Unlocking Reliability: The Role of Site Reliability Engineering (SRE)

Introduction:

Years ago, I was handed the responsibility of being an SRE Lead—a role I had little understanding of at the time. I didn’t know much about Site Reliability Engineering, its principles, or how to lead an SRE team. Over time, through hands-on experience, rigorous training, and insightful conversations with other SRE leaders, I’ve built a strong SRE team and gained a deep appreciation for the discipline.

Yet, even today, I notice some recurring misconceptions about SRE—what the role entails, what SRE should and shouldn’t do, and the critical importance of involving SRE in different phases of SDLC.

In today’s technology-driven world, reliability is a fundamental expectation from any digital service. Whether it’s a streaming platform, an e-commerce site, or a financial system, users demand seamless, uninterrupted experiences. This makes Site Reliability Engineering (SRE) more than just a practice—it’s a strategic necessity.

However, for SRE to succeed, it requires the active involvement of not just development teams but also business, product, and production support teams. In this blog, we’ll explore how these roles can work together with SRE, and why this collaboration is critical to building reliable, scalable, and user-friendly systems.

Why SRE?

When I first stepped into the role, I quickly realized that SRE is not just about keeping systems running—it’s about creating systems that are reliable, scalable, and self-healing. But achieving this requires much more than just technical expertise. It requires collaboration, proactive thinking, and a mindset that embraces both operations and engineering principles. Traditional IT operations have always focused on keeping systems running, but the modern tech landscape demands much more; High availability, fast recovery, scalability, and minimal human intervention are no longer luxuries—they’re expectations.

The question isn’t whether you need SRE—it’s how you implement it effectively to create a culture of reliability across your organization.

Common Misconceptions About SRE

One of the biggest challenges I faced as an SRE Lead was clarifying the role of SRE to various stakeholders. Here are some misconceptions I encountered:

1. “SRE is just glorified production support.” SRE is not about babysitting systems. It’s about designing systems that don’t need babysitting by automating monitoring, recovery, and incident response.

   
   

2. “SRE doesn’t need to be involved in the development lifecycle.”This couldn’t be further from the truth. SRE must be integrated into the design and development stages to identify and mitigate reliability risks early.

   
   

3. “SRE is only a technical function.”SRE also plays a strategic role by aligning business goals with system reliability, enabling better user experiences and innovation.

How SRE is Different from Traditional Models

SRE is not just an evolution of traditional IT operations—it’s a complete rethinking of how systems are managed. Here are the key differences:

Traditional IT Operations	Site Reliability Engineering (SRE)
Reactive approach—problems are fixed after they occur.	Proactive approach—issues are anticipated and prevented.
Manual processes dominate.	Heavy reliance on automation.
Focused on uptime without quantifiable goals.	Uses metrics like SLIs, SLOs, and SLAs to measure and guarantee reliability.
Operations and development teams work in silos.	Collaboration between development and SRE is integral.
Limited focus on scalability.	Scalability is a primary design consideration.

SRE blends development and operations, enabling organizations to move faster without compromising reliability.

What Makes SRE a Successful Model

For SRE to deliver its full potential, certain practices and principles must be embraced:

a. Early Involvement in the Development Lifecycle

SRE must be engaged from the design phase of applications to ensure reliability is built into the system architecture. This approach—known as "shifting left"—helps identify potential issues early, reducing costly fixes later.

b. Measurable Goals with SLOs and SLIs

SREs define Service Level Objectives (SLOs) and Service Level Indicators (SLIs) to set clear, measurable goals for reliability. For example:

• SLI: API uptime percentage or response time.

• SLO: "The system should maintain 99.9% uptime."

These metrics create accountability and provide actionable insights.

c. Automation and Tooling

Automation lies at the heart of SRE. Tasks like deployments, monitoring, and incident responses are automated to reduce human error and increase efficiency. Tools like Kubernetes, Terraform, and Prometheus are commonly used to streamline operations.

d. Incident Management and Postmortems

SRE teams implement structured incident management processes, including root cause analysis and blameless postmortems, to learn from failures and prevent recurrence.

e. Continuous Feedback and Improvement

SRE relies on feedback loops between operations, development, and business stakeholders to iteratively improve system reliability.

Collaboration Across Departments

The success of an SRE model hinges on collaboration between multiple departments. Here’s how various teams contribute:

a. Development Teams

• Provide deep insights into the application’s workflows, dependencies, and potential failure points.

• Collaborate with SREs to define SLOs and SLIs.

• Participate in operational readiness reviews to ensure systems are reliable before deployment.

  
  

b. Operations Teams

• Work with SREs to manage infrastructure and automate processes.

• Share best practices for monitoring, alerting, and incident response.

• Collaboration in Root Cause Analysis

  
  

c. Product Management

• Align reliability goals with business priorities.

• Help balance trade-offs between innovation and system stability.

  
  

d. Business Stakeholders

• Provide input on the acceptable levels of reliability based on user expectations and business impact.

  
  

e. Security Teams

• Ensure reliability doesn’t compromise security by integrating best practices into the system design and operations.

  
  

f. QA/Testing Teams

• Validate reliability and performance during the testing phase by collaborating on chaos engineering and failure simulation experiments.

The Role of Culture in SRE Success

Beyond processes and tools, culture is a key enabler of SRE. Organizations must foster an environment of:

• Shared Responsibility: Reliability is not just the SRE team’s job; it’s everyone’s responsibility.

• Blameless Postmortems: Encourage open discussions about failures without fear of blame to foster continuous learning.

• Proactive Thinking: Teams should anticipate and prepare for failures rather than react to them.

  
  

Conclusion

Site Reliability Engineering is not just a methodology; it’s a mindset that transforms how organizations build and operate systems. By involving SREs in the design phase, fostering collaboration across departments, and prioritizing automation and measurable goals, businesses can ensure their systems are reliable, scalable, and future-ready.

Adopting SRE isn’t just about improving technology—it’s about delivering exceptional user experiences and staying ahead in a competitive market. With the right practices and culture, SRE can become the backbone of your organization’s success.

Call to Action

If your organization is considering implementing SRE, start by fostering collaboration between development, operations, and other stakeholders. Define clear SLOs, invest in automation, and embrace a culture of continuous improvement. The journey to reliability begins with a unified team effort.