My Favourite Quotes from DORA's 2025 State of AI-assisted Software Development
DORA’s 2025 State of AI-assisted Software Development report is here, drawing on over 100 hours of qualitative data and nearly 5,000 survey responses. While the full report covers AI adoption, platform engineering, team profiles, and a new AI Capabilities Model, the section that resonated most with me was the chapter on Value Stream Management.
Here are the quotes I highlighted.
Without VSM, AI risks creating localized efficiencies that are simply absorbed by downstream bottlenecks, delivering no real value to the organization as a whole.
While AI adoption on its own shows a modest impact, the effect is dramatically amplified in organizations with strong VSM practices. This confirms that VSM is a critical enabler for getting the most out of your AI investments.
First, our research confirms that VSM practices have a direct and powerful impact on performance. We found strong evidence for the following:
- VSM drives team performance. Teams that consistently review and improve their value stream report markedly higher performance.
- VSM leads to more valuable work. Those teams spend significantly more of their time on work that matters to the organization and its customers.
- VSM improves product performance. Ultimately, this focus on the value stream translates into better product outcomes, which is arguably the most important result.
More importantly, we’ve discovered that value stream management (VSM) is the force multiplier that turns AI investment into a competitive advantage, ensuring that this powerful new technology solves the right problems instead of just creating more chaos.
Every organization is under pressure to innovate faster. We’re all adopting AI, automating processes, building platforms, and shipping features at a breakneck pace. But are we actually getting better? Or are we just getting faster at creating features that don’t deliver value, faster at burning out our teams, and faster at introducing complexity? The greatest risk today isn’t falling behind, it’s pouring massive investment into chaotic activity that doesn’t move the needle.
This year, we’ve confirmed that the capability to elaborate on and manage your value stream is what truly separates disorganized activity from focused improvement. In our 2025 research, we found that teams who focus on understanding their value streams dedicate significantly more of their time to valuable work.
For over a decade, DORA’s research has been guided by a core belief: The highest-performing organizations don’t just adopt new tools, they become experts in the system of delivering value. They have a proven capability for “getting better at getting better.” They can understand their workflow, identify their true constraints, and apply their resources with intention and focus.
You want to solve the whole system’s biggest problem, not just speed up a single step.
When a team collectively maps out a system, it gets all those details out of their heads and into a shared space. Suddenly, the system’s structure—and any hidden patterns—become obvious. This visibility makes it much easier to have a real conversation about what’s working and what isn’t. At its core, this is exactly what VSM is all about.
This systems-level view is crucial for identifying the best places to apply new solutions or technologies.
Read the full report: 2025 State of AI-assisted Software Development (PDF)