I recently had the chance to speak at the Engineering Leadership Speaker Series on the software metrics that engineering leaders can use to drive improvement in their organizations. (Thanks to the folks from Skipcard for including me).
As a VP of Engineering at Cloudlock, I scaled my engineering team to 75+ upon acquisition. As my team grew, I struggled to maintain visibility into what was happening day-to-day and how to help my team improve.
Since then, I have dedicated myself to understand what metrics engineering leaders can use to help their teams improve delivery, optimize their investment profile, drive enhanced quality, and more.
Delivery Pipeline Metrics
The delivery pipeline tracks phases from “work requested” to production release. Enhanced performance here improves predictability, time to value, work efficiency, and customer satisfaction.
Key delivery pipeline metrics include: Lead Time, Cycle Time, Time to Merge, Time to Release, and Release Frequency.
Investment Profile Metrics
Investment profile answers the question of where your team spends their time. Having a balanced investment profile ensures your team delivers new value in addition to completing non-functional work that enhances uptime and reliability.
Key investment profile metrics include: Story to Bug Ratio, Story to Non-functional Ratio, and Customer Commitment Percentage.
Quality Metrics
Quality has many definitions, but the one I like relates closest to efficiency. Ensuring that quality code is delivered proactively reduces rework and keeps the team operating efficiently.
Key quality metrics include: Code Rework, Bugs Found in Production, and Mean Time to Restore (MTTR).
Download the slides to learn more about these metrics and how to apply them to improve your organization.
