I have completed a very rough first draft of all the individual elements of my DevOps Transformation Framework. The framework intends to mature nine functions required to build and manage online services. They are:

• Build & Integration
• 3rd Party Component Management
• Feedback Loops
• Software Engineering
• Test Engineering
• Project Management
• Incident Management
• Change Management
• Budgeting

The framework takes each one of these functions through a series of steps (projects) which improve the capability and productivity of each function. Yesterday I submitted them to the first test process. I wanted to make sure that while each step might refer to other steps preceding it or assume capabilities in other functions at the same level they didn’t assume any capabilities only available at later levels. I did this in a distinctly old school way. I printed them all out, cut them up and laid out the starting point or capability level 0 as I’m calling it at the moment. This effectively defines the prerequisites for starting a DevOps transformation. I’ll publish more on that later. I then randomly selected capabilities from the next level (level 1 funnily enough) and made sure nothing was assumed that wasn’t already present and continued until I had laid out all the capabilities for each function.

I still have a long way to go yet. I need to confirm how far each function can mature before it has dependancies on other functions or what the impact might be if capabilities are introduced in one function before another. The next big task is to present one view showing the complete matrix of functions and capabilities and describe the advantages that result when they combine. For example: what advantages are available to an organisation when support and maintenance tasks result in use cases or user stories AND basic automated tests are available to be executed by anyone in the organisation. I’m getting close to needing some help to get the framework into a fit state for public review (and hopefully contribution). As such it needs a little peer review first. If you’re interested in working with me on creating a framework to help businesses transition to DevOps please drop me a line at grant@nextgendevops.com or tweet me @grjsmith or @nextgendevops or if you really must message me in Linkedin!