Tag Archives: tools

devops, work

Continuous Improvement: The Path to Excellence

The quest for operational excellence is unending in Cloud Engineering and Operations. We want to do more, better, faster, with fewer errors and with the same number of people. Amidst this quest, the philosophy of Continuous Improvement, a concept well-articulated by James Clear, finds a resounding echo. The essence of this philosophy lies in embracing a culture of making small, consistent improvements daily, which, over time, aggregate to substantial advancements.

The Myths Holding Us Back

Often, there’s a misconception in the operational realm that a massive overhaul of processes, done once and for all, will lead to a toil-free, highly automated environment.

We long for this mythical event where a major transformation will take place overnight, and our lives and jobs will be near-perfect and forever joyful.

However, this notion of an overnight transformation is more of a myth. It portrays a misleading picture of reality that can lead to an endless cycle of stress and disappointment if we chase it relentlessly.

Taking a goal-oriented approach that concentrates on setting up a perfect environment as the objective is likely to lead us down a path of frustration. It can mask the inherent value of incremental progress and the compound benefits it brings over time.

Another common myth is that there’s this one engineer who comes up with an amazing solution and implementation all by himself. My experience has shown that this is far from the truth. Exceptional tools come from great teams that work together, slowly building more resources on top of previous work—the well-known idea of standing on the shoulders of giants.

The Power of Small, Daily Wins

Drawing parallels from James Clear’s elucidation, the real power lies in accumulating small wins daily. It’s about identifying a manual task that can be automated, a process that can be optimized, or a workflow that can be streamlined. Each small win reduces toil, improves efficiency, and enhances system reliability. This is the process-oriented approach.

My take is to use the Pareto principle, also known as the 80/20 rule: Find the 20% of the tasks that cause 80% of your pain – or toil – and be relentless in eliminating, automating or delegating them. Keep doing it for as many iterations as you need to reach your operational workload goals.

The 1% Rule: Compounding Operational Efficiency

Adopting the spirit of the 1% rule – improving by a mere 1% every day, can have a transformative effect in the cloud operational landscape. Over time, these daily increments compound, significantly enhancing operational efficiency, system reliability, and team satisfaction. The beauty of this approach is that it’s sustainable and less overwhelming for the teams involved.

The Journey Towards Operational Excellence

Operational excellence in Cloud Environments is not a destination but a journey. A journey marked by daily efforts to eliminate toil, automate repetitive tasks, and enhance system resilience. By adhering to the philosophy of Continuous Improvement, you will position yourself on a trajectory of sustained growth and excellence.

work

Letting Go of the Chainsaw: Lessons from Firefighters for Software Engineers

I am reading this excellent book called Range, and I just went through an interesting chapter where the author reports some studies that were looking at why some firefighters die trying to outrun a fire while carrying heavy chainsaws, axes and other equipment. Should they have dropped those, they would have survived.

Emotional Attachment to Tools

One possible explanation is that their tools are so intrinsically linked to their identity as firefighters that they become almost like an extra limb on a subconscious level. People don’t realize those tools are not part of their being and can be dropped.

The book mentions one firefighter who noticed what was happening and knew he had to throw away his saw but felt compelled to carefully put it down – while trying to escape a ravaging fire. Still, he pushed the feeling aside, dropped his saw and survived.

The Sunk Cost Fallacy

When reflecting on this, the sunk cost fallacy also came to mind, which is “the phenomenon whereby a person is reluctant to abandon a strategy or course of action because they have invested heavily in it, even when it is clear that abandonment would be more beneficial.”

Letting Go of Past Investments

We can draw some valuable lessons from those examples in software engineering and operations. For instance, many people may feel emotionally attached to the tools, frameworks, and programming languages they have used throughout their careers. This attachment can be so strong that they become resistant to change, even when it’s evident that adopting new and more efficient technologies would yield better results.

Engineers may also hesitate to switch to a new technology or platform, fearing that the time and effort spent learning and working with their current tools would go to waste. However, it’s essential to recognize that technology is constantly evolving, and what was once cutting-edge may now be outdated. In these cases, it’s crucial to let go of past investments and focus on adopting new solutions to deliver better outcomes.

To succeed and keep improving, we need to be adaptable. Just as the firefighter who survived realized he had to drop his chainsaw, software engineers should be open to discarding tools or practices that may be hindering their progress or efficiency. It might be challenging to let go of something integral to your work, but doing so can open up new opportunities for growth and success.

Fostering Improvement

In team management and collaboration, fostering a culture that values continuous learning and improvement is essential. Encourage team members to explore new tools, frameworks, and methodologies to help the team become more efficient and deliver higher-quality software. By creating an environment where individuals feel supported in their pursuit of growth, you’ll be better equipped to handle the ever-changing landscape of software development.

Lastly, communication is vital when applying these lessons to your teams. Make it a point to regularly discuss new technologies, trends, and best practices with your team. 

Conclusion

Encourage open conversations about the tools and processes currently in place, and be willing to make adjustments if they no longer serve the team’s best interests. By fostering a culture of transparency and adaptability, you can help your team thrive in an ever-changing industry and drive continued success.

lifehacker

Work vs Toil: How to Work Smarter, Not Harder

We all know the feeling of being bogged down by toil – those repetitive, time-consuming tasks that require little mental effort but eat away at our productivity. This post will explore ways to reduce toil and work smarter, not harder.

Use Tools Correctly and Efficiently

For most of the audience of this blog, work involves spending much of our day typing and editing text. Mastering our tools – Microsoft Word, Google Docs, vscode, emacs or vim – is essential to our productivity. By learning our tools’ default shortcuts and features, we can save ourselves hours of wasted time. Copying and pasting, multi-line selection, searching and replacing, and moving efficiently between sections. This should be muscle memory and not consume either time or mental space.

Use Better and Modern Tools

Expanding on the section above, using outdated tools is often counterproductive. As more and more people use modern tools, new features are created to address everyday needs. For example, installing software on a Linux server used to be an extremely laborious process. However, modern Linux distributions now have package management systems that trivialize the process. By adopting modern tools, we can save ourselves hours of toil.

Now, I want to drive this point home with some points why you should put the effort to leave your comfort zone and learn new tools:

  1. Increased efficiency: Modern tools are often designed to be more efficient and streamlined than their older counterparts. They may have better user interfaces, more intuitive workflows, and more advanced features to help us work more efficiently and reduce toil. For example, newer text editors may have better search and replace functionality, faster loading times, and better support for various programming languages.
  2. Improved collaboration: Modern tools often have better features like real-time editing and commenting. This can be particularly useful for remote teams or working with clients in different locations. So we can reduce the need for back-and-forth communication and improve the speed and accuracy of work.
  3. Easier integration: Modern tools are often designed to work well with other modern tools. For example, a modern project management tool may integrate well with a modern time-tracking tool, enabling us to streamline our workflow and reduce toil. Using modern tools designed to work together can reduce the need for manual integration and reduce the risk of errors or inconsistencies.
  4. Staying competitive: Employers and clients may expect us to be proficient in the latest tools and technologies, and failing to keep up can lead to missed opportunities or lost business. If we stay up-to-date with modern tools, we can remain relevant and competitive in our field while reducing toil and improving the quality of our work.

Automate Repetitive Tasks

Automating repetitive tasks can save us a significant amount of time. Whether using a tool like autokey to create shortcuts or scripts to automate larger tasks, the benefits of automation are clear. Use the Pareto Principle to find the 20% of things you do that take up 80% of your time and automate those tasks.

Think of it this way: Suppose a software engineer needs to run a suite of automated tests on their codebase before deploying it. Running these tests manually can be time-consuming and error-prone. However, by automating the testing process, the engineer can save time and improve the overall quality of their work. This can be achieved using a continuous integration (CI) tool like Jenkins or Travis CI to run the tests whenever new code is committed automatically. The CI tool can be configured to run the tests on various environments, such as operating systems or browsers, ensuring the code works correctly across different platforms. The engineer can also receive notifications of failed tests, enabling them to identify and fix any issues quickly. By automating the testing process, the engineer can free up time for more critical work, such as developing new features or improving existing ones, while improving the codebase’s overall quality.

Delegate Tasks

Delegating tasks can be a tricky balancing act. One must consider factors like the importance of the task, the trustworthiness of the person or entity we’re delegating to, and the cost of our time versus the cost of having someone else do the task. However, delegating can be a powerful way to reduce toil and free up our time for more critical work.

This is also applicable in our personal lives in addition to our daily work. I still have to read the book Buy Back Your Time: Get Unstuck, Reclaim Your Freedom, and Build Your Empire by Dan Martell. But I listened to a podcast interview with him, and I was inspired.

Plenty of services will allow you to hire people in the gig economy to help you carry tasks, like Fiverr (which I used several times), TaskRabbit and Fancy Hands.

In a professional setting finding someone to delegate tasks can be challenging. Make sure you consider their skill sets and workload. Look for people who are reliable and require little direction. Or people who are self-starters and highly motivated and will only need to be taught once.

Create Checklists and Standard Operating Procedures

Maybe building up on the task delegation point, creating clear documentation and procedures can significantly reduce the toil involved in our work. By creating checklists and standard practices for everyday tasks, we can reduce the chance of mistakes, save time on training new employees, streamline our workflow and make delegation much more effortless.

In conclusion, by adopting these strategies, we can significantly reduce the toil involved in our work and work smarter, not harder. So take the time to streamline your workflow, automate repetitive tasks, and delegate where possible. Your productivity, your health, and your career will thank you.