DevSecOps - a trend around transformation in process, people and technology - is about breaking down silos and waste along the software development lifecycle and using agile methodologies, automation and insights to help get apps to market faster. This leads to higher quality apps, greater trust in organizations, less organizational friction, and ultimately a five-star customer experience.

These apps are the new competitive currency in this digital economy and they're powered by data. Without data or data-based interactions, these apps would be of little value to the user and would be just static one-dimensional bulletin boards. Imagine a banking app, for example, that does not give you data about your account or let you take some action. How much value is this bringing to the user?

IT's dirty little secret
Most companies, with the exception of recently born-in-the-cloud "unicorns," know that critical data resides in many different systems-of-record that have persevered through infrastructure refresh cycles or have been added via mergers and acquisitions. A dirty IT secret is that systems-of-record rarely go away as new ones are added, so coexistence is the unspoken reality. The apps you are speeding to market are - or should be - capable of interacting with many legacy code bases.

This legacy code base reality has implications for your organization, processes and tools as you apply DevOps principles. Here are three imperatives for every IT leader managing multiple code bases to build the right foundation for their Modern Software Factory.

1. Break down your infrastructure-based operational silos. Every organization has specialized individuals who have specific knowledge of certain code bases and infrastructure types. Do your best to break down those reporting silos and infrastructure-based management fiefdoms. For example, have your Windows, Linux, Unix, AS-400, mainframe and even cloud system admins report to the same managers. Don't isolate your "legacy" Dev or Ops teams on an island as the data that resides on those "legacy" platforms is vital to your current and future apps. This practice will speed decision-making and reduce organizational friction, while also helping to overcome retention and talent shortage issues.
2. Make your DevOps processes and tools inclusive of all your code bases and infrastructure types. Having a separate set of AppDev or DevSecOps tools and processes for each type of infrastructure or code base is antithetical to the business outcomes you want to achieve. This also reinforces silos - in this case, hardware and operating system silos - rather than breaking them down. You can't afford different ALM, release automation, service virtualization, test data management, app security testing, privileged access management, automation, APM or infrastructure management toolchains. Not only is software license duplication expensive but so are the supporting costs to host, maintain, learn, manage and upgrade those tools. That is wasteful and inhibits your ability to fund innovation. Steer clear of vendors pushing point tools that reinforce islands of infrastructure and the lock-in that results. Always ask if that DevOps-enabling software works across your infrastructure.
3. Use modern app architectures like APIs and Microservices. With APIs, developers can leverage data and build integrations between disparate systems faster and with fewer errors. With this approach, your APIs need to be adequately catalogued, which is more often than not an area developers glance over, to be used by teams across code base and infrastructure types. Microservices also allow for parallel development by enabling small autonomous teams to develop, deploy and scale their respective services independently. Monolithic architectures and hard-coded data paths should be a relic of the past.

There's a lot to learn about DevSecOps as it's a dynamic and evolving practice with many nuances. Flexible app architectures, heterogeneous tool chains and inclusive organizational structures can eliminate islands, unnecessary costs and friction as you advance on your DevSecOps journey.