Does comm::network::config::ConfigManager::getInstance().load() need to be repeated?

Yes, I think that makes sense here because the load(...) takes a different parameter here for the config file path according to the condition.

It looks like we can conditionally choose the file path and the call load only once.

Yes, right!
I don't think putting out the comm::network::config::ConfigManager::getInstance() out of the condition and then calling load(...) on the instance makes sense here because we are using it only once.

I think Tomek meant something like this.

I think we have an agreement don't use ternary operators where it is possible. I've searched the service's codebase and we didn't use it.
cc @palys-swm

Ok, so we can do this

It doesn't make sense to me. We are creating an additional variable here that in most cases will be used only once (if dev-mode is false) instead of just direct calling the method. In case of the dev-mode is true, we are rewriting this variable instead of just calling the method.
That case will look good if the code in the condition is complex, but we have only one method call in each occurrence.

I don't mind about this, but from my perspective, it looks like an overengineering here.