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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 1 Rockstars Janitors Builders @alicegoldfuss Work distribution in engineering orgs

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 2 • Built new features / tools / systems • Scaled existing ones • Cleaned up existing ones In the past 3 months, have you mainly:

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. I’m Alice 3 SRE @

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 4

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 5 • Define the roles • Examine the current environment • Discuss a better way

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 6 Rockstar

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 7 Rockstar Strengths ▪Curious and open-minded ▪Can iterate fast ▪Always looking to the next thing

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 8 Rockstar Weaknesses ▪Get bored easily ▪No patience for maintenance ▪Not used to thinking about end user experience

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. Builder 9

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 10 Builder Strengths ▪Understand scale ▪Value reliability ▪Good at catching “what ifs” that others miss

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 11 Builder Weaknesses ▪Can move slow while trying to build out ▪Have hard time letting things go ▪Can be resident doom-sayers

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. Janitor 12

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 13 Janitor Strengths ▪Understands the weaknesses in your systems ▪Really good at bandaids ▪Able to do a lot with a little

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 14 Janitor Weaknesses ▪Can often resort to cleaning manually instead of automating ▪Often gets stuck down in the weeds ▪Resistant to change

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 15 Rockstars Janitors Builders

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 16 Rockstars Janitors Builders

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 17 Organic == Good?

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 18 GMO

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 19 GMO Greater Mobility, Okay?

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 20 • They get stuck

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 21 • They get stuck • They get tunnel vision

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 22 Current State of Tech

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 23

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 24 117 responses

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 25 47.9% Currently Rockstars

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 26 55.2% Want to be Rockstars

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 27 19.7% Currently Builders

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 28 35.3% Want to be Builders

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 29 32.5% Currently Janitors

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 30 9.5% Want to be Janitors

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 31 47.9% 19.7% 32.5% Current State Rockstars Builders Janitors

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 32 55.2% 35.3% 9.5% Preferred State Rockstars Builders Janitors

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 33 70.9% 70.9% of Rockstars are Devs

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 34 58.3% 58.3% of Janitors are Ops

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 35 54.4% 54.4% of Builders are Devs

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 36 55.0% 55% who want to be Builders are Ops

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 37 70.9% 58.3% 54.4% Dev Ops Dev Rockstars Builders Janitors

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 38 26.3% 26.3% think work distribution on team is unfair

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 39 49.1% 49.1% think work distribution in company is unfair

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 40 people unhappy / not doing the work they want

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 41 can try to make something like reliability a first class citizen, but people confuse that with not changing anything, so it’s a tough sell Focus on Reliability

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 42 can try rotating responsibilities across teams, but some teams will be better at some tasks than others, and this will evolve back into an imbalance Rotate Teams

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 43 what to do? What to do?

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 44 Ursula Le Guin

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 45 The Left Hand of Darkness

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 46 “No physiological habit is established, and the mother of several children may be the father of several more.”

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 47 “Burden and privilege are shared out pretty equally; everybody has the same risk to run or choice to make. ”

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 48 Have everyone do everything

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 49 what??

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 50

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 51 That’s not what this is

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 52

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 53 Remove the Blinders

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. Build better 54

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. Foster new skills 55

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 56 Rotate

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 57

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 58 4 engineers

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 59 1 week janitor 1 week builder 2 weeks rockstar

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 60 50.0% 25.0% 25.0% Proposed State Rockstar Builder Janitor

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 61 55.2% 35.3% 9.5% Preferred State Rockstars Builders Janitors

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 62 Technical debt

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 63 Velocity!

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 64

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 65 Productivity = Size(TechDebt) Size(System) 1 - Griffith, C. Izurieta, H. Taffahi, and D. Claudio, “A simulation study of practical methods for technical debt management in agile software development,” in Proceedings of the 2014 winter simulation conference, Piscataway, NJ, USA, 2014, pp. 1014-1025. http://www.gregerwikstrand.com/technical-debt-reduction/

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 66 case study

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. Decommissioned 1,139 applications in 2013 alone Reduced systems 7,000 to 4,200 in three years 67 “The Digital Transformation Symphony: When IT and Business Play in Sync” http://www.slideshare.net/ capgemini/the-digital-cio

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 68 Reduced debt by €14 billion “The Digital Transformation Symphony: When IT and Business Play in Sync” http://www.slideshare.net/ capgemini/the-digital-cio

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 69 Where to start?

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 70 Ops team

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 71 firefighting

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 72 pile of sustaining work

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 73 pile of sustaining work Don’t punish your ops team for your dev team’s SHIT TY CODE

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 74 • What are you worried about?

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 75 • What are you worried about? • What could we do better?

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 76 • What are you worried about? • What could we do better? • What do you want to add?

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 77 devs overburdened

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 78 devs overburdened GOOD

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 79

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 80

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 81 Rockstar tasks ▪New feature / tool / system ▪Research new projects ▪Demo mockups

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 82 Builder tasks ▪Improve testing ▪Improve service resiliency ▪Understand greater impact

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 83 Janitor tasks ▪Bug fixes ▪Refactoring ▪Config cleanup

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 84 • What are you worried about?

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 85 • What are you worried about? • What could we do better?

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 86 • What are you worried about? • What could we do better? • What do you want to add?

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 87 47.9% 19.7% 32.5% Current State Rockstars Builders Janitors

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 88 • Define the roles

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 89

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 90 • Define the roles • Examine the current environment

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 91 47.9% 19.7% 32.5% Current State Rockstars Builders Janitors

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 92 55.2% 35.3% 9.5% Preferred State Rockstars Builders Janitors

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 93 • Define the roles • Examine the current environment • Discuss a better way

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 94

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 95 50.0% 25.0% 25.0% Future State Rockstar Builder Janitor

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. Thanks! 96 @alicegoldfuss

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 97 This document and the information herein (including any information that may be incorporated by reference) is provided for informational purposes only and should not be construed as an offer, commitment, promise or obligation on behalf of New Relic, Inc. (“New Relic”) to sell securities or deliver any product, material, code, functionality, or other feature. Any information provided hereby is proprietary to New Relic and may not be replicated or disclosed without New Relic’s express written permission. Such information may contain forward-looking statements within the meaning of federal securities laws. Any statement that is not a historical fact or refers to expectations, projections, future plans, objectives, estimates, goals, or other characterizations of future events is a forward-looking statement. These forward-looking statements can often be identified as such because the context of the statement will include words such as “believes,” “anticipates,” “expects” or words of similar import. Actual results may differ materially from those expressed in these forward-looking statements, which speak only as of the date hereof, and are subject to change at any time without notice. Existing and prospective investors, customers and other third parties transacting business with New Relic are cautioned not to place undue reliance on this forward-looking information. The achievement or success of the matters covered by such forward-looking statements are based on New Relic’s current assumptions, expectations, and beliefs and are subject to substantial risks, uncertainties, assumptions, and changes in circumstances that may cause the actual results, performance, or achievements to differ materially from those expressed or implied in any forward-looking statement. Further information on factors that could affect such forward-looking statements is included in the filings we make with the SEC from time to time. Copies of these documents may be obtained by visiting New Relic’s Investor Relations website at ir.newrelic.com or the SEC’s website at www.sec.gov. New Relic assumes no obligation and does not intend to update these forward-looking statements, except as required by law. New Relic makes no warranties, expressed or implied, in this document or otherwise, with respect to the information provided.

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 98 1 https://www.flickr.com/photos/lydur/22006675124/ 1 https://www.flickr.com/photos/qilin/491356901 16 https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:St_Anger_Album_Artwork.png 22 https://www.flickr.com/photos/tamakisono/14903068219 40 https://www.flickr.com/photos/46799485@N00/4470761409 43 https://www.flickr.com/photos/christinagallivan/8660375888/ 44 Photo by Jack Liu, 2014 45 https://queerscifi.com/for-readers-the-new-pronouns/ 49 https://www.flickr.com/photos/greencolander/3203922211 50 https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/ee/ Woodwards_building_Vancouver_demolition_2.jpg Image credits

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Confidential ©2008-15 New Relic, Inc. All rights reserved. 99 53 https://www.flickr.com/photos/3059349393/8000156483/ 54 https://www.flickr.com/photos/dalbera/4923032712/ 56 https://www.flickr.com/photos/moonlightbulb/8025527585/ 57 https://www.flickr.com/photos/dafnecholet/5374200948 62 https://www.flickr.com/photos/alebonvini/4757651199 63 https://www.flickr.com/photos/dave_see/15132684184 64 https://www.flickr.com/photos/diversey/1623358150/ 70 https://www.flickr.com/photos/expertinfantry/ 71 https://www.flickr.com/photos/adambelles/5044281763/ 72 https://www.flickr.com/photos/cogdog/9090732482/ 77 https://www.flickr.com/photos/twalmsley/5545712341 79 https://www.flickr.com/photos/athomeinscottsdale/3279949186/ 80 https://www.flickr.com/photos/modofodo/14964870008/