Does Tech Drive DevOps Forward or the Other Way Around?

As we are quickly approaching the 2015 DevOps Enterprise Summit , an interesting question has percolated into the software delivery conversation – does technology drive the DevOps movement forward or does DevOps drive technology forward? An easy answer might be to say “well, both of course,” but let’s look at this question a little closer. First of all, DevOps wouldn’t even be around if it wasn’t for the need or desire to improve our technology in the first place. The rise of computers and smart devices has given us new ways to interact with the world around us and software is just a subset of any technology. On the other hand, many would argue that plenty of technology today is largely being improved by and is increasingly reliant upon software. Everyone knows Marc Andreessen’s famous quote that “Software is eating the world.” This is a fact – it is everywhere and today’s leading web, enterprise IT, embedded, and mobile companies continuously need to build, test and deploy software efficiently to stay ahead of the innovation curve. This may just be the same old “chicken before the egg argument,” but if you think about it, the production gap between hardware and software has narrowed exceedingly. Value is no longer just a result of driving our cars, but rather the experience we have when driving – audio, video, notifications, emergency response, etc. Maybe it’s safe to say the digital age was first created through technology, but is now prospering through the proliferation of software in every aspect of our lives, across all industries. This is  made possible by practices such as Agile, Continuous Delivery and DevOps. It’s clear that the technology, delivery practices and tools/software that enable other software products to be developed and released -  are all reliant upon each other to succeed. It is with that in mind,  that we are very thrilled to welcome some of the best known brands in the technology space to speak at DOES15! We are truly honored to have the following speakers join us in San Francisco this October: Rosalind Radcliffe is a Distinguished Engineer and the Chief Architect for DevOps and CLM at IBM . She is a member of the IBM Academy of Technology and also a Master Inventor. Throughout her years of experience, one area in DevOps that she sees that people can learn the most from is keeping focused on enabling the understanding of the value proposition: “The difficulty teams have in adopting new tools and processes have shown the need for the focus on the value and the overall transformation. Without the right education, training and focus, the new tools and processes won't be accepted and won't provide the value needed.”   Jeffrey Snover is a Distinguished Engineer and the Lead Architect for the Windows Server Division at Microsoft.  He is the inventor of Windows PowerShell, an object-based distributed automation engine, scripting language, and command line shell. He has over 30 years of industry experience with a focus on management technologies and solutions. Jeffrey is all about “Creating space and opportunities for awesome people to do awesome work and ship it to improve the lives of literally billions of people.” How awesome is that! His one piece of advice that he wants to share with the rest of the community is “Embracing the right amount of self-doubt is a super power.”   Ralph Loura is the CIO of the HP Enterprise Group. He believes all IT functions should serve as value creators rather than cost centers, and that the path to value comes from business outcomes tied to user experience. At DOES15, Ralph is going to be presenting with Olivier Jacques and Rafael Garcia on how HP goes DevOps, brokering relationships among its business unit and infrastructure IT teams to make the move from organizational silos to integrated teams and continuous delivery pipelines and of course, much more! As the CIO of HP Enterprise, Ralph serves the needs of over 300,000 employees, making them the largest organization to share their story at this conference. (You can also hear Ralph speak at one of the recent video chats we hosted with the DOES15 speakers ).   Ramona Jackson is the IT Director for Cisco ’s Continuous Delivery Program – an initiative that will transform the way Cisco IT delivers software capabilities to the business. Ramona has more than 25 years of IT experience and has held leadership roles in Human Resource IT, Network & Data Center Services, and Global Infrastructure Services. At DOES15, Ramona will be presenting with Aji Rajappan on the state of the continuous delivery initiative at the company. The most interesting part of Ramona’s job is that “The business climate changes daily and being in a role that must adapt to change excites me and challenges me. I get to work with very smart people, use state of the art technology, and do innovative things - and that makes me want to come to work every day.”

DevOps, and the tech that makes DevOps possible:

If you would like to learn more from these four fascinating technology leaders and DevOps practitioners – as well as other real-world stories of how large enterprises are transforming their business with DevOps – we invite you to join us at the 2015 DevOps Enterprise Summit . Jeffrey, Rosalind, Ramona, Ralph and many more will share their insights and experiences with driving a DevOps transformation.

Don’t miss THE DevOps event of the year – Get your ticket now!