Although path-to-production mapping has been a near-universal practice at Thoughtworks since codifying Continuous Delivery, we often come across organizations unfamiliar with the practice. The activity is most often done in a workshop with a cross-functional group of people — that includes everyone involved in designing, developing, releasing and operating the software — around a shared whiteboard (or virtual equivalent). First, the steps in the process are listed in order, from the developer workstation all the way to production. Then, a facilitated session is used to capture further information and pain points. The most common technique we see is based on value-stream mapping, although plenty of process map variants are equally valuable. The activity is often eye-opening for many of the participants, as they identify delays, risks and inconsistencies and continue to use the visual representation for the continuous improvement of the build and deploy process. We consider this technique so foundational that we were surprised to discover we hadn't blipped it before.
