It’s difficult to be your most creative at an organization where the people overseeing things can’t spot the value in innovation. In our findings, the overwhelming majority of developers (84%) say improving their outcomes in terms of both velocity and quality is a “large priority,” at the very least, for their organization. But it’s the type of support given to developers by those in charge that translates into psychological safety and makes the difference.

The traditional view of leadership—c-suite, executives, and upperlevel management, in particular—might involve setting budgets, measuring outcomes, and distilling priorities. For those looking to release better software, they should start thinking about whether or not they’re building a culture of trust within their organization that lends itself to psychological safety.

From our findings, there’s direct relationships between teams that are higher performing and feel entrusted to take risks, and leadership’s actions to ensure those things are true.

Bosses can’t just tell a team to be innovative, then go back to checking Twitter and hope for the best. Virtually all our respondents (99%) say they are looking to feel safe when taking risks in deployment, especially around internal buy-in, tools, and culture (94%).

How leadership’s priorities impact software releases

We’ll dive deeper into causes and effects later, but some points worth highlighting:

• When leadership places the improvement of developer outcomes as either a top or large priority, 91% of developers say they are very satisfied with their jobs. So if leadership is perceived as placing an emphasis on making developers more successful, that seems to positively impact areas like retention.
• When leadership places the improvement of developer outcomes as either a top or large priority, 67% of developers say there’s a much stronger focus on releasing updates more quickly than avoiding rollbacks. In other words, teams that feel like their companies have their back are releasing more frequently.
• When developers are encouraged by leadership to take risks, the majority (54%) say either all or most of their releases are automatically approved (as opposed to manually approved, which can slow things down.) Organizations that assess the risk of automatic approvals to be less risky than the delays introduced by manual approvals signal that they trust developers, tools, and processes to take the right steps to manage risks appropriately.
• 86% of developers at companies that say they are more innovative than others agree that safely releasing code makes them feel empowered to experiment with new approaches. The momentum of an organization encouraging you to take risks can pay off through experimentation and, gradually, innovation.

In the next section, we’ll look at the ways in which a company’s overall priorities and approach, which, in many cases, are set directly by leadership, reflect back on the outcomes of software releases.

A focus on innovation starts with leadership championing developers

At 85%, the overwhelming majority of respondents feel their company is more innovative than others. That may speak to the competitive nature of the software industry, but those working at high-performing organizations seem to know it: 87% of teams releasing several times a week or more said their organization was more innovative than others.

Of those who say their company is more innovative than others, 88% say that improving developer outcomes for software releases is either a top or large priority at their organization. Those findings support the idea that innovation is driven partially by how high a value the organization, driven by leadership, places upon the support of its developers.

Most companies have some appetite for risk

The majority of our respondents say their companies (60%) are game for either a lot or at least some risk, which is good because you can’t have innovation without risk. And you can’t take risks if you’re feeling too worried about the outcome.

If you’re working in a regulated industry, such as finance or government, it’s understandable that your company would be more wary than others when it comes to something breaking. Among the 40% of those at organizations that can only stomach a little or virtually no risk, the split was almost even with those in regulated industries (42%) and unregulated (39%). Although, when it comes to those who answered that their company has a high tolerance for risk, those in non-regulated industries (12%) slightly edged out those (7%) in more regulated industries. The takeaway then is that even within companies where managing risk is likely top of mind, developers still perceive an overall willingness to take on risk in today’s dynamic, digital-first business environment

Even if organizations want risk, the fear is still felt by developers

In the previous section, we saw that most organizations are open to risk, but the concern around the consequences of errors is felt most by developers.

In fact, the majority of respondents (52%) say they are encouraged to either take low levels of risk or are pressured to work to minimize rollbacks altogether. The hypothesis, then, is that the actual process of releasing updates to customers naturally produces higher levels of organizational stress and urgency for developers to minimize errors.

Of the 35% of developers who say their company encourages low levels of risk, you can’t help but feel there are some missed opportunities. Fully 100% of developers say applying new development approaches and solutions can positively impact business outcomes, especially by encouraging greater innovation among staff (53%), increasing adaptability (52%), and improving the bottom line (49%).

And yet it’s difficult to imagine a team taking high levels of risk without feeling psychologically safe and having the support of the rest of the organization.. For those who say they are encouraged to take high levels of risk, a whopping 94% said their organization views improving developer outcomes as a large or top priority.

One other thing: 6% of senior executives said improving developer outcomes for software releases was only a small priority. If you’re a developer at one of those companies, maybe it’s time to start looking around for another job.

Process will help your innovation soar or stumble

The majority of respondents (61%) feel their company’s processes hinder their ability to innovate and try new things. What’s interesting is that even at companies where developers say improving outcomes is a top or large priority, 61% also describe their process as either significant or somewhat of an obstacle. That number, then, holds steady even if a company views developer outcomes as a priority.

So your organization can simultaneously be fighting to improve software releases and somewhat tolerant of risk, while also inadvertently making things harder for developers with its overall processes.

It’s worth noting, too, that 45% of teams that are releasing more often—either several times a day or week—say their process is not really an obstacle to innovation.

We’ll dig into some of the issues with processes in our next section.