Engineering Enablement by Abi Noda DX

This week's episode is with Jim Beyers, VP of Engineering Enablement at CVS Health. Jim joined CVS a year ago to lead an effort to build an internal developer platform. Abi and Jim discuss how Jim joined CVS to build an internal developer platform, what brought him to the job, and how the developer experience fits into the broader transformation goals of CVS. Additionally, this episode covers building the team, defining a strategy, and how he's thinking about winning the hearts and minds across his organization.

Discussion points:

(1:15) How Jim was brought into CVS
(2:39) How DevEx aligns with CVS’s transformation initiatives
(6:06) Jim’s vision for developer experience
(8:26) Building a DevEx team and working with product managers
(15:06) Defining and communicating a DevEx strategy
(19:37) Assessing Backstage and developing a platform
(24:40) Working with developers and leaders
(27:55) Working alongside colleagues tackling similar problems
(29:26) Reporting on progress

Mentions and links:

Jim Beyers on LinkedIn

Jim’s talk on the Target Application Platform

This week we spoke with Nils Loodin, Platform Product Manager at Spotify. Nils describes how his role in platform product management works, including unique challenges, approaches, and career considerations. Nils also discusses some of the recent changes within Spotify's platform organization, including shifting teams from tech-centric to journey-centric. 

Discussion points:

(1:30) How Nils came into his role
(3:59) How “developer experience” came into the picture at Spotify
(5:30) How the Platform team is structured
(8:52) Unique challenges of the Platform PM role
(12:51) Defining the Platform PM’s focus
(16:39) Staying close to their customers
(21:09) Optimal background for someone in this role
(24:43) Attracting PMs into Platform roles
(29:40) How it is that Spotify’s leadership invests in developer experience
(31:19) How a recent reorg shifted Platform’s focus 
(41:29) Improving onboarding for mobile engineers
(47:33) Measuring onboarding 
Mentions and links:

Connect with Nils on LinkedIn

The product management discipline in platform teams | Russ Nealis (Plaid)
Spotify’s Engineering blog 

This week we’re joined by Justin Wright and Matthew Dimich, who lead Platform Engineering and Engineering Enablement at Thomson Reuters. Justin and Matt give an inside look at how they’ve evolved their organization’s structure and approach over the past 8 years.
Discussion points: 

(1:03) Founding the platform team
(5:49) The current organizational structure
(9:00) Key initiatives the platform organization is focused on
(12:55) The enablement function within platform
(16:44) What drove the engagement function’s growth
(19:42) The value of having an enablement function
(24:05) Marketing the enablement team’s work
(29:47) How enablement interfaces with other platform teams
(33:22) Managing the work enablement focuses on
(36:55) The balance of requests vs proactive work

Mentions and links:

Connect with Justin and Matt on LinkedIn
Manuel Pais’ Platform as a Product talk

This week’s episode dives into the DORA research program and this year’s State of DevOps Report. Nathen Harvey, who leads DORA at Google, shares the key findings from the research and what’s changed since previous reports.
Discussion points:

(1:10) What DORA focuses on
(2:17) Where the DORA metrics fit 
(4:35) Introduction to user-centric software development
(8:05) Impact of user-centricity on software delivery
(9:40) Team performance vs. organizational performance 
(13:50) Importance of internal documentation
(15:19) Methodology for designing surveys
(19:52) Impact of documentation on software delivery
(23:11) Reemergence of the Elite cluster
(25:55) Advice for leaders leveraging benchmarks
(28:30) Redefining MTTR
(33:45) Changing how Change Failure Rate is measured
(36:45) Impact of AI on software delivery 
(41:25) Impact of code review speed
Mentions and links:

Connect with Nathen on LinkedIn

Listen to the previous episode with Nathen
Read the 2023 State of Devops Report

The DORA Quick Check

Blog post: Documentation is like sunshine

Join the DORA community

DevEx: What Actually Drives Productivity

This week we’re joined by Preeti Kota, the Head of Engineering for Compass at Atlassian. Preeti walks us through Atlassian’s journey with developer experience: including how they measure DevEx, and how they drive improvements through efforts at both the organization and team levels. Preeti also talks about how this journey has led to the development of Atlassian’s newly released internal developer portal, Compass.
Mentions and links:


Learn about Compass, Atlassian’s newly released internal developer portal  
Connect with Preeti on LinkedIn

Atlassian’s CTO, Rajeev Rajan, on the key to unlocking developer productivity 

Discussion points:

(1:43) Where Atlassian’s journey with developer experience began
(5:36) Who is championing the focus on DevEx at Atlassian
(9:30) How the company arrived at their level of investment in DevEx
(13:47) Defining developer experience
(18:19) How the program for improving developer productivity is structured
(21:19) The Developer Productivity Champions group
(23:53) Two metrics in focus: Self-serve documentation and self-serve dependency maintenance
(25:56) How Atlassian surveys developers 
(29:59) Types of projects the centralized teams tackle 
(31:19) Getting buy-in for investing 10% time toward DevEx projects
(33:13) How leaders get teams to feel they have permission to invest 10% of their time toward DevEx projects
(36:19) The backstory behind Compass, Atlassian’s new product 
(38:10) What Compass is, who it’s for, and how it is unique

This week we’re joined by Mark Côté, who leads the Developer Infrastructure organization at Shopify, to learn about their developer survey program. Mark shares what went into designing and running the survey, what they’ve done to drive participation rates higher, and how they interpret their data.
Mentions and links:

Follow Mark on LinkedIn

Read Shopify’s engineering blog

Discussion points:

(1:32) Starting the survey
(3:20) How the survey has evolved
(4:22) Three types of information gleaned from the survey
(7:37) Designing and running the survey
(12:28) Participation rates
(15:12) Why there's an increase of interest in the results at Shopify
(17:42) What's affecting participation rates
(23:03) Selecting survey questions
(27:01) Refining survey questions
(28:54) Survey length
(30:56) Analyzing the results 
(33:31) How the data is stored and shared
(35:56) Sending targeted surveys to the right developers 
(37:40) Using the results as a Developer Acceleration organization
(39:29) Confidence in the data
(41:27) The value of a developer survey