Becoming SRE

Do you wish the existing books on site reliability engineering started at the beginning? Do you wish someone would walk you through how to become an SRE, how to think like an SRE, or how to build and grow a successful SRE function in your organization?

Becoming SRE addresses all of these needs and more with three interconnected sections: the essential groundwork for understanding SRE and SRE culture, advice for individuals on becoming an SRE, and guidance for organizations on creating and developing a thriving SRE practice.

Acting as your personal and personable guide, author David Blank-Edelman takes you through subjects like:

• SRE mindset, SRE culture, and SRE advocacy
• What you need to get started and hired in SRE and what the job will be like when you get there
• What you need to bring SRE into an organization and what is required for a good organizational fit so it can thrive there
• How to work with your business folks and management around SRE
• How SRE can grow and mature in an organization over time

Ready to become an SRE or introduce SRE into your organization? This book is here to help.

Table of Contents

Part I. Introduction to SRE

Chapter 1. First Things First

Chapter 2. SRE Mindset

Chapter 3. SRE Culture

Chapter 4. Talking About SRE (SRE Advocacy)

Part II. Becoming SRE for the Individual

Chapter 5. Preparing to Become an SRE

Chapter 6. Getting to SRE from…

Chapter 7. Hints for Getting Hired as an SRE Chapter 8. A Day in the Life of an SRE

Chapter 9. Establishing a Relationship to Toil Chapter 10. Learning from Failure

Part III. Becoming SRE for the Organization

Chapter 11. Organizational Factors for Success

Chapter 12. How SRE Can Fail

Chapter 13. SRE from a Business Perspective

Chapter 14. The Dickerson Hierarchy of Reliability (A Good Place to Start)

Chapter 15. Fitting SRE into Your Organization

Chapter 16. SRE Organizational Evolutionary Stages

Chapter 17. Growing SRE in Your Org

Chapter 18. Conclusion

Appendix A. Letters to a Young SRE (Apologies to Rilke)

Appendix B. Advice from Former SRES

Appendix C. SRE Resources

About the Author

David N. Blank-Edelman works for Microsoft as a technical program manager focused on site reliability engineering and modern operations practices. He has almost 40 years of experience in the SRE/DevOps/sysadmin field in large multiplatform environments. He’s also the cofounder of the wildly popular SREcon conferences hosted globally by USENIX and is the editor/curator of Seeking SRE and the author of Automating Systems Administration with Perl, both for O’Reilly.