I led a TechOps transformation advisory engagement for a major education technology and digital publishing company. The engagement assessed the current state of their TechOps organization — spanning four teams (AppOps, DevOps, Platform Ops, and CloudOps) — and produced a target operating model, workflow mapping deliverables, and a FinOps cost savings proposal. The work culminated in a set of organizational and technology transformation recommendations structured across three tracks.
A key commercial deliverable was a FinOps proposal outlining $700K–$900K in cloud cost savings achievable within 90 days, alongside a Cloud Governance for Sustained Cost Control framework. A managed services proposal was developed in parallel as a potential mechanism for the CloudOps-to-AIOps transformation. The engagement also included a ticket and scope analysis using Jira, ServiceNow, and OpsGenie data to quantify demand volumes and identify automation opportunities.
AppOps Team (5 FTEs)
- Tier 4 / Team of Last Resort for max escalation across all business lines
- Owned Tech Check Synthetic Monitoring service (~100 apps monitored)
- OLR (Online Registration) and ACMS (Access Code Management System) administration
- Central SQL/query gateway for the organization — bottleneck identified
- GDPR compliance, student opt-out management, and KPI dashboard generation
Platform Ops Team (11 FTEs)
- WebAssign 24×7 production support and monitoring — primary revenue-critical application
- MySQL and MongoDB database administration for WebAssign
- On-premises datacenter (MCNC) infrastructure support and lifecycle management
- Akamai CDN management for datacenter-hosted applications
- WebAssign to AWS migration planning and Kubernetes implementation in progress
- Windows CI/CD automation via Octopus Deploy and WebAssign CI/CD pipeline management
DevOps Team (12 FTEs)
- Application CI/CD pipeline ownership and path-to-production standardization
- Supporting 5 lines of business with varied deployment cadences and tooling
- Open Cloud Foundry (PCF) platform in decommission process — managing two platforms simultaneously
- No unified DevSecOps model — security integration identified as a gap
CloudOps Team (7 FTEs)
- L1/L2/L3 cloud infrastructure support across the estate
- Observability ownership — monitoring, alerting, and dashboard management
- Demand intake via ServiceNow, Jira, Salesforce, OpsGenie, Slack, and email — multiple uncoordinated channels
- No automation-driven SRE capability; manual remediation dominant
Centralized AIOps Function
CloudOps transforms into a Centralized AIOps team covering L1–L3 support across infrastructure, network, and application monitoring. Database operations absorbs from Platform Ops. AppOps responsibilities distribute into Centralized Ops and Application teams — the AppOps team is dissolved as a standalone unit. Security escalation paths rerouted to the central security team. Agentic solutions recommended to streamline intake and demand management, reducing ticket volume through AI-driven automation. MTTR reduction and cost avoidance (security) are the primary measurable outcomes.
Center of Excellence & Governance
Establishment of an Architecture Governance CoE — standardizing Root Cause Analysis documentation, Policy as Code design and implementation, and a single source of demand/intake across all TechOps teams. Integrated FinOps governance practices embedded into application architecture and design decisions. Cloud cost allocation, tagging standards, and budget governance implemented as a foundation for sustained cost control.
Digital Platform Core Team
DevOps and Platform Ops consolidated into a single "Digital Platform Core team" with a shared services model and liaisons to the 5 lines of business. Charter: standardize the path to production across all applications. Accelerate Open Cloud Foundry decommission to eliminate the dual-platform overhead. Build reusable components and self-service capabilities for application teams. Integrate security to achieve a true DevSecOps model. Collaborate with Centralized Ops to evolve L1/L2 support into an automation-driven SRE model.
90-Day Savings Initiative
- $700K–$900K in cloud cost savings identified as achievable within 90 days
- Savings recommendations deck produced with line-item analysis across the cloud estate
- Rackspace Managed Services solution leverages AI and ML to reduce alert volumes and decrease MTTR
- Automated remediation capabilities proposed as cost avoidance for operational labor
Cloud Governance for Sustained Control
- Cloud governance framework for sustained cost control — tagging, allocation, and budget policy
- FinOps governance practices integrated into architecture and design standards
- Cloud Excellence & FinOps team proposed (headcount TBD) as a permanent capability
- Managed Services proposal developed as delivery vehicle for CloudOps-to-AIOps transition
Current State Workflow Mapping
Mapped the current-state workflows for all four TechOps teams — demand channels, team structures, tooling, key activities, and process flows for AppOps, Platform Ops, DevOps, and CloudOps.
Ticket & Scope Analysis
Analyzed Jira, ServiceNow, and OpsGenie ticket data to quantify demand volumes, identify automation opportunities, and characterize incident and change request patterns across the TechOps organization.
Observations & Recommendations
Produced the TechOps Observations and Recommendations deliverable — current-state findings, target state organizational design across three tracks, and POV on the path to Centralized AIOps.
Operating Model Design
Authored the Operating Model Design engagement document — detailing transformation activities, deliverables, assumptions, customer responsibilities, in-scope / out-of-scope items, and level of effort per track.
FinOps Proposal
Developed the FinOps cost savings proposal targeting $700K–$900K in 90-day savings, with a Cloud Governance for Sustained Cost Control framework and a managed services delivery model attached to the operating model transformation.
| Deliverable | Description | Format |
|---|---|---|
| TechOps Workflow Mapping | Current-state workflow maps for AppOps, Platform Ops, DevOps, and CloudOps — demand channels, tooling, activities, team structure | PPTX |
| Observations & Recommendations | TechOps current-state findings and target-state organizational transformation POV across three tracks | PPTX + PDF |
| Ticket & Scope Analysis | Jira, ServiceNow, and OpsGenie ticket analysis — demand volume, categories, and automation opportunity identification | |
| Operating Model Design | Structured engagement document detailing transformation activities, deliverables, scope, assumptions, and LOE per track | DOCX |
| FinOps Proposal (90-Day Savings) | $700K–$900K cloud cost savings initiative with line-item recommendations and cloud governance framework | |
| Managed Services Proposal | Rackspace Managed Services delivery model aligned to the CloudOps-to-AIOps transformation track | PPTX + PDF |