve common objectives. By working together to share out knowledge and responsibilities, we can solve our issues much faster and actively help to foster innovation. This is all part of the collaborative culture, which builds trust and speeds up the delivery of all work.

2. Increased Automation

Automation is a key part of the CALMR process design. It reduces manual processes, reduces the risk of errors, and enables us to speed up more repetitive tasks. With the appropriate levels of automation, teams can spend time doing the more valuable strategic work instead of merely maintaining quality levels of delivery and downtime. Automation improves the development of the overall performance of the team and their ability to deliver new features and updates.

3. Lean Principles

CALMR applies Lean principles in order to reduce waste and streamline workflow. Streamlining work by breaking it down into smaller batches also reduces times of waiting times and may reduce re-work times, which improves feedback loops. Focusing on teams that are delivering value quickly condenses time for implementing changed requirements or new requests, and we build in the quality for continuous improvement in determining our workload.

4. Data-Driven Measurement

CALMR makes decisions rooted in fact. It uses metrics such as lead time, deployment frequency, and customer feedback to assess progress and know themselves out. This fact-based decisioning allows teams to work effectively, continually improve efficiency, and embrace cadences and a high level of quality.

5. Effective Recovery Mechanisms

CALMR also helps teams to think ahead about unexpected situations and are capable of recovery if there is any sort of misstep. It encourages rollback methods and quick fixes to ensure downtime stays at 0%. By planning for the unexpected and learning from it, teams will be more resilient, and all service will remain consistent and reliable.

Having a good theoretical understanding of how the CALMR approach to DevOps is all related will help anyone wanting to survive and thrive in this fast-paced industry. Whether you're a developer, operations engineer, or in a role that is a management team, grounding yourself in these principles will help you streamline processes, eliminate unknowns, and deliver user value much faster.

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1. What is the CALMR approach to DevOps?

The CALMR approach to DevOps emphasizes Culture, Automation, Lean Flow, Measurement, and Recovery. It enables teams to collaborate efficiently, automate their processes, have faster flow, and recover quickly from adversity.

2. Why is Culture important in DevOps?

Culture is crucial, as it leads to collaboration and shared ownership. Everyone in the team, from development to operations, needs to work together to meet customer needs and adapt quickly to changes.

3. How does Automation help in DevOps?

Automation speeds up tasks like testing, building, and deploying. It reduces manual errors and helps teams deliver software faster and more reliably.

4. What does Lean Flow mean in DevOps?

Lean Flow is about working in small, manageable batches and reducing delays. It helps teams move quickly by minimising work in progress and focusing on delivering value without waiting too long.

5. Why is measuring progress in DevOps important?

Measuring progress helps teams understand what’s working and what might be failing. It tracks important metrics like lead time, deployment frequency, and customer satisfaction. With these metrics, teams can improve their processes continuously.