PHOENIX PROJECT 4ED Format: Paperback

The novel that brought DevOps into the mainstream, with more than 875,000 copies sold.

You know how it goes. The project is late. The last release broke something. The one engineer who can fix it is busy fixing three other things, and the business blames IT for all of it. The Phoenix Project is the story of that feeling, and of the way out.

On his way into work, Bill Palmer receives a call from HR with what is supposed to be good news. Bill’s boss and his boss's boss are out, and Bill is the new VP of IT Operations at Parts Unlimited, a $4 billion auto parts company. That same morning, the payroll run fails. Then there is Phoenix, the project the company has bet its future on, which is years late and $20 million in. When it finally launches, it takes down the checkout systems in the stores. The CEO gives IT ninety days to turn things around, or it will all be outsourced.

Help comes from Erik, a cryptic prospective board member who insists that IT has more in common with a factory floor than Bill wants to believe. The Three Ways he teaches, the principles behind DevOps, finally explain what Bill has been living with. Why work never seems to finish. Why the same fires keep breaking out. Why everything is waiting on one engineer named Brent.

Like The Goal, Eliyahu Goldratt's classic novel about saving a failing factory, The Phoenix Project teaches through story. You learn the principles the way Bill does, one crisis at a time, and you may find Parts Unlimited uncomfortably familiar.

If you work in IT, or your business depends on it, read this book. Then pass it to the person down the hall.

Gene Kim is an award-winning CTO, researcher, and bestselling author. He is the founder of Tripwire and served as CTO for thirteen years. His books include The Phoenix Project, The DevOps Handbook, Accelerate, The Unicorn Project, Wiring the Winning Organization.

Kevin Behr is the founder of the Information Technology Process Institute (ITPI) and the general manager and chief science officer of Praxis Flow LLC. Kevin has 25 years of IT management experience and is a mentor and advisor to CEOs and CIOs. He is the co-author of The Phoenix Projectand The Visible Ops Handbook.

George Spafford is a research director for Gartner, covering DevOps, technical change, and release management, in addition to the use of bimodal IT and the pace-layered application strategy. His publications include hundreds of articles and numerous books on IT service improvement, as well as co-authorship of The Phoenix Project,The Visible Ops Handbook, and Visible Ops Security.