During the last DevOps Days in Antwerp, our team attended an open space discussion on platform KPIs. The conversation revolved around the overwhelming number of things you can monitor in an internal developer platform (IDP), but the real question was: which metrics actually matter to management when it comes to platform adoption and value?
As a group, we quickly arrived at a fundamental question: is it even up to us as engineers to define these metrics?
The reality is that no single metric can definitively prove a platform’s value. This realization led to a discussion around the Platform as a Product paradigm. If a platform is a product, then it should be managed as one.
This reflection ultimately led to this post.
Shifting the narrative: from reporting to investing
In a traditional product-driven company, securing investment is key to growth. For an internal developer platform, the investors are the company’s management: CIOs, CTOs, and CFOs. Platform teams need to convince them that the platform generates value, not just costs money.
Too often, platform teams fall into the trap of measuring and reporting purely technical metrics: uptime, number of runs, CPU and memory consumption, adoption rates, pipeline counts, and module usage.
While these are useful for platform engineers, they rarely influence executive decision-making. Simply put, management doesn’t care about raw technical numbers – they care about business impact.
Instead of asking which metrics to provide to management, the better question is what management hopes to gain from the platform. What are they measured on? What outcomes matter to them? When reporting is aligned with those goals, it creates a clear incentive for continued investment in the platform.
The “Dragons’ Den” mentality
One of the most effective ways to frame this shift is to think of it as a “Dragons’ Den” or “Shark Tank” scenario.
In this framing:
- Platform teams have a product
- Management acts as venture capital
- Continued investment depends on a clear return on investment (ROI)
To strengthen this relationship, it’s important to identify the key business drivers for these internal investors. Are they focused on improving developer productivity? Reducing lead time? Increasing business agility? Cutting operational costs? Once those goals are clear, the right data can be extracted from the platform to demonstrate how it contributes to those outcomes.
Asking the right questions
A powerful question to ask management and internal stakeholders is:
“What happens if we shut the platform down tomorrow? Would the organization still be able to operate at the same level of productivity? What would the consequences be?”
If the answer reveals major disruption, then the platform has clear business value. The challenge is to quantify that value in a way that resonates with decision-makers.
Building a symbiotic relationship
The relationship between platform teams and management should be an enhancing one, not a battle for survival. By shifting from a reporting mindset to an investment mindset, organizations increase their chances of securing continuous funding and growing the platform as a strategic asset.
The key takeaway? Metrics shouldn’t be used to justify a platform’s existence in purely technical terms. They should be used as a tool to help management see the value they care about, so they continue investing in what the platform enables.