Establishing SRE Foundations with Vlad Ukis

On this episode of DevOps Toolchain, host Joe Colantonio interviews Vlad Ukis, the head of R&D for Siemens Health Imagineers, about the implementation and benefits of Site Reliability Engineering (SRE). Vlad emphasizes the importance of involving product management, product development, and product operations from the beginning to ensure the success of SRE in an organization. He discusses how to prioritize and communicate the importance of SRE in large organizations with competing initiatives and how introducing a role like SRE and creating a community of practice can facilitate cross-pollination of ideas and best practices. Vlad also dives into the concept of Service Level Objectives (SLOs), their importance in managing services, and the process of defining them by bringing together different teams. He shares his experience introducing SRE in a healthcare domain within a medical device vendor and addresses the challenge of orchestrating organizational buy-in for SRE. Vlad highlights the need for unique approaches to engaging each party in the organization and stresses the importance of culture in implementing new processes at scale. Listeners are encouraged to check out Vlad's book, 'Establishing SRE Foundations.' The interview provides valuable insights into the changes and efforts required for successful SRE implementation and the shift in mindset towards prioritizing reliability. Vlad also discusses the role of coaching and learning over time and the transformation of traditional product management, development, and operations models in the software-as-a-service world. The episode concludes with a discussion on the definition and practice of SRE, its role within an organization, and the potential creation of new positions. Don't miss out on this informative and thought-provoking episode featuring Vlad Ukis, a true expert in SRE and continuous delivery.