How to Implement SAFe for Agile Teams and Organizations?

“Being more responsive to customer feedback, getting value into the hands of the customer faster and improved workflow are the most common reasons to adopt agile”

Why SAFe?

The Scaled Agile Framework commonly known as SAFe is one of the demanding scaled agile delivery frameworks that was introduced by Dean Leffingwell in 2011 to help organizations develop better systems and software that delivers solutions to customers faster. SAFe comes with certain core values like alignment, built-in quality, transparency, program execution, and leadership which are used while Implementing SAFe strategy in an organization to form a culture among team members to improve business agility.

Today’s world demands digitally-enabled products and services. So, investing in innovative methods of software development lifecycle becomes mandatory if you want to develop your business.

Benefits of adopting SAFe

Implementing SAFe can help you address issues like:

1.      Aligning technology development with business goals.

2.      Methods to improve the quality of the solutions produced for the customers.

3.      Delivering new value in a short period.

4.      Creating a business environment that fosters collaboration and relentless improvement.

5.      Promotes taking risks, thinking creatively, and embracing continuous learning.

As SAFe evolves continuously with evolving business and technology trends, companies can stay ahead of the competition by implementing the latest knowledge in SAFe. As product delivery is a customer-centric approach, enterprises can rapidly increase their ability by following important SAFe principles to deliver innovative products in less time.

SAFe implementation for agile teams and organizations

Now that you know what SAFe can do for your business, it’s time to know how to implement SAFe in your organization. Achieving business agility is not a trivial practice but a process that begins with developing a Lean-Agile mindset by understanding the Lean-Agile principles. organizations willing to adopt agile transformation must identify their business portfolio, value streams, ATRs, and DevOps methodology to change their working culture.

Below mentioned is the SAFe implementation roadmap that is being followed by many businesses to get maximum results:

1.      Motivation to change: Implementing SAFe in a large organization is the most challenging yet rewarding change. And the need for change rises when the existing business plan is not enough to produce a new solution within a survivable time frame or could be when a company is failing to compete.

2.      Train Lean-Agile change leaders: Executives, managers, and other leaders need to be trained with courses like Implementing SAFe certification, Leading SAFe, and Certified SAFe Practice Consultants (SPC) to make good non-routine decisions so that they can become a continuous source of inspiration to guide team members. Certified trainers help implement the change with the necessary knowledge.

3.      Forming a Lean-Agile Center of Excellence: Within an organization, LACE is a small team of agile professionals committed to adopting Lean-Agile practices for generating maximum benefits.

4.      Training stakeholders and senior executives: Strong leadership is mandatory to lead, manage, and influence other players in the transformation.

5.      Leading in the digital era: To lead in this digital era, leaders must move away from past mindsets and practices to participate in SAFe transformation. They need to develop new competencies and practices to achieve business agility.

6.      Organizing a value stream: This requires an understanding of the new organizational model.

7.      Creating an Implementation plan: Here with attention to the knowledge gained from training, Lean-Agile mindset, and SAFe principles, enterprise leaders start to develop an implementation plan.

8.      ART launch: After identifying the value streams and creating an implementation plan comes the launching of the first ART to generate the initial short-term wins to build momentum in an enterprise.

9.      Train agile teams and launch ART: As the SAFe Practice Consultants are trained and launches are in place, it’s time to train agile teams to create systems required by the business. With the proper understanding of their role in the ART to effectively contribute to the production process.

10.  Enhancing the business portfolio: Through the journey of SAFe implementation, after coaching ART execution and launching more ARTs, and organizing value stream comes the stage where it is significant to enhance the SAFe portfolios of enterprises.

Title Description

1.      Is Implementing SAFe mandatory to achieve business agility?

When you start to grow as a large enterprise, you need to create a system that generates value for your customers constantly. And this is possible by Implementing SAFe methodology which provides you with a well-described set of values, principles, and practices.

Implementing SAFe Training vs Leading SAFe

Basically, both Implementing SAFe Training and Leading SAFe course is a train-the-trainer course that incorporates the same content but is taught in a differently.

How beneficial is Implementing SAFe Certification?

Implementing SAFe Certification plays a crucial role in training leaders and business owners of an organization in successfully implementing SAFe to encourage agile transformation. Certified SAFe trainers are change agents who combine their technical knowledge of SAFe with a Lean-Agile mindset to improve the company’s software and business process. 

About Advance Agility

We, at Advance Agility, are the new-age Agile Coaching, Consulting and IT services company. We enable end-to-end Digital Transformation. Agile execution is integral to our being. We are doing SAFe implementation with small, medium and large organization across the globe. Our vision is to be the leading Agile execution player globally. To keep adding value at every process stage. We are on a mission to empower our clients, move from concept to cash in the shortest sustainable lead time by adopting human centric approach to business agility. Embracing the change is in our DNA. Things that keep us apart are Quicker and Seamless execution with End-to-end gamut of services. Our Global presence and Stellar Track Record give us an edge over our competitor.

Connect with us at advanceagility.com to learn about SAFe and SAFe Implementation. We provide various SAFe certification courses along with DevOps, Scrum, Agile Coaching and more trainings. Write to us at contact@advanceagilty.com for any agile training or consulting needs. We are always looking for competent agile trainers as well. So if you are a good trainer or want to become one, do get in touch with us to that we can learn, grow and achieve together.