Platform Engineering: Evolution, Trends, and Future Impact on Software Delivery

Platform Engineering is frequently hailed as the latest paradigm shift enabling developers to ship code faster - but is it simply a return to the pre-DevOps era of siloed teams focusing on narrow parts of the software lifecycle?

Over the last decade we've seen DevOps explode in popularity, only to be declared "dead". We've seen Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS) emerge as a game-changer, to then be surpassed in popularity by Kubernetes and developers building their own internal platforms from scratch.

In this presentation, Paula will share her unique insights and experience from working in this domain for more than 12 years, with a focus on:

how platform engineering has evolved over the last decade and the impact this has had on the practice of writing code
the latest trends around inner sourcing and enabling developer teams to directly contribute components and capabilities into the internal platform
practical takeaways on evaluating internal platform maturity and leveraging internal platforms to deliver code that is faster, safer and easier to maintain

Transcript

1. Platform Engineering: Evolution, Trends, and Future Impact on Software Delivery paulalkennedy @paulalkennedy.bsky.social paula@syntasso.io Paula Kennedy (She / Her)
2. @paulalkennedy How I hope you feel at the end of this talk:
3. @paulalkennedy
4. @paulalkennedy How you might feel right now:
5. @paulalkennedy Prizes for questions!
6. @paulalkennedy PAST PRESENT FUTURE
7. @paulalkennedy Key takeaways / outcomes • Increase organisational performance through platform engineering, platform maturity and focus on “elite improvement” • Enhance Developer Productivity by growing “Platform as a Product” practice • Maximise ROI in Platform Engineering: avoid the “trough of disillusionment”
8. @paulalkennedy Paula Kennedy (She / Her) • Co-founder & COO, Syntasso (makers of kratix.io) • Previously VMware, Pivotal, CloudCredo • CNCF Ambassador, Team Topologies Advocate, OpenUK Ambassador • Organiser: DevOpsDays London, Kubernetes Community Days UK, FastFlowConf • Organiser: London Platform User Group (LoPUG) Who am I?
9. @paulalkennedy Why am I talking about Platform Engineering?
10. @paulalkennedy Why am I talking about Platform Engineering?
11. @paulalkennedy Why am I talking about Platform Engineering?
12. @paulalkennedy PAST
13. @paulalkennedy What is a Platform?
14. @paulalkennedy What is a Platform? “A raised platform elevates you. Building on top of a platform means you don’t need to start from scratch but can build on top of what others have created.” Gregor Hohpe, 2024 Source: https://architectelevator.com/book/platformstrategy/
15. @paulalkennedy “LOOK & FEEL” ENGINEERING “PLATFORM” “HAT ” Source: https://architectelevator.com/book/platformstrategy/ What is a Platform?
16. @paulalkennedy Platform Engineering evolution (my view) 2002 DEVELOPERs DBAs OPERATORs
17. @paulalkennedy 2002 DEVELOPERs OPERATORs Platform Engineering evolution (my view)
18. @paulalkennedy Patrick Debois Andrew Clay Shafer 2008 Platform Engineering evolution (my view)
19. @paulalkennedy DevOps is… • From practitioners, by practitioners • Not a product, specification, job title • An experience-based movement • Decentralised and open to all Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o7-IuYS0iSE Platform Engineering evolution (my view)
20. @paulalkennedy Platform Engineering evolution (my view)
21. @paulalkennedy “Other than it being a cross-functional combination (and a portmanteau) of the terms and concepts for "development" and "operations", academics and practitioners have not developed a universal definition for the term "DevOps"” Wikipedia Platform Engineering evolution (my view)
22. @paulalkennedy 2011 Platform Engineering evolution (my view)
23. @paulalkennedy Platform Engineering evolution (my view)
24. @paulalkennedy Platform Engineering evolution (my view) Source: https://jshingler.github.io/blog/2023/04/01/valueline/
25. @paulalkennedy 2014 Platform Engineering evolution (my view)
26. @paulalkennedy Platform Engineering evolution (my view)
27. @paulalkennedy • “Standing on the shoulder of giants” increases productivity = platforms are useful • From DevOps to PaaS to K8s = are these paradigm shifts helping or are we spinning our wheels? • The desire to “build it yourself” is inherent in engineers PAST Lessons
28. @paulalkennedy PRESENT
29. @paulalkennedy Platform Engineering popularity
30. @paulalkennedy Platform Engineering popularity “By 2026, 80% of large software engineering organizations will establish platform engineering teams as internal providers of reusable services, components and tools for application delivery” Gartner
31. @paulalkennedy Platform Engineering popularity
32. @paulalkennedy What is a Platform? “A digital platform is a foundation of self-service APIs, tools, services, knowledge and support which are arranged as a compelling internal product. Autonomous delivery teams can make use of the platform to deliver product features at a higher pace, with reduced coordination.” Evan Bottcher, 2018 Source: https://martinfowler.com/articles/talk-about-platforms.html
33. @paulalkennedy What is a Platform? “A digital platform is a foundation of self-service APIs, tools, services, knowledge and support which are arranged as a compelling internal product. Autonomous delivery teams can make use of the platform to deliver product features at a higher pace, with reduced coordination.” Evan Bottcher, 2018 Source: https://martinfowler.com/articles/talk-about-platforms.html
34. @paulalkennedy “A digital platform is a foundation of self-service APIs, tools, services, knowledge and support which are arranged as a compelling internal product. Autonomous delivery teams can make use of the platform to deliver product features at a higher pace, with reduced coordination.” Evan Bottcher, 2018 Source: https://martinfowler.com/articles/talk-about-platforms.html What is a Platform?
35. @paulalkennedy “A digital platform is a foundation of self-service APIs, tools, services, knowledge and support which are arranged as a compelling internal product. Autonomous delivery teams can make use of the platform to deliver product features at a higher pace, with reduced coordination.” Evan Bottcher, 2018 Source: https://martinfowler.com/articles/talk-about-platforms.html What is a Platform?
36. @paulalkennedy What is Platform Engineering? Source: https://youtu.be/_E2Mkebe9Jg?si=PdGatHyeTe-8WOiY
37. @paulalkennedy Self-service Experience • Developer Portals e.g. Backstage, OpsLevel, Port… • Improved developer experience • Reduced friction / increase flow of value
38. @paulalkennedy Explicit and Consistent APIs • APIs expose your platform functionality • Explicit APIs = documented APIs • APIs are the interaction at the boundaries of software Source: https://blog.developer.adobe.com/three-principles-of-api-first-design-fa6666d9f694
39. @paulalkennedy Paved / Golden Paths “engineers…created a tutorial on the recommended way of using our services; it was named “The Golden Path”. This is the way we support an easy and streamlined way of working…you can of course leave the Golden Path…but then you will not have the same support.” Source: https://engineering.atspotify.com/2020/08/how-we-use-golden-paths-to-solve-fragmentation-in-our-software-ecosystem/
40. @paulalkennedy Modularity Source: https://architectelevator.com/book/platformstrategy/
41. @paulalkennedy Core Requirements • Security • Compliance • Internal billing process • … Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l49bsDqflT4
42. @paulalkennedy “engineers…created a tutorial on the recommended way of using our services; it was named “The Golden Path”. This is the way we support an easy and streamlined way of working…you can of course leave the Golden Path…but then you will not have the same support.” Platform As A Product Platform as a Product is what happens when you apply a product mindset to your internal platform! Paula Kennedy
43. @paulalkennedy Platform Democratisation Platform as a Product is what happens when you apply a product mindset to your internal platform! Paula Kennedy
44. @paulalkennedy What do we see in Organisations?
45. @paulalkennedy • Platform engineering is becoming increasingly popular • Key patterns are emerging as “best / recommended practices” • Platform engineering is at the Peak of Inflated Expectations PRESENT Trends
46. @paulalkennedy FUTURE
47. @paulalkennedy FUTURE AI
48. @paulalkennedy How will Platform Engineering evolve?
49. @paulalkennedy What does the data tell us? Source: https://cloud.google.com/resources/devops/state-of-devops?hl=en • 89% of respondents are using an internal developer platform • Organisational performance has increased by 6% • Teams are 10% more productive • Individuals are 8% more productive Platform engineering can boost productivity Platform engineering has a positive impact on productivity and organizational performance, but there are some cautionary signals for software delivery performance.
50. @paulalkennedy What does the data tell us? Source: https://cloud.google.com/resources/devops/state-of-devops?hl=en • 8% decrease of software delivery throughput = decrease in change lead time, deployment frequency & failed deployment recovery rate • 14% decrease in software delivery stability = increase in change failure rate and rework rate Platform engineering can boost productivity Platform engineering has a positive impact on productivity and organizational performance, but there are some cautionary signals for software delivery performance.
51. @paulalkennedy Hypotheses • Stability is pre-existing issue the internal platform does not fix • Platform was introduced to achieve a specific goal e.g. compliance, reducing tech sprawl etc and is not focused on software reliability • Platform does not provide clear feedback to developers • Platform does not offer testing tooling or guardrails for sufficient testing • … Source: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLj6h78yzYM2N7Q2FfxjHu5Z8coFv_1ADz
52. @paulalkennedy More Hypotheses (from me) • “Automation complacency” = insufficient attention to and monitoring of automation output • “Platform complacency” = teams and individuals expect that the platform will “just work” • …
53. @paulalkennedy How will Platform Engineering evolve?
54. @paulalkennedy Platform As A Product • Build empathy across the “platform divide” • User-centeredness is key for high performing organisations • Listen to feedback and continuously improve the platform
55. @paulalkennedy How can we get there? Source: https://tag-app-delivery.cncf.io/whitepapers/platform-eng-maturity-model/
56. @paulalkennedy “The true mark of a platform leader is the ability to turn friction into opportunity, forging ahead to create systems that are greater than the sum of their parts. Lead with resilience, empathy and vision, and you’ll transform skeptics into believers.” Camille Fournier and Ian Nowland, 2024 Source: https://www.oreilly.com/library/view/platform-engineering/9781098153632/ How can we get there?
57. @paulalkennedy How I hope you feel at the end of this talk:
58. Thank you! paulalkennedy @paulalkennedy.bsky.social paula@syntasso.io Paula Kennedy (She / Her) Questions? https://speakerdeck.com/syntasso
59. @paulalkennedy References https://architectelevator.com/book/platformstrategy/ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o7-IuYS0iSE (Damon Edwards, History of DevOps) https://jshingler.github.io/blog/2023/04/01/valueline/ https://www.gartner.com/en/infrastructure-and-it-operations-leaders/topics/platform-engineering https://martinfowler.com/articles/talk-about-platforms.html https://youtu.be/_E2Mkebe9Jg?si=PdGatHyeTe-8WOiY (Kasper Borg Nissen, KubeCon Keynote) https://blog.developer.adobe.com/three-principles-of-api-first-design-fa6666d9f694 https://engineering.atspotify.com/2020/08/how-we-use-golden-paths-to-solve-fragmentation-in- our-software-ecosystem/ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l49bsDqflT4 (Platform Engineering in Financial Institutions panel) https://cloud.google.com/resources/devops/state-of-devops?hl=en https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLj6h78yzYM2N7Q2FfxjHu5Z8coFv_1ADz (Platform Engineering Day at KubeCon SLC playlist) https://tag-app-delivery.cncf.io/whitepapers/platform-eng-maturity-model/ https://www.oreilly.com/library/view/platform-engineering/9781098153632/