Your team is talented and busy, but does your product roadmap feel like it is stuck in mud? Deploying even simple features is terrifying and often causes new problems. Your engineers feel trapped, spending all their time fixing old code instead of building something new. The whole organization feels like it is running hard, but you’re still stuck in place.
This is what a broken development process looks like. Does it look like yours? An inefficient process is a constant source of friction, frustration, and wasted effort. What you need is a new, modern, and efficient process. It’s a force multiplier that makes your entire team faster, happier, and more innovative. It turns your development team from a cost center into the engine of your company’s growth.
The Problem: Identifying the Symptoms of “Shipping Chaos”
Before you can fix any problem, you have to admit that there is one. Many companies get so used to their own internal chaos that they start to think it’s normal. It is not. If you recognize any of the following symptoms, your development process is broken.
Symptom #1: Deployments Are Fear-Driven Events
If releasing new code requires a manual, multi-page checklist, takes hours to complete, and frequently has to be “rolled back,” your process is failing. The latest DORA (DevOps Research and Assessment) report finds that elite teams deploy multiple times per day, while low-performing teams may take months.
Symptom #2: The “It Works on My Machine” Syndrome
Your developers are navigating with the wrong map. They are constantly struggling because their local development environments do not match the actual production environment. This difference is why bugs keep showing up only after deployment.
Symptom #3: A Bloated, Endless “Testing” Phase
Features get stuck in a long cycle at the end because bugs are being found way too late. This creates a massive bottleneck. It also turns your developers and QA into enemies who are constantly blaming each other for bugs and flaws in your process.
Symptom #4: Lack of Visibility
As a leader, you have no real idea what is being worked on, why it’s important, or when it will be done. Planning is based on guesswork and wishful thinking.
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The Solution: The Three Pillars of a Modern Process
Fixing this chaos isn’t about finding a single magic tool. It’s about implementing a system built on three core pillars. This is the blueprint for a Michelin-star kitchen.
Pillar 1: A Simple, Agile Framework (The Recipe Book)
The first step is to bring order to the chaos of planning. An agile framework like Scrum or Kanban provides the “recipes” for your team. It’s not about rigid rules; it’s about creating a simple, predictable rhythm for planning, executing, and reviewing work.
- The Problem It Solves: It eliminates the “what should I work on next?” problem. It forces you to prioritize work based on real business value.
- How to Start: Implement short, two-week “sprints.” Hold a brief daily stand-up meeting. Use a simple digital Kanban board (like Jira or Trello) to visualize all work in progress. This brings clarity and focus.
Pillar 2: A CI/CD Pipeline (The Automated Assembly Line)
This is the technical backbone of a modern process.A Continuous Integration/Continuous Deployment (CI/CD) pipeline automates the entire workflow of testing and releasing code. A developer commits new code. Automated tests run. If the tests pass, the code is deployed. It is that simple and that fast.
- The Problem It Solves: The goal is to make deployments fast, safe, and completely uneventful. Strong automation achieves this. It catches bugs early, when they cost almost nothing to fix, instead of letting them slip into production. The 2024 DORA report confirms this. Elite teams can restore service in less than an hour after an incident. Low performers? They take weeks. That difference is automation.
- The Key Tool: A DevOps Engineer. This specialized role is the architect of your automation pipeline. They are the ones who build and maintain the “factory” that allows your other developers to ship code with confidence.
Pillar 3: A Culture of Ownership and Automation (The Professional Mindset)
The best tools and processes in the world will fail if your team doesn’t adopt the right mindset. A modern development culture is one of ownership. Developers are not just responsible for writing code; they are responsible for ensuring their code works in production. This culture is also obsessed with automation. Any task that is done manually and repeatedly should be automated.
- The Problem It Solves: It eliminates the “not my problem” mentality. It frees up your most expensive resource—your developers’ time—to be spent on high-value creative work, not on repetitive manual tasks.
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How Truss Helps You Build the Process and the Team
Building this kind of modern process can be daunting, especially if you don’t have the in-house expertise. This is where Truss provides a unique advantage. As our case study with Infinity Machine & Engineering shows, we don’t just provide you with talented developers; we provide you with the expertise to build a modern process from the ground up.
When we engaged with Infinity Machine, they faced challenges getting a new product off the ground. We didn’t just start writing code. Our first contribution was implementing a new Jira instance to streamline project management and providing comprehensive training on agile methodologies. We created a fully functional development department from the ground up, establishing the blueprint for their success before scaling the team.
Truss can provide you with the expert Project Managers who can implement your agile framework. We can connect you with the world-class DevOps Engineers from Central Asia who can build your automation pipelines. We give you both the team and the blueprint to succeed.
Stop fighting fires and start building a factory. Contact Truss to learn how we can help you build an efficient, modern development process.
