Results of CA Technologies Study Also Show Combination of Agile and DevOps Drive Greater Customer Satisfaction, Employee Engagement and Business Growth
India, 8 February, 2017 – Results from a new CA Technologies (NASDAQ: CA) global study on agile and DevOps practices and their business impact have revealed that there is a ‘maturity gap’ in Asia Pacific and Japan (APJ), with only 29 percent of organizations in APJ having scaled agile beyond development, and only 38 percent having deployed DevOps widely across the organization.
Interestingly, while advanced implementation rates are low, the findings also showed that a high number of organizations across APJ (82 percent) agree that agile and DevOps are critical to successful digital transformation strategies, and using a combination of both practices improves operational efficiency and customer satisfaction, and accelerates new business growth.
“It’s overwhelmingly clear that digital transformation is a stark reality that needs to be taken to task by every business for future readiness,” said Richard Gerdis, vice president, DevOps, Asia Pacific & Japan, CA Technologies. “Our research has shown that organizations are very much aware of the fact that they have to be ‘built to change’ – meaning agile enough to adapt to changing market environments if they were to win in today’s application economy. However, we have found that advanced implementation of agile and DevOps are at very low levels in APJ, citing lack of skills and in-house knowledge, and security issues as top obstacles respectively.”
The study, Accelerating Velocity and Customer Value with Agile and DevOps, polled 1,770 senior business and IT executives worldwide, with 799 from across APJ, about their attitudes toward agile and DevOps practices and the impact they see it having on their business.
With the study showing a direct correlation between technology and tools to real business benefits, APJ organizations stand much to gain from broadly implementing agile and DevOps – particularly if they went a step further to combine them by adding DevOps to an agile environment.
Better Business Results
Insights from the study showed that combining both practices resulted in significant business benefits, and that together, there was an even greater impact. Compared to those that only use agile methodologies, the surveyed organizations in APJ that have adopted both agile and DevOps:
- Improved new business growth by an additional 86 percent;
- Improved operational efficiency by an additional 65 percent; and
- Improved IT-related costs by an additional 135 percent than agile-only environments
Happy Employees Result in Happy Customers
When adding DevOps practices to an agile working environment, users found:
- A further increase of 27 percent in employee productivity;
- Improved customer satisfaction by an additional 59 percent; and
- 78 percent of users who paired agile and DevOps reported an increase in customer experience, versus 53 percent of agile-only users
In fact, 76 percent of companies in APJ that used agile and DevOps together showed an advantage in employee recruitment and retention – a huge benefit when you consider the shortage of talent in IT and the costs associated with attracting and retaining the best employees.
“The results from our study are clear – pairing the DevOps paradigm with agile practices gives organizations of all sizes a competitive advantage with increases in employee productivity and satisfaction that is resulting in a loyal customer base,” said Rob Carruthers, senior director, Agile Management at CA Technologies, Asia Pacific & Japan. “Embracing a combined approach reduces cycle times and makes sure that execution is aligned to strategy, ultimately for customer benefit.”
Scaling Beyond IT
The benefits of advanced adoption extend far beyond the purview of IT. The wider benefits available to the surveyed organizations in APJ that embraced these practices across the organization experienced:
- A 35 percent improvement in time-to-decision (the time to act on new opportunities) for advanced agile users, compared to 27 percent for basic users;
- A 46 percent improvement in speed-to-market, for advanced DevOps users compared to 19 percent for basic users;
- Improvement in customer experience (witnessed by 91 percent of advanced agile adopters, and 87 percent of advanced DevOps users)
Resources
- Agile and DevOps: Accelerating Digital Transformation Results Infographic
- Digitally Remastered: Building Software into your Business DNA
- DevOps for Digital Leaders: Reignite Business with a Modern DevOps-Enabled Software Factory
- A CIO’s Guide: Five Steps to Business Agility
CA Technologies: Benefits of Advanced Agile and DevOps Practices
