As enterprises adopt cloud native and everything as code approaches, the process of moving from code to production has become crucial for delivering value to customers. This process, known as the “pathway to deploy,” involves a series of complex steps and decisions that can greatly impact an organization’s ability to efficiently deliver software at scale. In this series, we will explore the strategies and target state mode for achieving a seamless and effective pathway to deploy.
To achieve an accelerated pathway to deploy, multiple moving parts and stakeholders must come together. We recommend a 4-stage roadmap for implementation:
Stage 1: Development automation
In this stage, automation is focused on building a catalog of continuous integration, deployment, and testing (CI/CD/CT) patterns. The development team takes ownership of infrastructure automation and pipeline automation. The most challenging part of this stage is automating testing capabilities.
Stage 2: Institutionalize pattern-driven model
The Cloud Capability Centre (CCC) works with the architecture board to establish a suite of repeatable patterns. These patterns represent individual cloud services as well as composite application patterns comprising multiple cloud services. This stage focuses on standardizing development models across the organization.
Stage 3: Self-service and cross-functional integration
This stage emphasizes meaningful participation between cross-functional teams such as security, compliance, and FinOps. High-availability patterns are aligned with resiliency teams, security and compliance requirements are codified into patterns, and validation is addressed through integration with relevant tooling.
Stage 4: Automated pathway to deploy
This stage focuses on decentralization and decoupling of various enterprise groups while integrating them through automation and DevSecOps. One example is the automation of change management processes, including automated release notes generation. This holistic approach improves operational efficiency and risk mitigation.
Building blocks of the cloud-native model include persona-centric IaC codification, shift-left security and policies validation, automated compliance evidence collection for reviews, and integrated patterns and pipeline toolkit.
To realize the pathway to deploy, the CCC works with multiple organization groups, defines the entire path to deploy process, establishes squads focusing on different aspects of the pathway, builds a backlog for capability development, and ensures continuous automation adoption.
By focusing on the pathway to deploy, enterprises can accelerate their software supply chain lifecycle and overcome the challenges of cloud transformation. It is recommended to collaborate with participating enterprise groups in a decentralized manner to leverage automation and self-service capabilities.
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