The Best of the Professor : The First Way

The “Best of the Professor” blogs will focus on one unique individual topic and will be followed by links to papers with more in depth information.

DevOps initiatives are supported by three basic principles. In his book “The Phoenix Project“, Gene Kim leverages the Theory of Constraints and the knowledge learned in production environments to describe the underlying principles of the DevOps movement in three ways. These principals are referred to as The First Way, The Second Way and The Third Way. This segment of “Best of the Professor” will focus on “The First Way”.

The First Way

Workflow. "The First Way" is all about workflow or the flow of work from left to right. Generally referring to that flow of work between the business and the customer. Work that is flowing from development to test and then test to operation teams is really only work in process. Work in process really does not equate to anything until value is realized on the other side. We must identify and remove or free up our constraints. For example, reducing the cycle from time of code commit to the time we are in production will reduce the release cadence. Ensuring the workflow from left to right can radically increase workflow throughout the delivery cycle. Define work and make it visible. None of us want to get trapped in a system that is destined to fail.

Be sure to view the following links to discover more and learn about the practices that support “The First Way”.

Five Principals of Lean Thinking : http://www.itsmprofessor.net/2016/02/the-5-principles-of-lean-thinking.html

Value Stream Mapping : http://www.itsmprofessor.net/2016/02/the-5-principles-of-lean-thinking.html

Continuous Delivery: http://www.itsmprofessor.net/2016/02/continuous-delivery.html

Cadence Vs. Velocity : http://www.itsmprofessor.net/2015/10/devops-cadence-vs-velocity.html

Agile Service Management Techniques: http://www.itsmprofessor.net/2015/03/agile-service-management-techniques-and.html

For resources and information about other DevOps Principles look for “Best of the Professor” papers titled “The Second Way” and “The Third Way”. Coming soon.

For information regarding training and certification: http://www.itsmacademy.com/brands/DevOps.html

http://itsmacademy.com/agile

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