Run, Walk, Crawl, or How We Failed Our Way to SLO Readiness
summary
A hypergrowth startup repeatedly fails at SLO adoption because early SLOs use platform APM metrics that aren’t tied to user experience, there’s no standard or ownership, and a major infra migration steals momentum. Success comes when teams adopt basic observability, build an understanding of normal via weekly quality-of-service reviews, assign clear owners, and give one person protected time to drive the effort. Concrete wins: SLO templates, a one-hour company workshop, and using error budgets to replace costly holiday code freezes.
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chapters (13)
- 0:00SLO adoption journey
- 2:25SLOs as sociotechnical challenge
- 3:30Startup culture vs reliability
- 4:55First SLO implementation
- 6:19Why initial SLO effort failed
- 7:23Service quality meetings
- 8:06Lack of standards derails SLOs
- 9:08MOP initiative migration
- 10:12SLO foundation building
- 11:38Cultural shifts engagement
- 12:21Error budgets holiday freezes
- 12:42Four-step reliability framework
- 13:25Summary lessons learned
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