There are many lessons learned (originally outside of software) in lean manufacturing and single-piece flow that profoundly improve an organization's ability to rapidly produce software products and services. In some companies, the culture maintains a notion that the development group has its own delivery pipeline, separate from the IT operations pipeline. This approach is more of a delivery conveyor belt anti-pattern. The software team is only ever committed to transporting product to the end of their conveyor. From there, it's off to a different belt and becomes another team's problem.
In contrast, a deployment pipeline delivering value directly to the customer implies a continuous and constant flow. At the very least, it starts with the source-commit (or sooner) and doesn't end until value is delivered to the customer. That pipeline is a common resource, owned and shared by all teams, to deliver products and services directly to the customer as a continuous stream of value. Just like water does not need hand-holding as it flows through a pipeline, the ideal road to production should be fully automated with sensors along the way ensuring quality is maintained.
