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Best of the Hedge: Episode 3

From time to time, I like to dive into the archive and find a show that’s worth repeating. Forthwith, Derrick Winkworth and automation.
 
Network automation efforts tend to focus on building and maintaining configurations–but is this the right place to be putting our automation efforts? Derick Winkworth joins Tom Ammon and Russ White at the Hedge for a conversation about what engineers really do, and what this means for automation.
 

 
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Fast Following Fails

Fast following fails.

Whenever I hear a leader in a technology business say, “We’re going to fast follow because it’s the most profitable place to be,” I know I’m looking at a failed organization. I didn’t come to this conclusion by thinking about it. I came to this conclusion by observing it repeatedly.

After observing it, however, I wanted to understand why this particular strategy fails so consistently and spectacularly. Why? To understand my theory, we need to start in a somewhat different place than business—we need to start with the nature of goals and humans.

You can place goals into two buckets: first things and second things.

First things are foundational. If you are a technology company, the first thing is building a stable, resilient, and flexible platform (or foundation). The products you sell will only be as stable as your platform. The innovation you achieve will only be as consistent as your platform is.

Second things are goals you can only achieve once you’ve built the first things.

Here’s the hard truth no one wants to hear: Generating revenue is a second thing.

Humans become what they do.

We all want to believe we can become what we Continue reading

Hedge 272: Are we addicted to the CLI?

Is the CLI the best way to configure, manage, and troubleshoot routers and other networking gear? Or should we move past the CLI towards automation and (possibly even) GUI-based tools? Mark Posser joins Russ and Tom to discuss on this episode of the Hedge.
 

 
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For more reading on this topic, please check out this post by Chris Grundemann.

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