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- Toil is repetitive, manual work that scales with system growth
- It is automatable and adds no enduring value
- Causes engineer burnout & distracts from high-value work
(Source: Google SRE Book)
- Manual and repetitive tasks
- Automatable with engineering effort
- Tactical, reactive, and devoid of lasting value
- Scales linearly with service/system size
- Example: repetitive incident response, manual deployments
- Burnout and reduced morale
- Less focus on innovation and scaling
- Increased operational risks due to fatigue
- Slower issue resolution and reduced reliability
- Automate repetitive tasks fully where possible
- Build tools and self-service platforms
- Prioritize engineering efforts on reducing toil
- Measure toil and track it as a key metric
- Empower engineers to reclaim time for high-value work
- AI-assisted coding tools automate routine development
- Autonomous agents execute repetitive operational tasks
- Continuous improvement of automation in CI/CD pipelines
- Goal: Engineer focus shifts to creative, strategic engineering
- Result: Higher productivity, lower burnout, better reliability