Death, Taxes and a Three-year Infrastructure Refresh Plan

Written by: Derek Winchester

In case you've been living under a rock, the industry as we know it is drastically changing. Among other things, we no longer look at infrastructure the same way. So, how does that three-year corporate refresh policy look now that the majority of your workloads are managed via the cloud? The majority of your applications are now SaaS offerings. Post-COVID-19, we have realized that the best way to eliminate high-touch inefficiencies is to apply automation to our infrastructure. It's just that simple...or so it seems. Despite the many advantages of updating your infrastructure, it also comes with a variety of costs in terms of maintenance fees which is known as the DevOps tax.

Since not everyone has fully embraced the necessity of the cloud and automation, many are struggling to keep up using dated methods. Hopefully, the following information will get you on board.

The Long-Term Effects of DevOps and the Cloud

Network engineering is a sector that has been starkly against change for quite a while. However, the emergence of DevOps and the use of the cloud changed all that. As the market started to open up and embrace cloud computing, DevOps served to be a necessary tool in terms of allowing us all to be more quickly and efficiently, while also responding faster to changes occurring in the market. This is because the cloud is a centralized source of technology that enables DevOps automation.

DevOps is one of the driving forces behind a new culture that is centered on agility as a means of obtaining quick results without forsaking quality. Introducing a far more collaborative and flexible infrastructure, DevOps requires the development and infrastructure teams to work together. This helps companies create products that are more effective and delivered quickly. Therefore, those who are reluctant to embrace these new technologies are likely to be left behind. No matter if they wish to accept the new trend or not, they will still be in the same market as those who have.

Developing an Infrastructure Refresh Plan

Now that we know more about how DevOps and the cloud have changed the network engineering realm indefinitely, let's find out more about developing an infrastructure refresh. Rather than waiting until the market forces you to upgrade, you should be planning your infrastructure upgrade now, so you will have enough time to implement these fresh additions without adversely affecting the business or your employees. That said, here are some tips to help you do just that.

Embrace Agility

Another thing you need to do is embrace agility. This means you should be focusing on instilling values such as collaboration, and open and direct communication. This will allow you to lay a solid foundation for DevOps. As this evolution slowly unfolds, you will be creating a new team that will help facilitate this transition. This team will be composed of employees who understand enough about both development and infrastructure, to be able to serve as a bridge between the two.

Over time, the two separate teams will begin to converge until they start functioning as one big DevOps team. They will start to discover the common ground, develop a common language, which will allow them to better collaborate moving forward. Not only will this make for easier communication, but it will also allow the infrastructure team to send faster responses, while also allowing the development team to more easily create new services and adopt these services at a much faster rate.

Focus on Culture

One of the top things you need to do to prepare your company for its new infrastructure is to focus on culture. Since deploying and optimizing your infrastructure cause a lag in terms of daily operations, if you fail to transform your work culture before you make the upgrades, the results can be downright catastrophic. However, by taking the time to promote a culture that promotes innovation, flexibility, disruption, and continuous learning, you will be preparing your employees for the changes to come.

Ease into Automation

Additionally, since automation is essential to embracing DevOps, you will want to start easing into it. To do so, you can begin by automating the most repetitive tasks. When you go to define these tasks, be sure to follow the best practices for the hardening and configuration of the tasks being automated. Either way, keep in mind that creating the proper infrastructure of automation will require constant improvements, upgrades, and tweaks before the platform is fully functional.

Moreover, experts assert that good automation includes the following:

?         Your company will need the ability to quickly access your process.

?         Your company will need to create reproducibility in terms of what real-world production environments entail versus pre-production environments.

?         The process will need to be resilient with regard to failure.

Software-Defined Everything

Also known as SDx, embracing a software-defined data center will enable your company to become more agile, which is one of the main conditions involved in DevOps. Moving forward, your company will be better able to keep up with the continual changes involved in using a DevOps system.

Overall, if you are fearful of upgrading your infrastructure because of the DevOps tax, be advised that your company will also lose money by sticking with the present infrastructure. Despite the fact that many companies are continuing to thrive despite not embracing DevOps and the cloud, within the next few years, this will start coming to an end. Tools such as Ansible, containers, Kubernetes, the DevNet, etc., are quickly taking over the network engineering field and drastically changing the business world as we know it. So, while you may have a little more time to embrace the coming changes, waiting too long to make a plan could prove to be one of the most taxing decisions you've ever made.