The One With Steph Hippo and Observability

In this episode of the Google SRE podcast, Matt Siegler and Florian Rathgeber interview Steph Hippo, Platform Engineering Director at Honeycomb, about the influence of AI on observability and SRE practices. Steph discusses how AI and observability create a self-reinforcing loop, with AI providing insights that enhance observability and observability ensuring confidence in AI systems. She shares experiences from Google and Honeycomb, highlighting how AI helps junior SREs ask better questions and understand complex systems more quickly. The conversation explores the evolving role of junior engineers in the age of AI, the importance of maintaining a human element in team management, and strategies for small businesses to adopt AI tools intelligently. Steph also touches on the ethical considerations of AI in computing and expresses excitement about the potential for AI to automate incident detection and response in the future.