Solved: Why Curiosity Beats Coding in DevOps.

Source: Dev.to

Executive Summary

TL;DR: A lack of curiosity in DevOps leads to inefficiencies, repetitive incidents, and resistance to innovation—often more detrimental than a lack of coding skills. The solution involves fostering a curious mindset through practices like the 5 Whys for root‑cause analysis, hands‑on system‑tool exploration, structured learning, living documentation, and blameless post‑mortems.

• 5 Whys – drill down to true underlying causes, moving beyond superficial symptoms (e.g., excessive logging in production).
• Hands‑on exploration – use system‑level tools such as strace (process behavior) and tcpdump (network traffic) to build intuition.
• Structured learning & knowledge sharing – “brown‑bag” sessions, living documentation (Post‑Mortem docs, Runbooks, Architecture Decision Records).
• Curiosity > coding proficiency – continuous learning and proactive problem‑solving keep teams agile and effective.

Why a Lack of Curiosity Hurts DevOps Teams

The “5 Whys” Technique

A simple yet powerful tool for root‑cause analysis. Encourage team members to keep asking “why?” until they reach the fundamental issue.

Example Scenario

Deployment failed because a service couldn’t start.

1. Why did the service fail to start? → Port 8080 was already in use.
2. Why was port 8080 already in use? → A previous instance didn’t shut down gracefully.
3. Why didn’t the previous instance shut down gracefully? → The shutdown script timed out during resource cleanup.
4. Why did the shutdown script time out? → It was flushing a large log buffer to disk, which was slow.
5. Why was the log buffer so large/slow? → Logging was set to DEBUG level in production, producing excessive output.

Root cause: Excessive logging in production.
Fixing the logging level eliminates the cascade of symptoms.

Hands‑On System‑Level Exploration

Investigating Process Behavior with strace

# Trace system calls of a running process
sudo strace -p <pid>

# Trace a command and log child processes
sudo strace -f -o /tmp/output.log /usr/bin/my_failing_app

Network Traffic Analysis with tcpdump

# Capture full HTTP traffic on eth0 (no name resolution, verbose)
sudo tcpdump -i eth0 port 80 -nn -s0 -v

# Capture traffic to/from a specific host and port (any interface)
sudo tcpdump -i any host 192.168.1.100 and port 22

Using these tools builds intuition about what’s happening under the hood, moving engineers beyond high‑level logs.

Structured Learning & Knowledge Sharing

Brown‑Bag Lunch Sessions

• Format: Informal 30‑45 min presentations over lunch.
• Topics: New tools, tricky problems, interesting projects, deep dives (e.g., Kubernetes operators, Terraform best practices), incident retrospectives.
• Participation: Encourage questions and discussion to foster a collaborative environment.
• Rotation: Rotate presenters so everyone gets a chance to research and teach.

Living Documentation

Documentation should be a living, evolving knowledge base, not a chore.

• Post‑Mortem Documents – Capture incident timeline, root‑cause analysis, resolution, lessons learned, and preventative actions.
• Runbooks & Playbooks – Detail step‑by‑step procedures for common operations and incident response.
• Architecture Decision Records (ADRs) – Record why architectural choices were made, providing context for future work.

When engineers are curious, they naturally contribute to and benefit from well‑maintained documentation.

Closing Thought

Cultivating a curious mindset is paramount for success in DevOps—often outweighing specific coding proficiency. By embedding the 5 Whys, encouraging hands‑on tool use, structuring continuous learning, and maintaining living documentation, teams create an environment where proactive problem‑solving thrives, keeping them agile, effective, and ready for the next challenge.

Why “Why” Steps Matter

Understanding why steps are performed, not just how, is essential for building a learning‑oriented culture.

Architecture Decision Records (ADRs)

Document the rationale behind significant architectural or technical decisions. This provides context for future engineers asking “why was this chosen?”

Example: Standardized Post‑Mortem Structure

Post‑Mortem: Outage (YYYY‑MM‑DD)

Date/Time: YYYY‑MM‑DD HH:MM UTC – HH:MM UTC
Duration: XX minutes
Impact: Describe the user impact, affected systems, e.g., “Partial degradation of API service, 50 % error rate.”

Incident Summary

Brief chronological overview of the incident detection, response, and resolution.

Root Cause Analysis

Detail the sequence of events and findings that led to the incident. Use the “5 Whys” technique here to drill down.

• Initial trigger:
• Why did X happen?
• Why did Y happen?
• … continue until a fundamental cause is identified …

Resolution Steps

1. Step 1:
2. Step 2:

Lessons Learned

Action Items

• [Priority: High/Medium/Low] (Owner: , Due: YYYY‑MM‑DD)
• [Priority: High/Medium/Low] (Owner: , Due: YYYY‑MM‑DD)

Culture of Curiosity & Blameless Post‑Mortems

A truly curious, learning‑oriented culture requires a safe space for failure analysis. Blameless post‑mortems keep the focus on systemic improvements, not individual culpability.

• Primary goal during an incident:

  • What happened?
  • How can we prevent it from happening again?
  • (Not “who caused this?”)

• Benefits:

  • Engineers share information openly without fear of retribution.
  • Enables thorough analysis and continuous improvement.

Guiding Principles

• Focus on Systems, Not Individuals: Assume everyone is doing their best with the information and tools available.
• Encourage Transparency: Make post‑mortems and incident reviews openly accessible to relevant teams.
• Choose the Right RCA Method: While the “5 Whys” is excellent for initial exploration, more complex incidents often benefit from broader root‑cause‑analysis frameworks.

Comparing RCA Techniques

Turning Post‑Mortems into Action

A post‑mortem is only valuable if it leads to concrete, trackable actions. A curious mind doesn’t just identify a problem; it seeks a solution and ensures its implementation.

• SMART Actions – Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, Time‑bound. Every action item should be clearly defined, assigned an owner, and have a deadline.
• Follow‑Up & Verification – Regularly review the status of action items and verify that implemented solutions are effective in preventing recurrence. This might involve:
  • Setting up new monitors.
  • Running chaos experiments.
  • Reviewing relevant metrics.

The Curious DevOps Engineer

• Continuous learner – constantly seeks deeper understanding.
• Proactive problem‑solver – turns insights into actionable improvements.
• Catalyst for innovation – drives resilient systems, streamlined operations, and meaningful progress at both individual and organizational levels.

👉 Read the original article on TechResolve.blog.