Tackling the Challenges of Managing AEM Deployments with Multiple Teams

Working with Adobe Experience Manager (AEM) deployments can sometimes feel like you’re juggling a lot of moving parts—especially when coordinating between multiple teams, vendors, and all the intricacies that come with deployment. Whether it’s handling change requests or managing releases, getting everything organized can be a real challenge. But, with a few strategies in place, it’s possible to streamline the process and keep things running smoothly.

In this article, we’ll walk through some of the common challenges that come with managing AEM deployments and how to overcome them—particularly when working with different teams in various time zones. We’ll also share some tips for dealing with the quirks of Adobe Cloud Manager and ways to improve your release management process.

Balancing Multiple Teams and Time Zones

Coordinating between different teams is tough enough, but when those teams are in different time zones, things can get even trickier. You might find yourself waking up at 3 AM for a production deployment with offshore teams or squeezing in deployment windows during off-business hours. It’s not ideal, but many organizations rely on global vendor partnerships, so it’s important to make it work.

To manage this more easily, it helps to have a clear schedule for each team, so everyone knows exactly when deployments are happening. This also means ensuring there’s always a developer available to jump in if anything goes wrong. Deploying outside of business hours can minimize disruption, but it requires careful coordination between all teams involved.

The Struggles of Multi-Module Deployments in Adobe Cloud Manager

If you’ve used Adobe Cloud Manager, you know that multi-module deployments are both a convenience and a headache. On the one hand, you can deploy multiple projects at once, but on the other hand, if there’s an issue with even one project, the whole deployment has to be restarted. This can turn into a time-consuming process, especially when deploying multiple projects at once.

A good way to handle this is by aligning the schedules of your projects to make sure that deployments don’t clash. Also, having a solid rollback and risk assessment plan in place can save you a lot of time and headaches if something does go wrong.

Handling Change Requests and Release Management

Change requests come with the territory in AEM projects, and managing them effectively is key to keeping everything on track. A useful approach is to create detailed change plans that include user stories, work items, deployment steps, rollback plans, and risk assessments. You can streamline this process by combining your release plan and change request plan into one document, with additional details added as subpages to keep things clear but simple.

For tracking releases, using a spreadsheet can be an easy and effective way to communicate with leadership and track deployment schedules. Pairing this with a platform calendar for visualizing deployment windows, vendor availability, and maintenance schedules can also help ensure everyone is on the same page.

Including Risk Assessments

Risk assessments are a must when it comes to AEM deployments, especially when you’re making changes that could impact business operations. Including a risk assessment questionnaire in every change plan ensures that potential risks are reviewed before the formal change request goes to the approval board. This extra step helps catch any issues before they become big problems during deployment.

You can make the risk assessment process even smoother by adding it as a standard part of your change plan template. This way, it becomes a routine step that’s hard to miss.

Making the Most of Platform Calendars

A platform calendar is a fantastic tool for keeping track of everything happening across teams, vendors, and deployments. It lets you map out stage and production deployments, vendor availability, and maintenance schedules so everyone knows what’s happening and when. The key to making this work is to ensure everyone keeps it up-to-date and actually refers to it regularly.

Additional Tips to Streamline Your AEM Deployments

If you want to take your AEM deployments to the next level, here are a few more strategies that can make a huge difference:

1. Automate Where You Can

Automation can be a lifesaver when it comes to deployments. If your team is handling repetitive tasks—like running the same tests or creating similar deployment plans—look for opportunities to automate. Tools like Jenkins or Adobe Cloud Manager’s built-in features can help automate much of the deployment process, reducing manual effort and minimizing human error. Automation also ensures that deployments are consistent, making it easier to track and troubleshoot when things go wrong.

2. Use a Centralized Communication Hub

When managing multiple teams, keeping everyone on the same page is key. Using a centralized communication platform like Slack, Microsoft Teams, or even a shared project management tool (such as Jira or Trello) can make sure that all updates, deployments, and requests are visible to everyone. This avoids miscommunication and ensures that nothing falls through the cracks, especially when teams are in different time zones. Everyone can quickly access the latest updates and see the status of ongoing deployments.

3. Document Everything

Having detailed documentation is crucial when working across teams and time zones. Whether it's the process for deploying code, guidelines for rollback procedures, or how to handle multi-module deployments, make sure everything is clearly documented. This makes onboarding new team members easier, allows teams to troubleshoot problems independently, and ensures consistency across deployments.

4. Hold Regular Check-ins

It’s helpful to hold regular check-ins with all teams involved, especially when working with external vendors. This could be a weekly sync or a post-deployment retrospective. These check-ins give everyone a chance to discuss any challenges they faced, share insights on what worked well, and make adjustments to improve future deployments.

Wrapping Up

Managing AEM deployments across multiple teams may not always be easy, but with the right strategies in place, you can make the process a lot smoother. From clear scheduling and coordinating multi-module deployments to using platform calendars for better visibility, these approaches can help you tackle the challenges of AEM deployments and keep things running efficiently.

With automation, centralized communication, and thorough documentation, you’ll be able to minimize downtime and ensure smoother deployments, even when you’re juggling multiple teams and time zones. Every deployment offers an opportunity to refine your process, and these small improvements can lead to big wins in the long run.