Over the past few years, DevOps methodology has gained utmost popularity in the tech industry. Most companies find themselves in a position where there is a need to accelerate innovation and improve the quality of the product all at the same time by not over-burdening the software engineers.
DevOps methodology involves collaboration between multiple teams, developers and operation teams within short intervals of time paired with constant feedback and room for improvement. With tons of DevOps certifications and roles in the market, many engineers seem to want to transition into this role but have no idea where to begin. In this post, you will learn how to transition from your current role to a DevOps Engineer role.
DevOps
The aim of DevOps is to use continuous integration and either continuous delivery or continuous deployment (CI/CD) pipelines to automate the app updates and deploy the code in various environments. Devops ensures rapid and quick stable code releases. This leads to increased collaboration within the software development teams. Application code is continuously developed, tested and deployed with the help of devops methodologies. DevOps is a collection, mindset and a culture that enhances team building and collaboration in siloed teams pertaining to continuous code delivery and ultimately client satisfaction.
DevOps is an approach that either follows agile or lean principles with a focus on continuous delivery and frequent software releases. DevOps enhances the software delivery process and certified DevOps engineers are in high demand in the market.
Transitioning roles
Every role requires a different skill set and DevOps Engineers are known to have both technical and soft skills. Make sure you have the required skills to be a devops engineer.
- DevOps reduces silos and makes incremental changes at a rapid pace hence requiring devops engineers to have great communication skills.
- A good devops engineer is experienced with CI/CD tools like Jenkins, AWS, source control tools like Git, cloud solutions like Azure, GCP, and other tools high in demand like Docker and Kubernetes.
- Coding and scripting skills in Python, JAVA, PHP, Shell, Node.js and many more.
- Ability to manage infrastructure for multiple environments and versions of code for multiple clients.
- Experienced in being proactive with learning new tools and technologies in the market.
- Identify key areas of improvement and ensure the stakeholders requirements are met.
Tips to transition to a DevOps Engineer Role
Technical skills
It won’t be a surprise that devops engineers have to be adept with a wide range of programming languages as well as other technologies needed to perform the day to day responsibilities. I highly recommend building industry experience with the programming languages listed above. Try creating personal projects to showcase your experience and technical skills required to transition to a devops engineer role in any organisation.
Operations background
Sometimes being a systems engineer in the past also helps with the transition to a devops engineer. To become a devops engineer, one needs to learn the operations side of building applications. Supporting the agile team to automate deployments, development and testing is a crucial responsibility and knowing how to generate scripts to maintain the infrastructure in place, install and change configurations is absolutely necessary. Ensure that you gain experience in operations background with creating scripts in Go, Bash, C/C++ etc, to support the application in order to begin your search for a devops role.
Certifications
Irrespective of whether you are trying to understand devops or taking a different career path, certifications prove to be useful in any situation. A DevOps certification will help in assuring the employer that you have achieved a certain level of expertise with CI/CD application and methodologies. The future is bright for engineers who already have a programming background and a devops certification. There are many AWS certifications and other such devops related certifications in the market that are aimed at helping people gain entry into the devops world with hands-on experience and tutorials.
Education
Read blogs, articles, books and other courses to get familiar with the tasks, technologies and tools used by a devops engineer in a typical company. Understand containers, cloud solutions, services and programming languages used by devops engineers. Go through the job descriptions on any job board and understand the requirements or good to have qualifications for an entry level devops role. If your budget supports you, then think of getting a Masters degree or any short term course based on the devops role and continuous integration and deployment.
Speak with Managers within your company
Schedule a one-on-one with your manager and communicate your wish to transition to a devops role. Keep an eye on the openings within your organisation and apply internally first before applying elsewhere. This makes the transition easier since you are aware of your colleagues and can get help in honing your technical skills without any hesitation. This will help you gain experience as a devops engineer without having to worry about certifications and courses.
Networking
Since you are new to this field, speak to people from your network and see if someone can recommend you for this role. Prepare your resume, do the work and attend the interview with confidence. Unfortunately, many companies do not hire freshers as a devops engineer, but if you have a recommendation and prior programming experience then your chances of getting hired increase.
There are many ways to transition to become a devops engineer and it depends on your will to learn new technologies and to adapt to the devops world that is constantly being updated. It can be challenging to transition to this role, but be rest assured that it will keep you engaged, and you are bound to grow with a career in DevOps.
