1st Week in DevOps

TLDR: The first week wasn't much work but I learned a few things: take notes, take all the meetings, and read everything.

I'm not new to starting new jobs, but I am new to not being a developer at work. Outside of my first job after college I have always walked into a job knowing I have to write code people will publicly use. Being in devops I might write code but after enough conversations I'm really just here to support my team.

So you work support?

Yes but also no. I'm basically the infrastructure person for my team. My team says "We need x so we can achieve y" and I make the magic happen. That's scary yet exciting, but also exactly what I signed up for. Sure I would have loved to had the chance to support a mobile team, but life happens and we take the cooler risk of life.

Anyway so what have I learned in a week? What could spark me to write a post after only one week? Well let me tell you!

Take Notes

This might seem like a no brainer but I'll explain. I work in the space industry again. If you have been here long enough then you know I'm a computer engineer. I don't know enough to talk about space and what is and isn't there because I chose the mobile app and security life.

Enough about me though, I have a team member who thinks in diagrams. It's really cool! He has a detailed diagram for everything he has learned about the company and systems we use. Now...this is not my thing, I'm more of take a bunch of notes until I see a pattern type of person. What I have learned from him is that I can do both. I can have my normal way of taking random notes with key topics, but then I can make a diagram and ask for clarification to make sure I'm understanding the system as a whole (is this what system engineers do? I might consider being one if so).

In devops there should be alot of diagrams. Not just for how you setup the infra but also as you trickle down to the team. Connect the two, and build collaboration with your teammates.

Take all the meetings

Yea I'm anti all these video meetings, but adjust to the remote life. When you are in these team meetings there are two things to note:

  1. Makes sure that you notice if people like video or are ok with voice only
  2. Be prepared for awkward intros. You might get called out if they will do round robin. Just be ready.

Read all the things

I'm not going to lie, all I do is read and I'm tired. That being said reading will make or break you. I spent a lot of this week reading and taking classes on linkedin. I suggest you learn more about the tools used in your organization. I have notes on some of our other tools but I can't say I'm a cloud native master. During your first few weeks things are slow so take advantage, read all the docs you can get your hands on, and refer to the other 2 suggestions.


Doing all these things can almost guarantee that you will excel at your job (assumption). Also doing these things will help you onboard future team members, improve onboarding processes, and give you things to talk about with your manager on your first 1:1.

PS. If you read this far the last paragraph is an assumption based on how I'm planning on navigating. lol