When you put together a DevOps team, this usually means that the Development and Operations departments should work together more closely and better. The primary goal is to provide solutions faster and in better quality through more intensive cooperation between development and IT. One of the biggest challenges here is to promote and maintain communication between the previously often separate teams in the long term.
Find out here how you can create the right conditions and do justice to both teams.
DevOps is more than just a new name
DevOps describes a real cultural change in the company, not just a new term. When putting together a DevOps team, it is important to focus on the needs of your own organization. Depending on the existing tools, team composition and goals, the ideal structure may differ from other companies.
Basically, there should be a clear distribution of tasks with direct communication channels. This means that there is a clear contact person for every problem so that information does not get lost. Regular meetings also promote open communication.
Important roles and skills in the modern DevOps team
The following roles are particularly relevant today (some can also be filled in combination):
- DevOps EngineerResponsible for automation and infrastructure, especially for the setup and optimization of CI/CD pipelines, containerization with Docker and the management and orchestration of Kubernetes clusters. A DevOps Engineer ensures that development and operational processes converge efficiently and are automated to ensure continuous and reliable delivery of software and systems.
- Site Reliability Engineer (SRE)The SRE ensures that systems function reliably even under high loads. He takes care of scalability, monitors system performance and availability, optimizes processes and implements measures to minimize downtime. SREs rely heavily on automation and proactive troubleshooting.
- Cloud ArchitectA Cloud Architect designs and manages complex cloud infrastructures. This role includes the selection of suitable cloud platforms such as AWS, Azure or Google Cloud as well as the planning and implementation of secure, efficient and scalable cloud environments. The Cloud Architect also pays attention to cost optimization and compliance requirements.
- Security Engineer (DevSecOps)Security Engineers integrate security aspects directly into the development and operational processes. Their task is to identify security risks at an early stage, develop automated security tests and ensure that security standards are adhered to at every stage of the development cycle.
The skills required today include in particular (for both cloud and on-premise solutions)
- Experience with Continuous Integration and Continuous Delivery (CI/CD), including the use of tools such as Jenkins, GitHub Actions or GitLab CI/CD to automate software delivery.
- Comprehensive knowledge of container management, especially in dealing with Docker and Kubernetes for the creation, management and scaling of containerized applications.
- Competencies in at least one major cloud platform such as Hetzner, Ionos, STACKIT, AWS, Azure, Google Cloud, including infrastructure design, management and security practices.
- Understanding of Infrastructure as Code (IaC) with tools such as Terraform or Ansible for efficient infrastructure management.
- Ability to monitor and optimize system performance with tools such as Prometheus, Grafana or ELK Stack.
- Basic knowledge in the application of GitOps principles, in particular using tools such as ArgoCD or Flux.
Example of successful team building
A typical, well-functioning DevOps team could look like this:
- A DevOps Engineer for CI/CD pipelines and automation.
- An SRE for infrastructure management and system stability.
- A developer with a focus on automation and scripting.
- A QA engineer for the automation of tests.
The practical tasks of such teams often include
- Automation of test and deployment processes.
- Monitoring and troubleshooting in cloud environments.
- Optimization of CI/CD pipelines for faster releases.
Tools and technologies for effective collaboration
Effective collaboration works best with the right tools:
- Communication: Slack, Microsoft Teams or Mattermost promote communication.
- Project management: Jira, Trello or Asana for task management and transparency.
- DevOps-specific tools:
- Terraform for Infrastructure as Code.
- Prometheus and Grafana for monitoring.
- ArgoCD or Flux for GitOps processes.
Integration of modern approaches in DevOps processes
- DevSecOps: Security aspects play a central role in modern DevOps processes. DevSecOps integrates security considerations directly into every phase of the development and operating cycle. This includes automated security tests, code scanning tools such as SonarQube or OWASP ZAP for the early detection of security vulnerabilities, as well as continuous security reviews to ensure compliance and data security in the long term. This also includes regular team training on security-related topics in order to establish a strong security awareness within the entire DevOps team.
- GitOps: GitOps means that all infrastructure changes are consistently managed via Git repositories. Changes to the infrastructure are treated as code that is managed like software versions. This increases traceability and transparency, as every adjustment is documented and traceable. Typically, teams rely on tools such as ArgoCD or Flux to automatically ensure that the real state of the infrastructure matches the target state defined in the Git repository. This approach makes changes more reliable and allows errors to be detected and rectified more quickly.
- AI and automation: The field of AI is currently developing particularly dynamically in the DevOps environment. AI-supported tools such as GitHub Copilot, Amazon DevOps Guru and Google Cloud Operations Suite are already helping to detect errors at an early stage, distribute workloads efficiently and provide automated suggestions for infrastructure optimization. These tools are also increasingly taking on complex tasks such as proactive error prevention, automatic problem analysis and resource optimization. Nevertheless, AI tools are currently and will continue to be mainly supportive in the foreseeable future. Competent specialists remain indispensable in order to use the tools effectively and implement DevOps processes successfully. However, the rapid pace of development promises exciting innovations that we can look forward to – who knows what these intelligent helpers will achieve in the future.
Best practices for communication in the DevOps team
Communication is at the heart of successful DevOps teams. Effective communication ensures that misunderstandings are avoided and information is available transparently at all times. Important measures for this include daily stand-up meetings via Microsoft Teams or Slack. These short meetings serve to identify current tasks and potential obstacles at an early stage and work out solutions together.
In addition, the use of project management tools such as Jira is crucial. Jira ensures clear, comprehensible task management and enables all team members to view the current status of a project at any time. Confluence complements this perfectly as a central knowledge management tool. Here, processes, documentation and important information can be recorded in a structured manner and made quickly accessible.
Another success factor is retrospectives, which should take place regularly. In these meetings, the team reflects together on what is going well and where improvements are needed. This strengthens open and honest communication and ensures continuous optimization.
In summary, a successful DevOps team combines continuous communication with clear structures and state-of-the-art tools to ensure smooth collaboration at all times and achieve optimal results.
Outlook – how DevOps roles could change
The roles in a DevOps team are constantly evolving – driven by automation, AI and the increasing integration of security, compliance and sustainability issues. Some traditional roles could fundamentally change or even disappear as a result, while new task profiles emerge:
- Roles with a strong manual focus, such as traditional QA testers or pure build managers, are increasingly being replaced by automated test and deployment pipelines or are merging with other roles.
- The DevOps Engineer will continue to evolve: from a pure tooling specialist to a bridge builder between platform engineering, development and security.
- The role of the Site Reliability Engineer could be more closely interlinked with AI-supported monitoring – instead of just rectifying faults, the focus in future will be on their automated prevention.
- In DevSecOps structures, security engineers are more closely integrated into cross-functional teams in order to think about security from the outset instead of checking it retrospectively.
- New roles such as “AI Operations Specialist” or “Sustainability Engineer” are emerging where complex systems need to be operated with AI support or ecological aspects need to be given greater consideration.
Conclusion: DevOps does not stand still. Building a successful team today requires not only specialist knowledge, but also openness to change. One thing is clear: automation replaces tasks, but not people. Those who set up teams correctly – with the right roles, clear communication and a willingness to evolve – will remain successful in the future.
At unbyte, we always work with state-of-the-art tools and methods to implement current and future-proof DevOps solutions. You can find more exciting articles and insights in the unbyte blog – take a look!
This blog entry was illustrated and optimized with AI support.