The FinOps Framework provides the operating model for how to establish and excel in the practice of FinOps. Like FinOps, the Framework is evolving and informed by community experiences, contributions, and conversations. It’s built by the community, for the community.
Using the FinOps Framework
An important aspect of the FinOps Framework is that it requires you to be intentional about how you adopt and implement FinOps Framework Concepts (such as Domains and Capabilities) into your practice. Since every FinOps journey is different, there’s no one set path. Instead, practitioners experiment with and implement concepts iteratively, revisiting the FinOps lifecycle phases, and reevaluating your goals in the context of your stakeholders and business needs.
Architecture of the FinOps Framework
Framework core content
This content provides a consistent information architecture including definitions, inputs, measures of success, maturity characteristics, functional activities, and the personas responsible for them. The Framework core content is directional, providing guidance toward building a successful FinOps practice and a bird’s-eye view of the FinOps journey.
Framework implementations
This content includes open-source resources integrated into the Framework core content created by the FinOps community that you can use directly or adapt to meet the needs of your FinOps practice. Framework implementations combine core content and real-world experience to help practitioners gain insights and illustrate how peers tackle challenges in the context of their own cloud complexity, organizational size, industry, and FinOps maturity.
These resources are in the form of capability playbooks, how-to guides, stories, assessments, videos, and podcast interviews to name a few examples.
Framework Concepts
FinOps Domains
FinOps Domains represent a sphere of activities that every organization will perform during their FinOps journey. They are not exclusive to one another or represent process steps. In fact, multiple Domains may be pursued during any phase of an organization’s FinOps practice. Taken together, the FinOps Domains represent the Capabilities an organization must perform in the practice of FinOps.
FinOps Capabilities
Capabilities are the building blocks of a FinOps practice; you can combine as many or as few as needed depending on where you are in our FinOps journey and the needs of your organization. Individually, they represent functional areas of activity involving FinOps personas, tasks and/or processes you implement iteratively to meet your FinOps challenges.
The components of each capability include attributes like KPIs, measures of success, maturity characteristics, functional activities, and the personas responsible for those FinOps activities. Additionally, open-source resources are weaved into the Capabilities core content so that you can extend or adapt them to create new implementations of that Capability to meet your needs.
FinOps Maturity Model
The FinOps Maturity Model designations are intended to identify where practitioners are currently operating across various concepts – without judgment – and empower practitioners to seek out opportunities for areas of potential investment. They’re also used to give practitioners a sense of a benchmark for their performance as they grow their practices.
FinOps Personas
Implementing the FinOps Framework requires you to work together with the FinOps Personas in your organization. Operating within the FinOps Framework requires finding allies in times of change, defining a common language, building enablement strategies to elevate, and developing communication programs.
FinOps Phases
The FinOps lifecycle consists of three iterative phases: Inform, Optimize, and Operate. The Inform phase gives you the visibility for creating shared accountability. The Optimize phase is intended to identify efficiency opportunities and determine their value. The Operate phase defines and implements processes that achieve the goals of technology, finance, and business.
FinOps Principles
FinOps Principles are north stars that guide the activities of your FinOps practice. They’re developed by FinOps Foundation members, and honed through experience. Embracing these principles will help you to establish a self-governing, cost-conscious culture within your organization.
How to contribute
The open source FinOps Framework updates its definitions, guidance, and information based on the collective experience of FinOps practitioners. These improvements come from Working Group outputs, Special Interest Group work, community discussions, and more.
Check out some of our Contribution Guidelines to learn how to tell your story or present FinOps best practices. You can also see active Working Groups, which are small groups that meet regularly to create and iterate on new best practices and guidance for FinOps practitioners.
How to submit changes to the FinOps Framework
If you see something that needs to be updated, augmented, or removed, we want to hear about it. This project is by the community and for the community and your voice matters.
There are multiple ways to submit changes:
- Submit an update or let us know of an error via the “Make Suggestion” button (top-right corner of Framework pages)
- Reach out to the members and team in the #framework slack channel
Review process
Changes to each respective section of this site will be reviewed during FinOps Foundation team meetings, or meetings with the Technical Advisory Council. During these council meetings, commits and Pull Requests can be reviewed and voted upon to be merged.
The FinOps Foundation team uses automation tools to rebuild the site multiple times a week to capture the latest changes or to make small updates to maintain the site.
Review cycles and timing
The FinOps Foundation’s core operating members maintain the organization as a business. Its technical components, however, must be reviewed and voted upon by a greater group of community members. These meetings are scheduled throughout the month and the timeliness of reviewing commits and changes will vary depending on when these meetings occur.
Issues and small changes like link fixes and typos might occur immediately, as those don’t require a significant amount of code review, voting, and/or approval.