a16z Podcast

Innovation Through Software Development and IT

Nicole Forsgren, Jez Humble, and Sonal Chokshi

Posted March 6, 2020

One of the recurring themes we talk about a lot on the a16z Podcast is how software changes organizations, and vice versa… More broadly: it’s really about how companies of all kinds innovate with the org structures and tools that they have.

But we’ve come a long way from the question of “does IT matter” to answering the question of what org structures, processes, architectures, and roles DO matter when it comes to companies — of all sizes  — innovating through software and more.

So in this episode (a re-run of a popular episode from a couple years ago), two of the authors of the book Accelerate: The Science of  Lean Software and DevOps, by Nicole Forsgren, Jez Humble, and Jean Kim join Sonal Chokshi to share best practices and large-scale findings about high performing companies (including those who may not even think they’re tech companies). Nicole was co-founder and CEO of Dora, which was acquired by Google in December 2018; she will soon be joining GitHub as VP of Research & Strategy. Jez was CTO at DORA; is currently in Developer Relations at Google Cloud; and is the co-author of the books The DevOps HandbookLean Enterprise, and Continuous Delivery.