This. I think that today the barrier to entry is low enough that, especially in small companies, developers with little knowledge of the space can get a basic CI system or production deployment going. And, the company is more than happy to let them instead of hiring somebody specializing in the area. This seems to really blow up if it goes unaddressed as the team/product grows.
I've watched at least one company burn time on the same issues for years because instead of acknowledging the need for and empowering people with distinct skillsets or knowledge, they're content to let developers bumble through the process of learning and reinventing the wheel over and over in the margins. That's if they can even get the developers on growing and siloed teams to communicate with one another at all. There needs to be experienced leadership somewhere.
Developers should have more responsibility over their apps and what they're putting in to production. But, it's unfair an inefficient to expect all but a few will ever even have time to become skilled practitioners in these areas. Especially while already keeping up with their normal duties. Now not just tech debit, but foundational infrastructure can be pushed aside by the drive for new/more features.
For the foreseeable future it seems like the trend of tasking devs with so much of this work will result in engineering teams continuously, wastefully toiling over fractured infrastructure built by novices. (Maybe someday the tools will actually allow for developers to take this one with limited knowledge/resources, though.)
I've watched at least one company burn time on the same issues for years because instead of acknowledging the need for and empowering people with distinct skillsets or knowledge, they're content to let developers bumble through the process of learning and reinventing the wheel over and over in the margins. That's if they can even get the developers on growing and siloed teams to communicate with one another at all. There needs to be experienced leadership somewhere.
Developers should have more responsibility over their apps and what they're putting in to production. But, it's unfair an inefficient to expect all but a few will ever even have time to become skilled practitioners in these areas. Especially while already keeping up with their normal duties. Now not just tech debit, but foundational infrastructure can be pushed aside by the drive for new/more features.
For the foreseeable future it seems like the trend of tasking devs with so much of this work will result in engineering teams continuously, wastefully toiling over fractured infrastructure built by novices. (Maybe someday the tools will actually allow for developers to take this one with limited knowledge/resources, though.)