Lead time for changes is the time between your code committed to your code successfully running in production. It is one of the four key metrics in the DORA research. In order to be considered into lead time for changes, a pull request needs to be deployed into production.
In Axify, we broken the lead time for changes into four sub phases: coding, pickup, review and deployment.
The Coding phase reflects the time from the first commit to the moment the pull request is opened.
The Pickup phase is the time from where the pull request is opened to the first interaction (e.g., comment, reaction, thumbs up). This phase is important as it may reflect a bottleneck in your flow like idle pull requests or where the pull requests get stuck.
The Review phase represents the time from the first interaction (e.g., comment, reaction, thumbs up) to when the pull request is merged. It reflects the time to review the pull request and the back-and-forth between team members before it is merged.
The Deploy phase represents the time from the pull request being merged to it being deployed.
Consult the Frequently asked questions about lead time for changes.