Gene Kim, George Spafford, and Kevin Behr's DevOps novel that teaches operations, bottlenecks, and flow. Learn the principles of continuous delivery through a story about saving a failing IT project.

The Phoenix Project is the book I hand to executives who don't understand why deployments are always breaking. It's a novel—a story about an IT manager trying to save a failing project—but it teaches the principles of DevOps, continuous delivery, and the theory of constraints through narrative. The characters are recognizable: the overworked sysadmin, the developer who ships code without testing, the manager who doesn't understand why things take so long. The book shows how small changes—automating deployments, reducing batch sizes, making work visible—compound into dramatic improvements. I've recommended it to three different teams, and all of them said it helped them understand DevOps in a way that technical books never managed. The story format makes the concepts stick, and the ending—where the team actually succeeds—feels achievable. My only critique is that some of the technical details feel simplified, but that's intentional: this isn't a how-to guide, it's a why-it-matters story. If you're trying to get buy-in for DevOps practices, this book is your secret weapon.

Gene Kim's DevOps novel teaching operations, bottlenecks, and flow. Learn continuous delivery principles through a story about saving a failing IT project.

The Phoenix Project: DevOps Novel About IT Operations

The Phoenix Project: A Novel About IT, DevOps, and Helping Your Business Win

Gene Kim's developer-centered companion story to The Phoenix Project about cognitive load and platform engineering. Learn how developers can fight back against technical debt and bureaucracy.

The Unicorn Project is The Phoenix Project from the developer's perspective, and it's the book I wish I'd read when I was drowning in technical debt. Kim tells the story of a developer trying to ship features while fighting against bureaucracy, legacy systems, and cognitive load. The book's focus on developer experience and platform engineering resonated deeply—I've been the developer who can't get a local environment set up, who has to wait days for infrastructure changes, who can't test code because the test suite is broken. The chapter on the five ideals—locality and simplicity, focus and flow, improvement of daily work, psychological safety, and customer focus—gave me a framework for advocating for better tooling and processes. The story shows how small wins—fixing the test suite, automating deployments, reducing cognitive load—build momentum. My only critique is that some of the solutions feel too easy compared to real-world constraints, but the principles are sound. I've recommended it to developers who feel stuck in bureaucratic organizations, and it's helped them see that change is possible, even if it's slow.

Gene Kim's developer-centered story about cognitive load and platform engineering. Learn how developers can fight back against technical debt and bureaucracy.

The Unicorn Project: Developer Story About Technical Debt

The Unicorn Project: A Novel About Digital Disruption, Redshirts, and Rebelling Against the Ancient Powerful Order

Research-backed field guide that ties lean software delivery habits to measurable business outcomes, unpacking the DORA metrics, cultural foundations, and continuous delivery capabilities that separated top performers in the Accelerate State of DevOps reports.

I revisited Accelerate with my platform leadership team last summer, and the data still punches above its weight. The authors translate years of DevOps research into a playbook you can actually socialize with executives: define the four DORA metrics, invest in trunk-based development, shrink batch sizes, and relentlessly remove deployment toil. The chapters on culture and psychological safety were the missing piece when we launched our own delivery initiative—no tooling overhaul would have landed without that buy-in. Every time I run a value stream workshop now, this book is sitting on the table.

Research-backed playbook translating DevOps research into executive language. Learn DORA metrics, trunk-based development, and cultural foundations.

Accelerate: Science of Lean Software & DevOps Building

Accelerate: The Science of Lean Software and DevOps: Building and Scaling High Performing Technology Organizations

Essential devops book every developer should read. These books have shaped our engineering practices and careers. Find 3 products with detailed reviews, pros, c

DevOps Book Products

The Phoenix Project: A Novel About IT, DevOps, and Helping Your Business Win

The Unicorn Project: A Novel About Digital Disruption, Redshirts, and Rebelling Against the Ancient Powerful Order

Accelerate: The Science of Lean Software and DevOps: Building and Scaling High Performing Technology Organizations