Technical health is how sustainably a team can deliver, code quality, system reliability, and delivery velocity together. You can't improve what you don't measure, but the goal is insight to drive improvement, never a number to hit. Metrics are a flashlight, not a scoreboard.
What to measure
DELIVERY (DORA metrics — well-researched, balanced):
- Deployment frequency - Lead time for changes
- Change failure rate - Time to restore service
QUALITY / RELIABILITY:
- Production incident rate & severity
- Test coverage trend (direction, not a vanity %)
- Escaped-bug rate
TEAM / FLOW:
- Cycle time, time-in-review (slow review = hidden bottleneck)
- Recurring pain points (survey the team — they know)
