WHITE PAPER

Introducing ZeroOps
Increasing developer productivity
and decreasing burnout
Introducing ZeroOps - Increasing developer productivity and decreasing burnout // amazee.io // 01

Introduction
If there’s one thing we can all agree on, it’s that the last few years have been very hard on development teams.
And with rising economic concerns, this isn’t likely to change in the near future.

A lot of developers are overworked, burned out, By the end of this whitepaper, you will be
and at the end of their rope able to understand:

• That’s why we wrote this whitepaper. • Why exactly your team is struggling.

• That’s why we’re so committed to ZeroOps. • How to work less but be more productive.

• Simply put, we think that development teams deserve better, and they • The specific tools, and platforms your team needs to thrive.
need more.
• The long-term consequences of burnout on your team’s
• Developers need tools and platforms to help them work more productively productivity and well-being.
and efficiently. To get more done more effectively under less pressured
• The best steps you can start taking to improve today.
environments. Teams need better support and less work overall to deal
with burnout.

• Within this whitepaper, we will address the top reasons developers burn
out, and how things got so bad. We’ve included our three-step framework
for burnout-busting success, so you can start making positive changes
right away.

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The modern developer

What does the modern developer look like? Here’s a description.
As time changes, so, too, does work: The landscape of software development Over time, the applications will break or need work to remain functional. A shift
has gotten a lot more complex in the last few years. Trends change every is occurring, where most of the web development world deeply understands this
year, and there’s immense pressure for developers to keep up. So why is it critical (yet inconvenient) truth: An application or a site is never really finished,
different now? Simple - because complexity is also rising, when it comes to and it needs work, optimization, and regular care.
building applications. More and more applications are being moved away from
monolithic approaches to using dependency management and micro-services So what does that mean? Consider all it takes to run an application. Aside
approaches, which creates much more complex application environments from just building and creating it, there are maintenance, monitoring, security,
for developers. It’s true that developing apps this way does create more debugging, updating, and seemingly endless infrastructure and operations
flexibility, but it also comes with the added task of needing to take care of the tasks. These things sound simple enough, and maybe they’re not hard to do,
dependencies your application consumes. but they are hard to fit into a daily schedule. Dealing with infrastructure and
operations tasks on top of other daily work can make a developer team feel
Another challenge that’s making it hard to exist as a developer in 2022 is a absolutely overwhelmed, with no chance of accomplishing what they’d hoped
large shift in the way websites and applications are run and developed. There in a day, week, or month.
are still projects that are created, tossed into the world, and not really updated/
maintained, but that never usually works well.

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Who is handling security patches?

Are backups created regularly and their restore tested?
How does your scaling work, and what happens if something goes wrong?

What happens if issues pop up at 2 a.m.?

These are the important questions to ask yourself and your team - and you just doing anything other than developing is probably very tedious and frustrating
might realize that your developers are completely overwhelmed because these for developers with too much to do, and maintenance tasks getting in the way
tasks have crept in and become a central part of their daily jobs. And when they of coding, developers and engineering teams globally are starting to display
first started, all they really wanted to do was code and create. concerning signs of burnout, “quiet quitting,” and general unhappiness at
work. This isn’t heading in a positive direction - burnout can truly destroy an
Developers like to code and develop applications - that’s why they became organization from the inside out, and it can seriously impact mental and
developers in the first place. Many team leads don’t consider the fact that physical health along the way.

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The great resignation is over. Or is it?

We’re sure you remember the “Great Resignation” and what a time that was. So that’s how things got to how they are now. And where are we now?
That time period, marked most significantly in 2020 and 2021, demonstrated one Are companies still scrambling to find and hire developers?
critical thing to organizations: Developers are incredibly valuable. And there aren’t
enough of them. No, not as much as before. They are certainly still in high demand, but the
epidemic we called the “Great Resignation” has slowed down. And in fact, due
So when companies panicked and began hiring more developers, something to economic concerns based on changes in the economy in mid-to-late 2022,
unexpected happened: More and more developers began quitting and getting new some organizations are actually letting people go or freezing hiring entirely.
jobs. Why? Because they knew they deserved more positive working conditions,
and they set out to find them. Did teams stop needing developers? Absolutely not. But if leaders have instructed
team leads to do less hiring, that’s what they’re going to do. The workload for
This happened for a long time, leading to a great “reshuffling” of teams: their team will likely remain the same, whether they’re hiring or not. These teams,
Developers would get hired, stay for a few months, and leave. Rinse and repeat. fractured from the Great Resignation or 2021 reshuffling, aren’t complete.
This happened so much, so often, and to so many teams, eventually, something But they’re still tasked with accomplishing everything they wanted to in a given
else started to happen. Those employees left on a team after the developers quarter. The pressure is exceptional, and we have proof that people aren’t able
left, and those who weren’t leaving - got stuck with doing a lot of cleanup work to handle it well: One report claims that two-thirds of full-time employees have
and being slowed down by the technical debt the situation created. Developers felt burnout in their careers, and 75% report answering “yes” to feeling burned
staying put had to pick up the slack for those who were in flux. Overwork certainly out right now. Younger people may be dealing with the worst of it, as 84% of
wasn’t new to developers back then, but this was something new. Repeated and employees of millennial age report feeling burned out in their current positions.
constant turnover can be really hard on a team, and during the Great Resignation,
this became worse than ever.

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What will happen if something The hiring, training, losing, and rehiring of employees takes a toll, and morale

doesn’t change? beginsto dip. Teams are composed of people who don’t deeply understand what
they’re doing, and they don’t really know or trust one another.

We expect to see rising rates of burnout, unhappiness at work, mental health

We all know that unhappy or unmotivated teams don’t lead to very much good in
issues, and even physical health issues - if something big doesn’t change. The
an organization, especially not productivity or creativity.
status quo has become completely unsustainable for developers and teams,
many of whom just continue to quit jobs and take new ones in the hopes that
If things don’t change, it’s likely that it will be even harder to find developers,
they’ll feel better.
because many will choose different career paths or retire early. It’s unsustainable
and unrealistic for an employee to stay in a job that’s causing them severe mental,
They often don’t - because this problem has become systemic and widespread.
physical, or emotional distress. New research even links burnout to heightened
And it’s obvious that losing employees year over year is very bad for business.
rates of physical illness, even long-term chronic illnesses.

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Introducing ZeroOps - Increasing developer productivity and decreasing burnout // amazee.io // 06

The need for a new solution

We’re sure you’ve heard of all types of things to combat burnout: Beer at work, If your developers are going to do less work, ask yourself this: What are they
more casual dress codes, ping pong tables in the office, and even free lunches or absolutely essential for? What can they not do less of?
snacks brought in. We applaud companies that are going out of their way to try
and make life easier for their employees, no matter what they’re trying to do. The answer is likely something like developing applications, writing code, and
creating - which is why they were hired. It’s helpful to take a step back and look
However, we have noticed something: A lot of employers do things listed at everything your developers do. Why were they hired? What did you want them
above without actually addressing the circumstances that stressed their to do? List those things, and those are non-negotiables. You need them for
team out to begin with. Yes, it is great to wear comfy clothes and have free those tasks, but they can’t do everything anymore. Something has to slide off
food brought in - but it doesn’t cancel out how stressful developers’ jobs have their plate, and onto someone else’s.
become. Some companies have offered more remote work, which certainly
helps, but here’s the most important question: Are developers still overworked? A realistic and manageable workload is a critical part of fighting burnout within
If the answer is yes, then burnout will still remain a problem, whether someone an organization. The reason is simple: if you ask someone to do too much for
is at home or at the office. too long, they will begin to break down. There is some debate as to whether
humans were even meant to work for 8+ hours per day, and when those days
In our opinion, the best way to move toward a solution to burnout is one that span into 10-12, health and daily life begin to suffer. But before we start making
actually takes a load off the team and helps developers do less work. the argument for shorter work days or a 4-day workweek, let’s first get your
Yes, less work. Because at the end of the day, the only real way to combat developers out of the red zone.
burnout is to remove some of the strain.

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Our three-part burnout-busting strategy:

1 3
Better management practices and delegation.Leadership needs to take If not addressed by 1 or 2, reduce developers’ workload. This is the
an active role and assume responsibility for the failures of a team. bottom line here. Your developers need to be doing less. In whatever
Managers should be tasked with removing roadblocks, distractions, and way you decide to move forward, this needs to happen. Otherwise, the
manual tedious tasks wherever they can. Automation should factor into issue of burnout is here to stay in your organization.
your new strategy because it can save a shocking amount of time when
applied to the right processes. We know it may be an initial investment,
but trust the positive impact that it could have on your team and their
future productivity.

2
Robust resources, tools, and platform to assist your developers.
It’s time to look at your budget. If your developers need help or are
overworked, you have a few choices: one, you could hire some new
full-time employees. Two, you could hire some part-time, freelance, or
offshore labor to assist or supplement your team with a contractor.
Or, three, you could look into some tools and platforms that would
assist your developers in the same way. Three is probably the most cost-
effective option, to begin with, especially if you’re working with a tool
leaning on automation and Kubernetes. Something as simple as
using a platform that helps remove infrastructure and operations tasks
from your developers could make a world of difference.

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Introducing ZeroOps - Increasing developer productivity and decreasing burnout // amazee.io // 08

Introducing ZeroOps as a solution

In our opinion, one clear answer to the conundrum of developer overwork is ZeroOps helps remove anything that isn’t coding. It’s even in the name - Zero
an emerging technology trend called ZeroOps. The reason we think this is the Operations. This doesn’t mean that there are literally zero operations, it just
solution, as opposed to something else, is simply because it removes work from means that developers no longer have to worry about handling them.
developers’ shoulders and allows them to do less of what they don’t want to do,
and more of what they do. If developers aren’t the ones doing infrastructure and ops, but rather, they
sit around waiting for another overburdened team to do it, this can create
We mean this in the most positive way possible. ZeroOps will take work from bottlenecks. ZeroOps is still our recommended option in this scenario, as it
developers - tedious, annoying, laborious work that they didn’t want anyways. removes bottlenecks and allows tasks to be completed much more quickly.
What developers want is to code. But what they’re most likely doing is a
combination of coding, infrastructure maintenance, operations tasks, and
worrying about updates and security. It’s worth remembering that developing
software is a creative process, and developers need space to think without
interruptions. Even short interruptions or disturbances to this creative process
(for example, with urgent operations tasks) will certainly impact the quality of
work produced.

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Introducing ZeroOps - Increasing developer productivity and decreasing burnout // amazee.io // 09

What is ZeroOps and how does it lead to better productivity?

You may have heard of ZeroOps or NoOps, but what is it really and how can it help In fact, from what we’ve seen in the past, organizations can take advantage of
developers become more productive immediately? the actual employees they already have, who are so overworked that they’re
not delivering at their full potential. When you can take away nonessential tasks
We’ve written at length in the past about WebOps. But in 2022 when amazee.io and help them remain more focused, most teams find that they can seriously
joined Mirantis, we decided to move to a ZeroOps focus because it’s better for maximize the productivity of the employees they already have - all while
teams and developers. improving their lives, mental health, and working relationships.

Formally, we define ZeroOps as a set of practices that result in developers

focusing solely on coding and creating, with 0% of their time spent on operations
or infrastructure.

Our goal for all developers is that they won’t need to worry about infrastructure
obligations, tasks, stressors, or hassles. When teams operate in this way, with
zero operations, they can significantly improve their productivity and work
experience - all without needing to hire new employees.

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What specifically does it look like?

Kubernetes itself isn’t inherently ZeroOps, but it can significantly contribute by the The main reason Kubernetes saves you time is that it provides the framework
way it automates. Many teams know about Kubernetes, want to use it, and plan to automate your containers and manage their life cycles. This includes all
to, but they know that the learning curve is substantial. Managing Kubernetes tasks related to managing and overseeing apps, like:
clusters yourself takes a lot of knowledge, expertise, and staff dedicated to • Deploying • Scaling
doing so every day. This can take even more time away from busy teams, so • Monitoring • Load balancing
we recommend looking into Kubernetes-as-a-Service or managed Kubernetes if • Managing life cycles • Security
you’re striving for ZeroOps.
The truth is this: Without Kubernetes, you won’t be as automated as your
Because ZeroOps and Kubernetes go hand in hand. Kubernetes is an open competition, and in this way alone, you begin to fall behind. Whether you opt to
source container orchestration process that helps automate tasks related to go entirely ZeroOps or not, we think Kubernetes is an absolutely essential part
building, hosting, and running applications and sites. Kubernetes manages of your stack for managing and overseeing your sites and apps.
apps in containers, which are the superior way to run apps and sites because of
the flexibility (when compared to the old, outdated servers that many still use.) Another huge component of what ZeroOps looks like in action is automation
Kubernetes automatically updates each individual container, which is tedious - both with Kubernetes and also through automated monitoring, security, and
manual work that you don’t have to do. You can see how the time savings reporting. This was likely all once done by a person or several people, so many
would build up. teams feel an enormous sense of relief when these tasks become automated.
Using Kubernetes can contribute to improved security automation anyways
since container image scanning is usually possible.

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Can ZeroOps be truly done?

Can an organization truly achieve ZeroOps? We believe so, but it might take some This no longer works, and we believe it won’t work for teams in the future,
time. It’s a good place to aim for, and we all start somewhere. In a true ZeroOps because of the long-term strain it puts on developers. ZeroOps can also just be
scenario, development and operations would operate entirely separately. In reality, described as “platform engineering.” Developers only need to learn about the
it’s possible that there might be some small overlap. But wouldn’t it be better to application with this method, and then the platform team runs the platform
reduce your operations tasks by 87%, even if you haven’t reached perfection yet? for both developers and production.
Even reducing the burden of these tasks by 50% can have a profound impact
on a team. In this case, the platform team is not in-house, but rather the team you hire or
choose to work with. Application developers, in the past, have also been expected
The idea of ZeroOps isn’t new. Some people call it NoOps. Analysts from Deloitte to be system administrators. But with their specialized skill sets, doing so doesn’t
claim that achieving ZeroOps would actually mean reaching the top of the DevOps allow them to focus on their current skill set and perform the specific tasks they
mountain by assisting developers for a more frictionless development and were hired to do.
deployment experience.
The separation of operations and development will only assist developers, who
But we disagree with this point. In our opinion, ZeroOps is not a continuation of really don’t need to think or care about operations. Most developers only want to
DevOps - it is a proposal to replace it entirely. Why? Because developers shouldn’t do one thing: Develop apps and create code.
have to worry about operations or infrastructure. In the DevOps model, developers
and operations are thrown together and both are made responsible for everything.

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On the flip side, infrastructure and operations teams are struggling too. They need Our solution to this problem (and the core of ZeroOps) is this: Let developers
to deliver reliable, unchanging infrastructure, but reactive environments also need be developers. The complexities of infrastructure can be abstracted away.
to meet developers’ needs. Developers need environments that adapt to their For developers, we think user-space-centric tooling is critical. Operations and
speed, which means that while infrastructure and developers rely on each other, developers shouldn’t need to worry about the same things, because they have
they sometimes have conflicting goals. With these conflicting priorities on a day- very different priorities and skill sets.
to-day basis, often, developers and operations both often end up unhappy and
overwhelmed. It’s not the job that either side signed up for.

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ZeroOps, or the platform model Before vs. after picture of teams

who use ZeroOps
Instead of the “ops” team, we propose a “platform team.” They build a platform,
which, in our case, is based on Kubernetes and is the same for development One of our current customers, a startup with limited funding, used
and production. It can be the same cluster if you want, or it can be separated. ZeroOps to get off the ground. They lacked the resources and
Platform teams for hire, like ours, work seamlessly with your team to create the employee expertise to set up their infrastructure and operations
best outcomes for your developers. themselves. To do so would have cost them years they didn’t have
to get to market, hundreds of thousands of dollars, the equivalent of
Developers now deploy applications into containers - locally, in development 3 full-time employees. But when using amazee.io’s ZeroOps solution,
environments, and in production environments. These containers can move they were actually able to focus all their time, effort, and energy on
between different platforms, all of which speak the Kubernetes language. their product, while we handled infrastructure, operations, DevOps
tasks, and more.
This approach is yielding significantly improved outcomes as compared to the
DevOps approach before. Since the containers allow for a complete separation In the end, they didn’t ever have to hire anyone to work on those tasks,
of responsibilities, developers have more bandwidth to create and develop. not even today, because they simply kept using the amazee.io ZeroOps
There are very few instances where teams will wonder who is responsible for platform. And as a result, they got to market a full year faster than they
what: If it’s involving something inside the container, it’s the developer. If it’s would have, which has allowed them to significantly accelerate their
outside the container, it’s the platform team. growth. They used the money saved by working with amazee.io to
focus on the product and their sales efforts, which were significantly
With the development team focusing on applications and the platform team more successful because they had resources to put behind them.
focusing on operations, developers simply don’t need to worry about ops or
infrastructure anymore. Hence the name - ZeroOps.

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How does amazee.io do ZeroOps?

Lagoon is our avenue to ZeroOps. Lagoon, our open source application delivery Imagine a world where your developers can build whatever they want, without
platform, automates the deployment, management, security, and general having to worry about how they’re going to do it.
operations of your sites and applications. Lagoon is the leading open source
platform that allows your developers to develop their code and services with This is why Lagoon exists. We’re excited about that potential for developer
Docker and run the same system in production with Kubernetes. This means teams everywhere, and we truly believe in a world where no hands-on operations
the exact same container images, configurations, and code. work is required on a daily basis. Lagoon’s developers actually built the platform
specifically to solve some problems they were struggling with.
Lagoon is extremely developer-focused. It was built for developers, by developers.
It’s a cloud-native solution, so when using Lagoon, developers don’t actually The added benefit of choosing amazee.io for your ZeroOps application delivery
need to have cloud-native experience or knowledge, since Lagoon serves as that is this: We offer support for all major web technologies and frameworks, which
expertise base. gives you the freedom to choose what’s best for your team, your processes, and
your organization.
Lagoon allows teams not only to deploy into Kubernetes easily, but it also is able
to abstract Kubernetes and its complexities into fully-automated deployments.
This lifts an enormous burden off developers’ shoulders. Lagoon is our ZeroOps
secret sauce because it enables us to provide teams with a true ZeroOps
experience - from the very start.

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Curious about how ZeroOps could take
your team to the next level?

Contact our expert team today to schedule

a chat or a technical demo.