SAFe-Agilist SAFe Agilist - Leading SAFe (SA)(5.1.1) Questions and Answers

The next step for an epic with a completed Lean business case in the analyzing step of the Portfolio Kanban is to move it to the ready state if it receives a ‘go’ decision from Lean Portfolio Management. The analyzing step is where the epic hypothesis statement and the Lean business case are developed and validated. The Lean business case provides the economic justification, assumptions, risks, and potential benefits of the epic. The Lean Portfolio Management is the authority that reviews and approves the Lean business case and decides whether to fund and implement the epic or not. If the epic receives a ‘go’ decision, it moves to the ready state, where it waits for implementation capacity. If the epic receives a ‘no go’ decision, it is either deferred or cancelled. References: Portfolio Kanban, Lean Portfolio Management

This statement is one of the values from the Agile Manifesto. The Agile Manifesto is a declaration of four values and twelve principles that guide Agile software development. The four values are: individuals and interactions over processes and tools; working software over comprehensive documentation; customer collaboration over contract negotiation; and responding to change over following a plan. Customer collaboration over contract negotiation means that Agile teams value building strong relationships with their customers based on trust, feedback, and shared understanding, rather than relying on rigid contracts that limit flexibility and creativity. References: Thriving in the Digital Age, Agile Manifesto

According to the SAFe Agilist 6.0 domain of Built-in Quality, this practice reduces bottlenecks and ensures consistency by:

• Encouraging teams to share responsibility for the quality of their work products
• Establishing common standards and guidelines for coding, testing, documentation, etc.
• Enabling teams to collaborate and coordinate across domains and dependencies
• Promoting a culture of continuous improvement and learning

https://scaledagileframework.com/built-In-quality/

Transparency is one of the SAFe core values. SAFe core values are the fundamental beliefs that guide the behaviors and actions of SAFe enterprises. Transparency means that all the relevant information about the strategy, plans, progress, risks, and issues are openly shared and visible to everyone who needs it. Transparency helps build trust, alignment, collaboration, and learning among all the stakeholders in a SAFe enterprise. References: SAFe Core Values, Transparency

Deploy, verify, monitor, and respond are all activities of Continuous Deployment. Continuous Deployment is one of the elements of the Continuous Delivery Pipeline, which is a key enabler of Agile Product Delivery. Continuous Deployment means automatically releasing every update to a production environment or a staging environment that is identical to production. Continuous Deployment involves four activities: deploy (releasing the solution to the target environment); verify (ensuring that the solution meets the quality standards and acceptance criteria); monitor (collecting feedback and data on the solution performance and usage); and respond (taking actions to improve or fix the solution based on the feedback and data). References: Agile Product Delivery, Continuous Delivery Pipeline, Continuous Deployment

Lean Portfolio Management is responsible for managing the Portfolio Kanban. The Portfolio Kanban is a method for visualizing and managing the flow of portfolio epics from ideation to implementation and completion. The Portfolio Kanban helps align strategy with execution, prioritize demand with capacity, reduce cycle time and variability, and foster collaboration and feedback. Lean Portfolio Management is one of the core competencies of business agility in SAFe. Lean Portfolio Management aligns strategy and execution by applying Lean and systems thinking approaches to strategy and investment funding, Agile portfolio operations, and governance. References: Lean Portfolio Management, Portfolio Kanban

Autonomy is one of the requirements besides purpose and minimum possible constraints for unlocking the intrinsic motivation of knowledge workers. Autonomy is the ability of individuals and teams to self-organize, self-manage, and make decisions about their work without excessive interference or control from others. Autonomy fosters creativity, innovation, ownership, and engagement among knowledge workers. Autonomy is one of the aspects of the Lean-Agile mindset and one of the SAFe core values. References: Lean-Agile Mindset, SAFe Core Values, SAFe Principle #8

Lean thinking is the type of thinking that allows the customer to pull value from the producer. Lean thinking is a philosophy and a set of principles and practices that aim to eliminate waste and optimize value delivery. Pull is a concept that means that nothing is built or delivered until there is a demand for it from the customer or the next process. Pull helps reduce overproduction, inventory, and waiting, and ensures that only valuable work is done. References: Thriving in the Digital Age, SAFe Principle #1

This is how SAFe describes Customer Centricity. Customer Centricity is one of the core competencies of business agility in SAFe. Customer Centricity means putting the customer at the center of everything the enterprise does, and understanding their needs, desires, and problems deeply. Customer Centricity also means adopting a mindset that focuses on observing and learning from customer behaviors that produce the best innovations, rather than relying on assumptions or opinions. Customer Centricity helps enterprises deliver solutions that delight their customers and achieve market differentiation. References: Customer Centricity

Decisions that deliver large and broad economic benefits are the type of decisions that should remain centralized even in a decentralized decision-making environment. Decentralized decision-making is a principle and practice that empowers individuals and teams to make decisions about their work without excessive interference or control from others. Decentralized decision-making fosters autonomy, agility, innovation, and ownership among knowledge workers. However, some decisions are better made centrally by those who have more authority, information, or expertise. These include decisions that affect the whole enterprise or portfolio, such as strategy, vision, budgeting, governance, compliance, etc. References: SAFe Lean-Agile Principles, SAFe Principle #9