Kickstart your journey by taking the interactive assessment at DevOps Assessment Tool. This article will guide you through each question, helping you gain deeper insights and make the most of your evaluation in the category: culture.
Welcome to your comprehensive assessment guide designed to evaluate and elevate the maturity of your DevOps culture, CI/CD pipelines, and DevSecOps practices. This article will help you understand key cultural and operational questions critical to your organization's success in software delivery and security.
How to use this article: For each question below, reflect on your current practices and select your maturity level from the options: Not doing, Novice, Intermediate, Advanced, Expert, Visionary. Use the provided resource links to deepen your understanding and find actionable steps to improve. Each question is also linked with an anchor for easy navigation and future reference.
1. What is the maturity level of cross-functional collaboration and shared ownership across development, operations, project management, QA, and security teams?
Cross-functional collaboration is the backbone of successful DevOps culture. When development, operations, QA, security, and project management teams share ownership of the software lifecycle, organizations benefit from faster delivery, higher quality, and improved security posture. This shared responsibility reduces silos, accelerates feedback loops, and fosters innovation.
For engineering teams, this means smoother workflows, clearer communication, and collective problem-solving, which leads to fewer bottlenecks and faster incident resolution. To achieve this, encourage regular cross-team meetings, establish shared goals, and use collaboration tools that promote transparency.
Learn more about building a collaborative DevOps culture at Atlassian DevOps Culture.
2. How mature is the process of reviewing and evolving the DevOps toolchain with active participation from skilled teams and security-aligned stakeholders?
Regularly reviewing and evolving your DevOps toolchain ensures that your technology stack remains efficient, secure, and aligned with business goals. Involving skilled engineers and security stakeholders in this process helps identify gaps, optimize workflows, and integrate security controls early.
Engineering teams benefit from streamlined tools that reduce manual work and improve automation, while security teams gain confidence that their requirements are embedded in the pipeline. To improve, establish a governance committee that meets periodically to assess tools, gather feedback, and pilot new technologies.
Explore best practices on evolving your DevOps toolchain at Red Hat DevOps Overview.
3. What is the current maturity level in how DevOps workflow changes are driven by expert teams and reviewed by a coalition including security and compliance?
Expert-driven workflow changes backed by a coalition of security and compliance stakeholders ensure that process improvements do not compromise governance or risk management. This collaborative approach leads to more resilient and compliant pipelines.
For engineering teams, it means changes are vetted for security and compliance early, reducing costly rework and incidents. Achieve this by forming cross-disciplinary review boards and integrating automated compliance checks into your CI/CD workflows.
Learn how to manage your DevOps toolchain effectively at Atlassian DevOps Toolchain.
4. How effectively does your culture enable and encourage all team members to take personal responsibility for security, compliance, and privacy obligations?
A culture where every team member owns security, compliance, and privacy responsibilities dramatically reduces vulnerabilities and fosters proactive risk management. This mindset shift transforms security from a gatekeeper role into a shared value.
Engineering teams empowered with security knowledge can identify and fix issues early, improving overall product quality and customer trust. To cultivate this, provide ongoing security training, promote blameless incident reviews, and reward responsible behavior.
Discover strategies to embed security culture at DevSecOps.org.
5. To what extent are security engineers embedded in the design of modular components and routinely engaged when security patterns evolve?
Embedding security engineers early in the design phase ensures that modular components are architected with security best practices, reducing vulnerabilities and technical debt. Continuous engagement with evolving security patterns keeps the architecture resilient against emerging threats.
This collaboration helps engineering teams build secure, maintainable systems and accelerates compliance readiness. Achieve this by integrating security architects into design reviews and establishing feedback loops for security pattern updates.
Understand DevSecOps integration at Synopsys DevSecOps Glossary.
6. What is the maturity of collaboration between SRE and DevSecOps teams in driving secure, reliable, and efficient operations across the stack?
Strong collaboration between Site Reliability Engineering (SRE) and DevSecOps teams is vital for maintaining secure and reliable production environments. This partnership balances operational stability with proactive security measures, enhancing system resilience.
Engineering teams benefit from shared monitoring, incident response, and continuous improvement practices. To improve collaboration, foster joint planning sessions, shared tooling, and aligned metrics between SRE and security teams.
Explore SRE and security collaboration at Google SRE Book.
7. How well does your team practice Root Cause Analysis (RCA) and foster psychological safety for open, blameless learning from incidents?
Practicing thorough Root Cause Analysis (RCA) combined with psychological safety encourages teams to learn from failures without fear of blame. This culture accelerates problem resolution and prevents recurrence of incidents.
Engineering teams gain confidence to report issues transparently and innovate without hesitation. To foster this, implement structured RCA processes, conduct blameless postmortems, and promote open communication channels.
Learn more about RCA and blameless culture at IBM RCA Guide.
8. What level of maturity does your SRE practice demonstrate in shifting left the ‘Wisdom of Production’ into early development and design cycles?
Shifting production insights left into development enables teams to anticipate and mitigate operational issues early. Mature SRE practices embed monitoring data, incident learnings, and reliability metrics into design and coding phases.
This approach helps engineering teams build more robust systems and reduces costly firefighting later. To advance, integrate SRE feedback loops into development sprints and use production telemetry to guide design decisions.
See detailed SRE practices at Google SRE Book.
9. How deeply is a culture of continuous learning, experimentation, and improvement embedded within your SRE and operations practices?
A culture that embraces continuous learning and experimentation drives innovation and operational excellence. Teams that iterate rapidly on processes and tooling can adapt to changing environments and emerging threats.
Engineering teams benefit from ongoing skill development and improved system reliability. To embed this culture, encourage knowledge sharing, support safe-to-fail experiments, and measure improvements with actionable metrics.
Further reading on continuous improvement in SRE at Google SRE Book.
10. To what extent are the principles and rules of engagement well-defined for SRE interactions with development, testing, and product teams?
Clear principles and rules of engagement between SRE and other teams prevent misunderstandings and ensure smooth collaboration. Defined roles, responsibilities, and communication protocols help maintain focus on shared goals.
Engineering teams experience fewer conflicts and faster issue resolution. Establish these by documenting collaboration guidelines, setting SLAs, and conducting joint planning and review sessions.
Reference SRE engagement best practices at Google SRE Book.
11. How intentionally are cultural behaviors such as collaboration, ownership, and innovation recognized and rewarded across teams?
Recognition and rewards for collaboration, ownership, and innovation reinforce positive behaviors that drive DevOps success. Intentional culture-building motivates teams to sustain high performance and continuous improvement.
Engineering teams feel valued and inspired to contribute beyond their core roles. Implement recognition programs, celebrate successes publicly, and embed these values in performance reviews.
Explore culture-building strategies at Atlassian DevOps Culture.
12. How well are DevOps principles embedded in onboarding, performance evaluations, leadership development, and organizational processes?
Embedding DevOps principles into organizational processes ensures long-term sustainability and alignment. When onboarding, evaluations, and leadership programs reflect these values, teams adopt them naturally.
Engineering teams onboard faster, align better with company goals, and leaders champion continuous improvement. Achieve this by integrating DevOps training into HR processes and leadership curricula.
Learn how to institutionalize DevOps at The DevOps Handbook.
Ready to elevate your DevOps culture and security maturity? Connect with experts who can guide your transformation journey. Contact us today to start your assessment and unlock your team’s full potential.
