DevOps vs. Traditional IT

Traditional team structures are not effective because they don’t scale and often have opposing philosophies, limiting their ability to collaborate. As technology continues to evolve, more flexibility is required. DevOps is a culture that gives organizations the ability to respond to ever-changing and expanding market needs. When development and operations teams come together through understanding each other’s concerns and views, they are able to build and deliver resilient software products at a fast pace. When comparing Traditional IT Ops to DevOps, it’s clear to see how they differ and why DevOps is increasingly embraced by organizations worldwide.

“DevOps teams spend about 21% less time putting out ‘fires’ on a weekly basis and 37% less time handling support cases.”

How They Spend Time
DevOps teams spend 33% more time improving infrastructure against failure than Traditional IT Ops teams. In addition, DevOps teams spend about 21% less time putting out “fires” on a weekly basis and 37% less time handling support cases. DevOps teams also spend less time on administrative support due to a higher level of automation and self-service tools and scripts for support tasks. With all of this extra time, DevOps teams are able to spend 33% more time improving infrastructure and 15% more time working on self improvement through things like education and training.

Failures and Recoveries
The average DevOps teams see only 2 app failures per month and recovery time is less than 30 minutes for over 50% of all respondents. 71% of DevOps teams can recover from failures in less than 60 minutes while 40% of traditional IT Ops need over an hour to recover.

Firefighting
A key practice of DevOps is to be prepared for the possibility of failures. Continuous testing, alerts, monitoring and feedback loops are put in place so that DevOps teams can react quickly and effectively. Traditional IT Ops teams are almost two times more likely to require more than 60 minutes to recover, while recoveries in less than 30 minutes are 33% more likely for DevOps teams. Automated deployments and an infrastructure that’s programmable are key features for quick recovery.

Releasing Software
When it comes to releasing software, DevOps teams need roughly 36.6 minutes to release an application whereas Traditional IT Ops teams need about 85.1 minutes. This means that DevOps teams release apps more than twice as fast as Traditional IT Ops teams.

To sum it up, DevOps teams get more done and solve problems faster. They spend more time improving things, less time fixing things, recover from failures faster, and release applications more than twice as fast as Traditional IT Ops. With every member of the various parts of IT working together they all have the same goal, which is to bring quality software into the market.