Hello and welcome to the third podcast in a series from IBM Rational Software on the topic of DevOps for government. Our first two recordings, which we produced specifically for government, were on the topics of why governments should pay attention to DevOps and examples from government clients who have benefitted from adopting DevOps. As a reminder, DevOps is an enterprise capability for continuous software delivery that enables organizations to seize market opportunities and reduce time to customer feedback. DevOps takes the best from agile and lean software delivery approaches, unites the people, practices, technologies and the information across the organizations that support the software delivery process. For governments, this means that by applying this DevOps approach and the associated best practices, agencies and departments can respond faster and with higher quality to citizen expectations. Oh, Paul, you must be on mute. Are you there, Paul? So, we're still talking about DevOps in government again today, Laurel? Yes, our topic is Special Considerations for Governments as they Adopt DevOps. Paul, as a thought leader who worked with government clients daily, I know you -1-
have insights on this topic. Yes, I do have a few. One thing that comes to mind is cloud, Laurel. As IBM's Rational offering manager for public sector, I'm sure you're aware that the U.S. government has a cloud first policy. Cloud computing offers a way for organizations that can save cost, provide flexibility for IT departments that need and eliminate the long procurement and certification process. Yes, that's right. The U.S. Chief Information Officer knew this back in 2010 when he issued the 25 point implementation plan to reform Federal information technology management. Today, we're living this reality as many organizations are moving or considering moving some portion of their business to the cloud. Yes, I think most people know the advantages of cloud computing across government and outside of government, but many of our clients don't know how to take advantage of this promise of cloud for their agency or department, nor do they understand exactly how DevOps and cloud capabilities can best be leveraged to meet their department or maybe their organizational needs. So, with that in mind, why don't we talk about government clients and how they should consider implementing DevOps -2-
with cloud? That is an important topic for government. Combining the advantages of cloud computing and DevOps continuous software delivery will transform the way government does IT and provide services to citizens. Cloud removes obstacles and provides speed, and so does DevOps. That's correct, Laurel. Software is a central component to so many technological shifts. These shifts have an impact on all of us, either directly or indirectly. Government is no exception. Mobile applications are everywhere, and government uses mobile and social technologies to engage and deliver information and services to its citizens and other organizations. Government agencies and departments generate and share enormous amounts of data, and there's an increased use of embedded software in instrumented devices. Not to mention the device and intelligence systems on our roads, rails and airways drives the need for DevOps and cloud. Software is at the heart of all these exciting DevOps...[excuse me], developments, and as a result, cloud computing is growing exponentially. Right. And that is why IBM has invested millions into cloud services and technologies. IBM has -3-
chosen to support an open cloud system because it empowers clients to make choices about how and where to run their workloads. With open architecture, you can decide to deploy your app with IBM or any other provider that embraces these standards and open architectures. Clients can make choices based on their business needs and the value the provider adds through knowledge, experience and offerings. IBM has helped establish technologies such as Oasis, Topology and orchestration specification for cloud applications, Open Stack and open services for lifecycle collaboration along with best practices from the Cloud Standards Customer Council. IBM doesn't just consume from these open ecosystems, but is actively engaged in each of these projects and many others because IBM has a vested interest in ensuring the best technologies are brought forward. Just a few data points on IBM cloud. It's built on Open Stack and leverages heat engines and hot templates which gives great flexibility while maintaining reliability. IBM cloud powers 270,000 more websites than Amazon, that's SoftLayer IaaS offering. And IBM cloud hosts 30 percent more of the top websites than anyone else in the world. And finally, 24 out of 25 of the best performing companies trust the IBM cloud. -4-
Wow, those are impressive stats, Laurel. You know, for government clients, whatever their plans are for evolving IT infrastructure, they can take advantage of cloud services in combination with on premises platforms to create flexibility for their business. However, this poses some interesting architecture choices, ones that each of these organizations should consider such as what's done in the cloud versus what's done on premises. Or, what's done in partner organizations, how they should handle secure and private connections between the cloud and on premises; and, the capacity for moving data between these environments. Cloud computing serves different needs for different constituents in an organization. Now, from my perspective, there can be three flavors from DevOps associated with the cloud, if you will: DevOps capabilities that services in the cloud, DevOps capabilities that deploy applications to the cloud and DevOps capabilities that can control the cloud. A good place to start for DevOps as your development and development platform. For example, IBM BlueMix DevOps services are hosted in the cloud where you can develop in the cloud and deploy to the cloud. But for most clients I work with, they're looking for the promise value of adopting -5-
DevOps with or without cloud and trying to improve their IT shop software delivery, their first questions are always, how do I get started and how do I get started practically? We developed a clear four-step process that we introduce to all of our clients, regardless of how they're going to implement DevOps. And it's proven to be an effective and very practical approach and if you'd like, I can talk about that now. Paul, please do. Well, thank you. So, first, you know, customers should think through their business level drivers for improvement. Too often, we get caught up in the technical changes and we want to really understand our business drivers. Now, as I mentioned before on an earlier podcast, IBM's approach to DevOps looks at a broader view of continuous delivery lifecycle that includes, but also extends beyond the idea of just integrating development operations together collaboratively. This approach expects the inclusion of other stakeholders such as the business, suppliers, operations and partners involved in software delivery and the consumers themselves. -6-
Consider that the way these different groups such as business planning and development, test and release engineers or [monitoring teams] can affect your plans. You should also use this time to reason about the outcomes you want to achieve. So, examples of business goals are like accelerant time to production or deliver more reliably or improve quality. They're great examples if you can show clear alignment to your business priorities and identify how you're going to measure success. Now, once you've identified these outcomes of the initiative you're planning, you'll want to get a clear understanding of where you are today. Sometimes it's difficult for clients to assess on their own where everything is going well or they can't really understand where the problems are emanating. Most know that the biggest pains are here, but not necessarily why those pains exist. A good source to start this is IBM's DevOps practice self-assessment tool. And you can find it on ibm.com or just Google it using the string IBM the invisible thread and DIY, such as Do It Yourself. You'll find my blog that explains the self-assessment process and how best to use the tool. It's free and open to the public, and the tool allows you to self-assess at any of the DevOps adoption tabs. So, you mean like steer, develop, test, -7-
deploy and operate as we discussed in the first podcast of this series? Yes, that's right. And now, when you're at this point and you've got your assessment and you know where you're at, you understand where you're going and the direction you want to take your organization, your measurable goals and your benchmark of current practices should be available and understood by everybody planning this change. Now, it's time to connect the dots by prioritizing your changes and arriving to the measured milestones in order to achieve your goals. [INAUDIBLE] quick and early wins. It's very important, the social attraction to the change is to get wins that are relevant to everyone. In IBM, we accomplish this with a capability and practice based framework for improvement in our DevOps proficiency model. But whatever you choose, should provide a means for all your organizations that mutate the changes in improvements while measuring the accomplishments and expressing value at each step of the way. Also, your means of prioritizing improvements should be composed to changes into something that you could manage, just like a project. And finally, you want to take these prioritized -8-
improvements, create a plan that you can manage. And this is best accomplished when you use a set of prioritized improvements as a backlog. Define the improvements to be introduced in each release or each phase of change across your organization. Again, be sure to define measured value to your users for your programs and the organization. The value will help you to grow support socially as you learn the or lead the organization to adoption. Now, when you introduce improvements to DevOps capabilities it's always a good practice to use the social organization adoption strategy -- that is, when you want to implement improvements that return organizational value while gaining user, team, project level buy in and make your improvements go viral. Bottom line, by achieving and retaining the support of the user base and the grass roots folks and gaining social acceptance, you'll create an excitement and meet or improve the outcomes you planned. Wow, this is excellent advice, Paul, I really appreciate it, but we're almost up on our time. In our fourth and final recording, let's pick up this conversation with an example of how IBM is taking advantage -9-
of cloud and DevOps to transform software and delivery...oops, software delivery. Okay. How, long was it? Hello and welcome to the third podcast in a series from IBM Rational Software on the topic of DevOps for Government. Our first two recordings which were produced specifically for government were on the topics of why government should pay attention to DevOps and examples of government clients who have benefitted from adopting DevOps. As a reminder, DevOps is an enterprise capability for continuous software delivery that enables organizations to seize market opportunities and reduce time to customer feedback. DevOps takes the best from agile lean software delivery approaches, unites the people, practices, technologies and the other information across the organizations that support the software delivery process. For government, this means that by applying this DevOps approach and the associated best practices, agencies and departments can respond faster and with higher quality to citizen expectations. So, I guess, Laurel, we're still talking about -10-
DevOps in government today. Any particular topic? Well, yes, our topic today is special considerations for governments as they adopt DevOps. Paul, as a thought leader who works with government clients daily, I know you'll have some insights on this topic. Yes, I do have a few, but one thing that comes to mind is cloud. You know, Laurel, as Rational's offering manager for the public sector, I'm sure you're aware that the U.S. government has a cloud first policy. Cloud computing offers a way for organizations to save cost, provide flexibility for IT departments and to eliminate the long procurement and certification process. Right, that's right. The U.S. Chief Information Officer knew this back in 2010 when he issued the 25-point implementation plan to reform Federal information technology management. Today, we're living this reality as many organizations are moving or considering moving some portion of their business to the cloud. Yes, the advantages of cloud computing are well understood. But you know, many clients don't know how to take advantage of cloud for their agency or department and how DevOps and cloud capabilities can be leveraged to meet your department or organizational needs. And with that in -11-
mind, maybe we should talk about government clients should consider DevOps in the cloud or DevOps with the cloud. Well, that's an important topic for government. Combining the advantages of cloud computing and DevOps continuous software delivery will transform the way government does IT and provide services to citizens. Cloud removes the obstacles and provides speed and so does DevOps. Correct, Laurel. And software is a central component to so many technological shifts. These shifts have an impact on all of us, either directly or indirectly. Government is no exception. Mobile applications are everywhere and government uses mobile and social technologies to engage and deliver information and services to its citizens. Government agencies and departments generate and share enormous amounts of data. There's an increased used of embedded software instrument devices, not to mention the rise of intelligent systems on our roads, our rails and in the air. Software is at the heart of all of these exciting developments and as a result, cloud computing with DevOps has grown exponentially. And that's the reason why IBM has invested billions into cloud services and technology. IBM has chosen -12-
to support an open cloud system because it empowers clients to make choices about how and where to run their workloads. With open architecture, you can decide to deploy your app with IBM or another provider that embraces these standards and open architectures. Clients can make choices based upon their business needs and the value the provider adds through their knowledge, experience and offerings. IBM has helped establish technologies such as Oasis, Topology and orchestrations to specification for cloud applications, Open Stack and open services for lifecycle collaboration, along with best practices from the Cloud Standards Customer Council. IBM doesn't just consume from this open ecosystem, but is actively engaged in each of these projects and many others because IBM has a vested interest in ensuring the best technologies are brought forward. Let me just give you a few data points on the IBM cloud. The IBM cloud is built on Open Stack and leverages heat engines and hot templates which gives great flexibility while maintaining reliability. The IBM cloud powers 270,000 more websites than Amazon. The IBM cloud hosts 30 percent more of the top websites than anyone in the world; and finally, 24 of the 25 best performing companies trust the IBM cloud. -13-
Wow, those are some performance, impressive stats. Now, for government clients, whatever their plans are for evolving their IT infrastructure, they can take care of cloud services in combination with doing on premises platforms in order to create flexibility for their businesses. However, this poses some interesting architectural choices, once you consider such as what's done in the cloud versus what premises is [done] versus what partner organizations do, whether they have a secure or private connection to the cloud and the capacity for moving data between these environments. Cloud computing shows different needs for different constituents within the organization. Now, from my perspective, there could be three flavors in general for DevOps associated with the cloud. You could have DevOps capabilities as services in the cloud, you could have DevOps capability to deploy applications to the cloud and you can have DevOps capability that provide control for the cloud. Now, a good place to start is these DevOps as your development and deployment platform. An example of this is the IBM BlueMix DevOps services where you can develop, build and deploy applications in the cloud that are destined to -14-
run in the cloud. Now, for most clients I work with who are looking to get this promise value of adopting DevOps with the cloud, they're striving to improve their IT shop software delivery overall and achieve some of these business goals. But their first questions are always about how to get started and get started practically. We developed a four-step process for this that we introduced to all of our clients and it's proven to be an effective and very practical approach. I can discuss this sometime if you like, Laurel. Hey, why don't you go ahead, Paul, we have a little bit more time. Okay, sounds good. Well, first, now one of the things we recommend is that our clients think through their business drivers for the improvement. Now, these may focus on cost, quality of performance, but as I mentioned on a previous podcast, IBM's approach to DevOps defines a broader view of a continuous delivery lifecycle that includes, but it also extends beyond the idea of a development and operations working collaboratively. This approach expects the inclusion of stakeholders such as -15-
business folks, partner organization, suppliers, operations that are all involved in its software delivery and the consumers of the delivery themselves. We considered to weight these different groups such as, that do things such as business planning or development or test or even release management and monitoring their applications and how they would affect your plan. And we should understand that these guys are looking for outcomes from this change or this initiative and we want to make sure that outcomes such as accelerating our time to production or delivering more reliably or improving quality are not only well defined, but they show clear alignment to what our business priorities are and we can identify exactly how we're going to measure the success. Now, once we have a good idea of what we're trying to drive from a business point of view and how we're going to measure these outcomes, we want to take a good, clear understanding of where we are today. And we want to look at it from a practice point of view. Now, sometimes it's very difficult for some of my clients to do their own self-assessment because they're not exactly what should they look at or how they should assess themselves and when the assessment is complete. So, most -16-
tend to know what the biggest pains are but not necessarily the why. So, a good way to start this is to use IBM's DevOps practices self-assessment tool. We've got this available on the web and you can find it just by Googling IBM, the invisible thread and then DIY, for Do It Yourself. And you'll see my blog that explains the self-assessment process and how to use the free tool. We'll also include a link to the tool in the description of this podcast. And the tool allows you to self-assess in any of the DevOps adoption tabs. Oh, like steer, develop, test, deploy and operate, like we discussed on the first podcast, right? Yes, exactly. And now at this point after you've done this assessment and you know your current status, now you're at the point where you can start looking at the direction and the way in which you want to achieve these goals and you have a benchmark in place that you can start to show change. Now, it's time to connect the dots and prioritize your changes and drive the measured milestones that should include quick and early wins. Now in IBM internally, we accomplish this through a capability and practice based -17-
framework for improvement in our DevOps proficiency model. This is a model we talked on a previous podcast and is available on ibm.com. Whatever you choose, you should devise a means for all of your organization to communicate the changes and the improvements and measured accomplishments and the value at each step of the way. Also, your means of prioritizing improvement should be composed the changes into something you can manage just like a project. Now, finally, you want to take these prioritized improvements and create a roadmap plan that you can manage. This is best accomplished when you define a set of improvements that will be introduced in each release or phase of change for your DevOps improvement. When you introduce these improvements, it's always a good practice to use a social, cultural and organizational adoption strategy. That is, you want to gain user levels, team, project program level buy in and maintain the support and social acceptance of the change while striving toward organizational goals. This excitement and buy in will promote the change favorably to other groups in line for the adoption and ease your transition. Paul, this is excellent advice and it -18-
touches the topics that our government clients are most concerned about like cultural change and practice improvement. We're almost up on our time. In our fourth and final recording, let's pick up this conversation with an example of how IBM is taking advantage of cloud and DevOps to transform its own software delivery. Sounds good, and maybe next time, I'll bring some others along that can talk a little bit more about the IBM story with me. Oh, that would be fantastic. Thank you, Paul. This is the third in the series of podcasts produced by IBM Rational Software for government. Watch for the fourth recording, DevOps, an IBM example. [END OF SEGMENT] -19-