Survey focuses on DevSecOps evolution

Progress has published the results of its 2022 survey, “DevSecOps: Simplifying Complexity in a Changing World.” More than 600 IT, security, application development and DevOps decision makers globally shared insights into the level of DevSecOps maturity and challenges faced across their organisations. The full report and findings can be found here.

Conducted by Insight Avenue and sponsored by Progress, the survey aimed to uncover the true state of DevOps and DevSecOps adoption – from business priorities to technology adoption, lack of cultural alignment and investment, and the common pitfalls and successes shared by businesses worldwide. 

Significant findings from the survey include:

• Many companies are behind in achieving their DevOps and DevSecOps goals: 73% of organisations said they could be doing more, 76% acknowledge they need to be more strategic about how they manage DevSecOps, and 17% still consider themselves at an exploratory and proof-of-concept stage. 

• Security is the number one driver behind most DevOps and DevSecOps implementations. Yet only 30% feel confident in the level of collaboration between security and development, 86% experience challenges in their current approaches to security and 51% admit that they don’t fully understand how security fits into DevSecOps.

• Culture is the biggest barrier to DevOps and DevSecOps success. In fact, 71% of respondents agreed that culture is the biggest barrier to DevSecOps progress, yet only 16% are prioritising culture as an area to optimise in the next 12-18 months.

The organisations succeeding in the implementation of DevOps and DevSecOps policies and practices recognise the importance of security training and upskilling. This helps them reach a higher level of continued long-term collaboration between security and development teams. According to the respondents, the top business factors driving the adoption and evolution of DevOps inside their organisations include a focus on agility; reducing the business risk of quality, security, and downtime or performance issues; and the need to implement DevOps to support a cloud-mandate or their move to the cloud. Other survey areas highlighted include infrastructure modernisation efforts, policy as code, cloud-native adoption, time to ROI, investment and education opportunities, and more.  

“The benefits of integrating security into DevOps are plentiful – from reduced risk and lower costs to faster delivery and more effective compliance. Unfortunately, it’s not as easy as snapping your fingers,” said Sundar Subramanian, EVP & GM DevOps, Progress. “Our research confirms what we see and hear from customers every day – that each has their own unique culture and trajectory, with their own inflection points and challenges, which present more than one roadblock to DevSecOps adoption. That’s why businesses around the globe are turning to Progress. We make DevSecOps an automated reality.”

The race to digital has only accelerated across every aspect of business over the last few years, and organisations that have embraced this acceleration are thriving today. Many rely on Progress to serve the entire DevSecOps lifecycle, from design to development to operational assurance – including secure hybrid-cloud infrastructure management, full-stack observability and high availability. Progress is a leader in DevOps and DevSecOps, offering essential products to automate and secure deployments to multi-cloud, hybrid cloud and on-premise environments.

The survey, “DevSecOps: Simplifying Complexity in a Changing World,” was conducted by Insight Avenue, a UK-based research firm, specialising in business-to-business technology research. The team conducted 606 interviews with IT/Security/App Dev and DevOps decision makers in organisations with 500+ employees from 11 countries from Europe, Asia, Latin America and the United States.