The document discusses creating a culture that supports continuous delivery at Ancestry.com. It outlines several lessons learned, including being a change agent, adopting a lean-agile mindset, preparing stakeholders for change through education and envisioning the future state, invoking an emotional response to gain buy-in for changes, and challenging existing norms and assumptions. The goal is to transform the culture to better support continuous delivery of value to customers.

1. Crea%ng
a
Culture
for
Con%nuous
Delivery
John
Esser
Director
Engineering
Produc%vity
Change
Architect
Ancestry.com
ChefConf
2013

2. Ancestry.com
is
the
world s
largest
online
family
history
resource
with
more
than
2
million
subscribers,
11
billion
records,
and
4
PB
family
history
data.
Ancestry.com
can
help
you
discover
your
roots
and
tell
your
unique
family
story.

3. You
are
here
my
child…

4. What
is
culture?
• “Culture
is
the
byproduct
of
consistent
behavior.”
• It
is
what
the
organiza%on
values,
rewards,
and
reinforces.
It
defines
a
“norm.”
• Culture
develops
over
%me;
it
becomes
engrained.
• Culture
is
in
the
organiza%onal
subconscious;
it
is
habit;
it
is
reflexive.

5. What
is
culture?
• Culture
is
manifest
in
the
organiza%on’s
social
structures:
group
and
team
structures,
rela%onships,
and
communica%on
paUerns.
• Culture
is
hierarchical.
There
are
super-­‐
cultures
and
sub-­‐cultures.
• Culture
is
emo%onal.

6. Cultural
forces
are
powerful
and
formidable.
“I
find
your
lack
of
faith
disturbing.”

7. “Culture
eats
strategy
for
breakfast.”
-­‐Peter
Drucker
Culture
eats
everything!
Strategy
for
breakfast,
collaboraBon
for
lunch,
and
execuBon
for
dinner!

8. “Culture…[creates]
either
pleasure
or
pain,
serious
momentum
or
miserable
stagna%on.”
-­‐Shawn
Parr,
Fast
Company

9. Culture
can
be
changed!
But
it
is
oIen
not
easy
to
do.

10. Lessons
Learned
@
Ancestry
How
we
created
a
culture
that
supported
con%nuous
delivery
and
other
cool
changes.

11. Memories,
Light
the
corners
of
my
mind
Misty
water-­‐colored
memories
Of
the
way
we
were

12. “Ancestry
was
already
successful,
but
had
problems
and
issues
like
every
company.
Except,
there
was
a
vision
and
a
sense
that
Ancestry
was
capable
of
more,
much
more.”

13. Ancestry.com
Phase
I
-­‐
Transforma%on
Agile
–
Lean
Boot
Up
(Scrum)
Enterprise
Agile
Framework
Architecture
Standards
for
agility
IaaS
/
Private
Cloud
Con%nuous
Delivery
2
year
period
(April
2010
–
April
2012)

14. Ancestry.com
Phase
II
-­‐
Matura%on
Refine
CD
plahorm
Standard-­‐
iza%on
/
Unified
tools,
approaches
Lean
adop%on
into
other
areas
of
business,
e.g.
marke%ng.
Business
Agility
2
-­‐
3
year
period
(2012
–
2015?)

15. Lesson
#1:
Be
[or
u%lize]
a
change
agent.

16. Evangelist
Parent
Coach
Colleague
Psychologist
Manager

17. Lesson
#2:
Adopt
a
Lean-­‐Agile
mindset
as
the
founda%on
for
change.

18. LEAN
Agile
(Scrum,
Kanban,
XP,
etc.)
DevOps
Lean
Startup
LeanUX
Con%nuous
Delivery

19. Lean
is
fundamentally
about
flowing
value
to
the
customer
as
quickly
as
possible.

20. The
Lean
Mindset
AUend
to
value
stream
and
flow
Systems
thinking;
think
holis%cally
Eliminate
waste
to
reduce
cycle
%me
and
increase
efficiency
Autonoma%on
Respect
for
people
Commitment
to
con%nuous
improvement.

21. People
X
Process
Realize
that
both
are
necessary.

22. Lesson
#3:
Prepare
for
change.
Red
Pill,
Blue
Pill?

23. 23
“This
is
your
last
chance.
Aper
this,
there
is
no
turning
back…You
take
the
blue
pill,
the
story
ends.
You
wake
up
and
believe
whatever
you
want
to.
You
take
the
red
pill…you
stay
in
wonderland…and
I
show
you
how
deep
the
rabbit
hole
goes.
–
Morpheus,
The
Matrix

24. Lesson
#4:
Envision,
evangelize,
educate.

25. Envision
a
future,
but
speak
as
if
it
were
happening
NOW.

26. Educa%on/evangeliza%on
events
• Small
team
training
sessions.
• Weekly
brown
bags.
• Tech
talks.
• Book
sharing
sessions.
• Cul%vate
communi%es
of
interest.
• EMBED
into
the
team.
YOU
CAN’T
OVER
DO
IT.

27. Lesson
#5:
Create
a
posi%ve
emo%onal
reac%on.
Your
proposal
must
be
reasonable
and
logical,
but
emo%on
is
what
will
invoke
desire
and
ac%on.

29. You
must
win
over
their
hearts
and
minds.

30. Paint
a
picture
of
how
life
in
the
future
will
be.
Find
pain,
remove
it.
Use
stories,
use
successes,
use
experiences.

31. Lesson
#6:
You
must
challenge
the
“norms.”

32. Typical
things
you
need
to
challenge
• “Tradi%onal”
IT
• Silos
/
Func%onal
groups
• What
devs
/
ops
/
test
/
product
do?
• Vendor/cookie-­‐cuUer
solu%ons.
• ITIL
/
SOX
misapplica%on

33. CASE
STUDY
Who
is
responsible
for
deploying
and
operaBng
the
applicaBon?
Who
is
responsible
for
applicaBon
availability?

34. Ops
is
accountable
for
availability
App
may
be
unstable
Ops
restricts
changes;
doesn’t
want
to
be
vic%m
Ops
requires
deployment
of
applica%on.
Ops
enforces
opera%ng/running
applica%on.
Ops
requires
change
control;
“slows
down”
development
“Tradi%onal”
Ops

35. “Dev
Must
Own
What
They
Build
‘Cradle
To
Grave’…
You
Build
It
You
Run
It.”
-­‐Werner
Vogels

36. Ops
Transforma%on
• Be
a
service
organiza%on
• Owns
availability
of
infrastructure
• Provides
capacity
• Promotes
infrastructure
standards.
• Op%mize
for
delivery
speed
above
cost/
efficiency.

37. Lesson
#7:
Some%mes
you
just
have
to
force
it.
This
is
risky.
Do
this
carefully.

38. Scene:
BeauBful
fall
day
in
September
2010…
Me
(to
Ops
group):
“We
need
every
team
to
be
able
to
deploy
at
least
daily
if
they
need
to.”
Ops
1:
“What?!
That
isn’t
possible.
We
can’t
even
deploy
now
without
serious
problems
and
you
want
us
to
do
it
more
open.
That
is
a
recipe
for
disaster.”
Ops
2:
“How
will
we
hold
that
many
Change
Advisory
Boards?”
Ops
3:
“I
don’t
want
to
be
available
at
all
hours
on
Dev’s
beck
and
call
to
roll
their
code…that
sucks.”
Me:
“No,
they
will
do
it
themselves.”
Ops
(in
unison):
“What?!
You
are
nuts.”

39. Me
Them

40. Engineering
Produc%vity
Engineering
Produc%vity
Dev
Ops
Engineering
Produc%vity
Con%nuous
Delivery
Tools
Test
Tools
DevOps

41. 18
months
later…
• 50%
of
all
deploys
are
done
with
our
con%nuous
delivery
plahorm.
“Blob
roll”
is
dying.
• 30-­‐40
deploys
per
week
and
increasing
(previously
1
per
2
weeks).
• Incidents
with
auto-­‐deployed
services
have
significantly
decreased.
• Business
is
now
leveraging
capability
to
increase
innova%on.

42. Lesson
#8:
Pa%ence…s%ck
to
it…
transforma%on
takes
%me!

43. 5
years
(and
not
done)!
Agile
–
Lean
Boot
Up
(Scrum)
Con%nuous
Delivery
Business
Agility
The
next
thing!
4-­‐5
years
3
years
2
years
1
year

45. Thank
You.
Q
&
A