DevOps 101: Core Concepts, Benefits and Implementation Strategies

What is DevOps?

DevOps is defined as “a collaborative approach to software development and IT operations that aims to improve the speed, quality and reliability of software delivery. It combines practices, tools and a culture of shared responsibility to automate workflows, enhance communication and continuously deliver value to users.”

Essentially made up of two words, “Dev” + “Ops” ( DevOps), Dev refers to “Development,” which essentially consists of writing code, building features and creating applications or software. Ops refers to “Operations,” which includes IT operations teams responsible for running, maintaining and supporting the built software. It focuses on stability, infrastructure, deployment, monitoring and security.

DevOps represents both a cultural and technological movement. Organizations must change their organizational structure and culture to embrace DevOps, such as adopting new tools and processes.

On the organizational side, participants must embrace collaboration across teams and share the automation and consistent application delivery goal.

As discussed in our Embrace DevOps eBook, DevOps is about building high-velocity organizations. Everyone who practices DevOps is doing it to create these types of companies. DevOps is born from the experiences of its practitioners. Although many people assume that the original DevOps practitioners were web innovators, that’s not necessarily true. What does matter is that DevOps practitioners are always honing their skills and looking for ways to improve.

Why Is DevOps Required in Modern IT?

DevOps has become a cornerstone of modern IT because of its ability to streamline and accelerate software development and deployment processes, allowing new features and updates to be introduced to the market.

Additionally, DevOps practices, such as continuous integration and continuous delivery (CI/CD), help minimize errors and improve the overall quality of software by automating repetitive tasks to promote consistent environments.

With the rise of cloud computing and microservices architectures, organizations must efficiently manage complex, distributed systems. DevOps tools and practices, like infrastructure as code (IaC) and automated monitoring, provide the necessary framework to handle these challenges. They enable teams to adapt to changing requirements and scale their operations quickly. As a result, businesses can achieve incredible innovation and competitiveness, driving better customer experiences and business outcomes. Find out more about how DevOps can help you better drive digital transformation.

Core Principles of DevOps

The Embrace DevOps eBook has a great take on DevOps principles, specifically highlighting five:

Safety. Safety can mean human safety or the safety of information. It can also have a broader meaning, which is the ability of individuals to act without fear of unintended consequences. DevOps builds organizations where people can express themselves without getting hurt.

Knowledge. Access to knowledge is a leading indicator of social progress. The goal isn't to minimize the amount of knowledge you need. The goal is to help people access the knowledge they need when they need it. For example, can your engineers see the revenue the company generates and why? If they can't, how can they understand what products and features will improve the business?

Freedom. Freedom is the power to act, speak or think without hindrance or restraint. DevOps empowers people to act. DevOps means that you trust the people in your organization, no matter what their job, and give them the freedom to do what they know best.

Contentment. Contentment means being satisfied with the things you have. Constant happiness is not a realistic goal for a DevOps practice. You will always have bad days. Contentment is a realistic goal. You can achieve contentment if you feel good about the people you work with, the systems you're building and the outcomes you expect. Even on bad days, you'll have a community of people you can rely on to help you get through.

People over products. A final marker of DevOps practitioners is that they put people over products and companies. DevOps practitioners, when they talk about what they're doing and why they're doing it, talk about people before they talk about the company or its products. DevOps practice prioritizes the human beings who are doing the work.

Benefits of Implementing DevOps

Accelerated Delivery and Time to Market

DevOps practices enable faster software delivery by automating processes and improving collaboration between development and operations teams. This leads to quicker time to market for new features and updates.

Improved Quality and Reliability

Continuous integration and continuous delivery (CI/CD) practices facilitate that code is tested and deployed consistently, reducing the likelihood of errors and improving the overall quality and reliability of software.

Enhanced Collaboration and Communication

DevOps fosters a culture of collaboration and communication between development, operations and other stakeholders, breaking down silos and promoting a more cohesive work environment.

Increased Efficiency and Reduced Costs

Automating repetitive tasks and efficient resource management increases operational efficiency and reduces costs, allowing teams to focus on more strategic initiatives.

Learn how you can accelerate your DevOps efforts in our whitepaper.

What Are Key DevOps Best Practices?

Use Infrastructure as Code

Infrastructure as Code (IaC) is a method of automating IT infrastructure management using code instead of manual processes. DevOps professionals use code (generic or DSLs) to automate generic DevOps tasks like provisioning and configuration. Implementing automation with IaC helps expedite those processes to be performed faster and consistently and with minimal errors.

The key concepts of Infrastructure as Code are:

• Automation: Replaces manual setup with automated policy and infrastructure management.
• Repeatability: Leads to reliable and consistent processes for IT and DevSecOps.
• Reproducibility: Makes rebuilding or updating systems easier and more dependable.

IaC brings the benefits of consistency across environments, faster setup and deployment, version control for tracking and collaboration and cost savings through reduced manual effort. In short, IaC boosts efficiency, reliability and scalability in IT operations.

To learn more about Infrastructure as Code, read our article.

Apply Configuration Management

Configuration management enables teams to maintain consistent system states across diverse infrastructure environments.

The process involves automating the setup, deployment and maintenance of servers and applications using repeatable and version-controlled processes. With tools like the Progress® Chef ® automation platform, enterprises can implement infrastructure as code, manage configuration drift and maintain system integrity across on-premises, cloud and hybrid platforms.

This approach enhances reliability, scalability and security while minimizing manual errors and operational overhead.

For a deeper dive into infrastructure management practices, check out this blog post.

Implement Continuous Monitoring

Instead of relying on periodic manual checks, continuous monitoring uses automated tools to detect changes, misconfigurations or vulnerabilities as they happen.

This approach helps teams quickly address issues, promote system reliability and meet compliance requirements. By integrating monitoring into the software delivery pipeline, infrastructure and applications remain aligned with performance and security standards throughout their lifecycle. Visual dashboards give a consolidated visibility into the security posture of the entire IT fleet, allowing users to act quickly and responsibly.

To understand how continuous monitoring can be implemented, read this article.

Integrate Security

DevSecOps includes the integration of security into DevOps processes. It basically involves shifting security left into every process of DevSecOps, from development to operations, so that security does not remain an afterthought.

DevSecOps is evolving rapidly, with advancements in AI and automation enabling early threat detection, continuous compliance and enhanced efficiency across software pipelines.

Meanwhile, Managing a DevSecOps Environment emphasizes cross-team collaboration and the role of security champions in maintaining consistent, compliant systems. For organizations aiming to mature their practices, Advancing DevSecOps offers a strategic roadmap focused on automation, cultural transformation and process improvement.

Popular DevOps Tools and Technologies

Version Control Systems

Version control systems like Git are foundational to DevOps, enabling teams to collaborate on code, track changes and maintain version history. Platforms such as GitHub, GitLab and Bitbucket support distributed development, branching strategies and continuous integration workflows. They also facilitate code reviews, testing and rollback capabilities, making them essential for efficient software delivery and team collaboration.

Continuous Integration Tools

Continuous Integration (CI) tools automate the process of testing and integrating code changes, helping developers detect and fix issues early. Jenkins, GitLab CI and CircleCI are widely used, but CI also integrates seamlessly with infrastructure automation tools like Chef software . With Chef Workstation and Test Kitchen, teams can incorporate CI into infrastructure code to promote compliance and stability before deployment.

Read our blog to learn about CI/CD practices for GitLab and Chef software.

Containerization Platforms

Container platforms like Docker and Podman package applications with all their dependencies, promoting consistent behavior across environments. Containers are lightweight and portable, making them ideal for microservices and scalable architectures. They integrate well with CI/CD pipelines and are often used alongside tools like Chef software to automate the deployment and configuration of containerized workloads across hybrid and cloud environments.

Orchestration Tools

Orchestration tools coordinate the deployment, scaling and management of applications across distributed systems. Orchestration helps streamline workflows across DevOps processes.

The Chef DevOps automation platform also provides orchestration capabilities with Chef Job Orchestration, enabling teams to execute infrastructure jobs reliably across nodes and environments. It supports scheduled tasks, dependency handling and promotes consistency across complex deployments.

Monitoring Solutions

Monitoring tools like Prometheus, Grafana and Icinga provide visibility into system performance, application health and security events. Chef software promotes a “monitoring-as-code” approach, integrating tools like Icinga with the Chef platform to manage monitoring configurations programmatically to help configure systems correctly and monitor them consistently. Read more about Chef Continuous Monitoring in our blog.

4 Challenges in Adopting DevOps

1. Cultural Resistance

One of the biggest challenges in DevOps adoption is cultural change. DevOps emphasizes collaboration and shared responsibility, which may conflict with traditional silos between development and operations teams.

Success requires a mindset shift, trust-building and support by leadership to foster transparency and cross-functional communication throughout the software lifecycle.

2. Skills Gaps

Adopting DevOps often demands new skills in automation, scripting, cloud service and toolchains. Teams may struggle to bridge these gaps without proper training or hiring. Solutions include investing in continuous learning and certifications, like those offered through Progress Chef training programs, to empower teams with the knowledge needed to manage modern infrastructure effectively.

3. Tool Integration Complexities

DevOps involves many interconnected tools, and integrating them smoothly can be complex. Compatibility issues, inconsistent data flow and unclear ownership of tools can hinder productivity.

A consolidated automation platform like Chef software can help overcome these challenges offering a unified automation platform for infrastructure, compliance and application delivery. Explore: Chef Products

4. Measuring Success and ROI

Quantifying the success of DevOps initiatives can be tricky. Metrics such as deployment frequency, lead time, mean time to recovery (MTTR) and change failure rates are crucial. However, aligning them with business outcomes and demonstrating ROI requires clear goals, continuous feedback and visibility into performance improvements over time.

DevOps Lifecycle

The DevOps lifecycle is unlike typical lifecycles which have a beginning and an end. DevOps lifecycles loop continuously until the software is decommissioned and no longer worth updating.

The software development lifecycle (SDLC) — the pure development part of the overall DevOps lifecycle — has eight basic phases, as the graphic below shows:

Source: Learntek

The DevOps lifecycle also has several unique components, including:

• Continuous development
• Continuous integration
• Continuous testing
• Continuous deployment, and
• Continuous monitoring

Below is one take on the phases of the DevOps lifecycle:

Source: JanBask Training

What Is DevOps Engineering?

DevOps now has its own list of technical and job categories, one of which is DevOps engineering and, of course, DevOps engineers.

A DevOps engineer is a technical position working with developers, system operators (SysOps) and other IT stakeholders such as IT operations and quality assurance. These engineers oversee code releases, which are frequent in agile environments that adopt continuous integration/continuous deployment (CI/CD) processes.

DevOps engineering teams also work on the infrastructure upon which software relies, so resources that support the software are properly deployed and provisioned, the right deployment model is chosen and the software is tested and validated before release. Moreover, they are often charged with maintaining the underlying environment and improving it through automation.

Secure DevOps

DevOps professionals are concerned with the security of their applications throughout their entire lifecycle, including iterations that occur frequently due to agile methods. CSPM should be baked into all stages of the application development process, with security tracked and managed through continuous monitoring.

When it comes to CSPM, the earlier the better. According to the For Better Security and Efficiency, Add CSPM to DevOps Processes blog, “A core tenet of DevOps is to do things at the point where it costs the least amount of money to fix. The earlier you can identify issues when creating resources, the faster you can give feedback to those creating and consuming resources in the cloud. DevSecOps solutions such as CSPM, IaC scanning and Policy as Code help organizations merge these processes and get people on the same page.”

DevOps Implementation Roadmap

A successful DevOps journey begins with assessing current capabilities and identifying goals.

• Start by fostering a collaborative culture, then introduce version control and CI/CD pipelines.
• Automate infrastructure and configuration using tools like Chef Infra and Chef Automate.
• Gradually integrate security and monitoring, enabling continuous feedback and improvement.
• Measure key metrics and iterate on processes throughout the journey.

Chef software provides the tooling and guidance needed to support every stage of this transformation.

Learn more: Chef DevOps Solutions

Future of DevOps

The future of DevOps is shaped by evolving technologies that make software delivery faster, more reliable and more secure. Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) are beginning to play a key role in automating processes, from intelligent testing to predictive analytics that can anticipate and mitigate potential issues.

Additionally, serverless architectures are gaining traction, enabling developers to focus more on code without worrying about infrastructure management. Chef infrastructure automation software supports this trend by offering seamless integration with cloud-native environments and enabling infrastructure automation at scale.

Get Started with DevOps

Success Stories

SAP: Infrastructure Compliance Scanning at SAP with Chef

Capital One: Automating Manual Processes for Rapid, Secure Cloud Growth at Capital One

Training Resources

Tutorials: Introduction to DevOps

eBook: Embrace DevOps: Your Guide to the DevOps Lifestyle

Webinars

Applying DevOps Principles for Managing Endpoints

Achieve DevOps Success While Closing Skills Gaps

Creating the Next Generation of DevOps

DevOps Checklist for Managing Your Endpoint Devices

FAQs