Envision the route to production as a conveyor belt using just in time techniques. All stages of this process should be automated and streamlined where possible.
Continuous integration is a given, Continuous Delivery the target.
DevOps focuses on getting a business to work as one on the end-to-end process; rather than departments working in silos, focusing on small parts of it.
The Theory of Constraints shows that a process will only operate as fast as the slowest part. Making efficiencies in non-constraining parts of the process have no effect to the overall process.