Phase 1 / Practitioner participation

An interview, not a survey.

Phase 1 of the R.I.V.E.R. research program is a series of structured interviews with practitioners and leaders at organizations operating in the release era. This page explains what is involved and how to volunteer.

Format

Sixty to ninety minutes, structured, over Zoom or equivalent

Confidentiality

Not for attribution by default; you control what is published

Cost

Your time only. Phase 1 is research, not paid customer development

I / What Phase 1 is

Qualitative grounding, before quantitative claims.

R.I.V.E.R. is a measurement framework for the full value chain of software delivery, currently a thesis. Its claims are practitioner-grounded but not yet empirically formalized; formalization is what the research program produces.

Phase 1 is the program's qualitative grounding. The goal is twenty to thirty structured interviews with practitioners across a range of organizations, conducted over the course of [FILL: rough Phase 1 window — e.g., "the next two quarters" or specific months], synthesized into the framework's first calibration. Phase 2 is a pilot quantitative survey. Phase 3 is an annual longitudinal report on the DORA model. Phase 1 is the foundation the rest of the program is built on.

The framework cannot earn its evidentiary basis without practitioner input at this stage, and Phase 1 is the mechanism for getting that input rigorously.

II / Who is the right fit

People who run, or work close to, the deploy-release seam.

Phase 1 is designed for people whose daily work touches the operational seam where deployed code becomes a release. The interview will draw on what you have actually shipped and operated, so the right participant is someone with hands-on practice rather than only strategic vantage.

Primary subjects

The practitioner tier

Engineering managers running product-aligned teams
Product managers and senior product leaders close to release decisions
SRE and operations leaders running guardrails, monitoring, and post-deploy operations

The interview instrument is calibrated for this tier; if you sit here, you are who Phase 1 is built around.

Secondary participation

Director-level and C-suite

Engineering, product, or platform directors
VPs and CTOs responsible for delivery performance
Founders at organizations where these roles are not yet differentiated

Conversations at this level are part of the program where they sharpen the organizational picture, alongside the practitioner-tier interviews rather than instead of them.

If you are wondering whether this is for you

You should consider volunteering if at least some of the following are true:

Your team practices, or is moving toward, progressive or reversible release.
Deploy and release are operationally distinct events in your environment, even if the discipline around them is still emerging.
You have shipped a release that produced (or did not produce) the outcome you expected, and you have opinions about why.
You have been asked, or are about to be asked, whether the work your team is doing is generating value commensurate with its cost.

If your organization ships in a single binary event from commit to all users, R.I.V.E.R. is not built for your operating regime, and Phase 1 is not the right fit. The framework is honest about that boundary; the page on what R.I.V.E.R. is goes into detail.

III / What participation looks like

A single interview, structured but conversational.

The interview follows a structured guide, but the structure is there to make sure the conversation covers the right ground, not to constrain it. You will be asked about your practice in your words, and the interviewer will follow the threads worth following.

Length

Sixty to ninety minutes, single session.

Format

Synchronous, over Zoom or equivalent. Audio-only is fine if you prefer.

Recording

Recorded with your consent, used only for note-taking and synthesis. Not published, not shared.

Pre-work

None. You do not need to read the thesis in advance. The interviewer will frame each section.

Interviewer

Terrence C. Cort, sometimes joined by a research collaborator on the program.

After

A short follow-up email with any clarifying questions. You receive the synthesis findings before they are published.

What we will cover

How your team currently practices release: what gets exposed, to whom, in what stages
What you measure today, and what you wish you could measure
Specific recent releases and what you learned from them, in your terms
Your reaction to R.I.V.E.R.'s structural claims: intent typing, success-signal declaration, the maturity ladder
Where the framework's vocabulary fits your reality, and where it misses

IV / What you get from it

Less than a vendor study, more than a survey.

Phase 1 is research, not paid customer development. Participants are not compensated. What participants do get is the following.

Findings

A copy of the synthesis findings before they are published, with your input on anything that draws from your interview.

Acknowledgment

A line in the published research report, if you want one. Default is not-for-attribution.

Self-assessment

Mid-interview, a structured locator on where your team currently sits on the R.I.V.E.R. maturity ladder. Useful regardless of what happens with the framework.

Standing

A position in the network of Phase 1 participants once Phase 2 begins, including the chance to influence the survey instrument.

Most participants will tell you the strongest value is the interview itself: it is a chance to articulate, with structure, what you have been carrying around informally about how your team measures and operates release.

V / Confidentiality and use of data

Defaults you can rely on, and what is negotiable.

Phase 1 follows research-grade data handling. The defaults are conservative because the framework's credibility depends on participants being able to speak candidly.

The defaults

Attribution: All interviews are not-for-attribution by default. No quote, paraphrase, or organizational detail will be used in published findings without your explicit approval.
Organization names: Organization names are masked in published findings. Where industry context is necessary, only the size band and sector are disclosed.
Recordings: Recordings are used only for note-taking and synthesis. They are not published, not shared with third parties, and are deleted after the synthesis is complete.
Review: Any quote, paraphrase, or organizational detail used in published findings will be sent to you for approval before publication.

If you want different terms, fully off-the-record or fully on-the-record with explicit attribution, those are negotiable and will be agreed before the interview begins. The research collaboration on the program includes someone with formal training in research ethics; the data handling reflects that.

Phase 1 is small enough that the right way to volunteer is direct: an email with a brief note about who you are and what you would be drawing from. A structured signup form will replace this when the program scales; for now, the email approach matches Phase 1's size.

Subject: Phase 1 interview interest

Brief context. Your role and team scope. Your organization (rough size and industry are enough; specific name is optional). One sentence on the release practice you would be drawing from. Whether you have a preferred week or two for scheduling.

Questions worth answering up front

Things readers tend to ask.

What if I do not sit in one of the role categories you named?

The role list is a starting point, not a gate. If you work close to the deploy-release seam in any capacity and have a perspective worth sharing, send the email. The interviewer will tell you honestly if Phase 1 is not the right fit, and may suggest a different point of engagement.

My organization is not yet practicing progressive release. Does that disqualify me?

Phase 1's evidence base is built from organizations operating in the release era, because R.I.V.E.R.'s claims are scoped to that operating regime. If you are not there yet, you are welcome to read along with the program's outputs, but the interview is not the right form of engagement for you yet. R.I.V.E.R. is honest about its scope; the framework will not produce its intended outcomes for organizations that ship in a single binary event from commit to user.

Will I be asked to share confidential or proprietary information?

No. The interview focuses on practice and vocabulary, not on metrics, financials, or strategic plans. If a question gets close to something you cannot discuss, you say so and the conversation moves on. Nothing in the interview guide requires you to disclose information that would be sensitive at your organization.

Can multiple people from the same organization participate?

Yes, with a default of one interview per role per organization. If a product manager and an engineering manager from the same team both want to participate, that is useful and the synthesis will treat their perspectives separately. The point is the range of perspectives, not the headcount.

How long is Phase 1 running, and is there a cutoff?

[FILL: state the running window for Phase 1, e.g., "Phase 1 is running through Q4 2026" or "the program is open through approximately N months."] The aim is twenty to thirty interviews total. Earlier participation is more useful than later participation, because the synthesis sharpens with each round and the earliest interviews shape the questions asked of later ones.

Will I be asked to endorse the framework publicly?

No. Phase 1 is research, not advocacy. If you find R.I.V.E.R. compelling enough that you want to speak about it publicly, that is welcomed and separate from your interview participation; the two are not coupled.