Teams can agree that they practice DevOps while disagreeing about what the term means. That makes it difficult to connect engineering improvements with leadership, governance and customer outcomes. The DevOps Standard, a book from DevOps Institute, attempts to give those conversations a common foundation. Its purpose is not to prescribe a particular toolchain, but to describe an operating model that can remain useful as the technology changes.
Alan Shimel discusses the effort with Marc Hornbeek, CEO and founder of Engineering DevOps Consulting, and Markus Bause, VP of product at PeopleCert. Hornbeek says uncertainty about DevOps persists even among practitioners at community events. Bause connects the need for clearer guidance with AI-driven development: faster engineering does not automatically create better business results. Testing, deployment and operations still have to work together. The book aims to link those capabilities with the organizational decisions that determine whether improvements reach customers.
Hornbeek describes the definition as a sociotechnical system integrating people, processes and technology practices for efficient, safe and reliable delivery of software-enabled products and services. Keeping that scope broad is deliberate. Specific tools and narrowly defined techniques can become obsolete, while the underlying delivery responsibilities remain. The discussion also explores alignment with service management without treating DevOps as something ITIL should replace. A shared vocabulary should help teams connect their work across those boundaries rather than create another isolated discipline.
The harder test is keeping the guidance alive after publication. Bause says the book is available as a free download and is not tied to certification, with adoption and practitioner feedback as the immediate priorities. Hornbeek points to community review during its development and to the care taken to avoid overly specific prescriptions. Neither presents publication as the end of the discussion. The next step is for teams to use the framework, challenge it with their experience and help determine how it should evolve.
Alan Shimel is founder, CEO and editor-in-chief of Techstrong Group, a Futurum company, and a member of Futurum's executive leadership team. A technology entrepreneur, media executive and industry commentator, Shimel has spent more than three decades building businesses, communities and media platforms serving enterprise technology professionals, including co-founding StillSecure, a network security company, and the DevOps Institute, a DevOps certification and training body. At Techstrong, he leads a portfolio of media brands including DevOps.com, Security Boulevard, Cloud Native Now, Techstrong AI, Techstrong IT, Digital CxO, Platform Engineering, Techstrong Semi and Techstrong TV, along with a growing portfolio of events, educational programs and digital communities. With more than 25 years of experience in cybersecurity, Shimel is a familiar voice in the space and was an early advocate of the DevOps movement, helping bring DevOps practices into mainstream enterprise technology. His work today spans cybersecurity, DevOps, cloud-native technologies, artificial intelligence, semiconductors and digital transformation, and he hosts popular programs including Techstrong Gang, Shimmy Says and Still Cyber, After All These Years. He holds a Bachelor of Arts in Government and Politics from St. John's University and a Juris Doctor from New York Law School.