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Large-scale change, why not with SAFe®

Many organizations that are involved in large-scale complex developments feel the need for large-scale change. Their ambition is to deliver better, more innovative products at lower costs in order to stay ahead of the competition. Why not with SAFe®? SAFe® stands for Scaled Agile Framework and has been the most widely used framework in corporate Netherlands for organizing Agile for some time now. We see this question being addressed in three ways: Sounds hip, let's do that; I'll explain why SAFe® won't work for us; Which elements of SAFe® could help us then? The latter is the healthiest, but unfortunately we rarely encounter it in practice. In this blog series, we will look for frustrating patterns in your organization and elements in SAFe® to break through them. Pattern 1: Employees are overloaded with work At our customers, we see many places where employees never finish their work. The workload is so overwhelming that the comment "Not now, can't you see that I'm busy!" is more the rule than the exception. This means that a lot of work ends up on a waiting list in the best case and is picked up later. Management becomes impatient and intervenes, which creates “side steering”. The same management sees too little result and therefore starts new projects, which makes the backlog even larger and even less is completed. Sound familiar? How does it work? SAFe® works, just like Scrum, with dedicated teams that work together, from one prioritized list, according to the pull principle to process customer requests. Team members are therefore available to help each other to process a customer request, so that more customer requests are processed and the backlog shrinks. But wait, don't some experts in dedicated teams regularly run out of work? We'll look at that pattern next time. Want to know more about SAFe®, then register for our Leading SAFe® training. The next one will take place on January 6 and 7, 2020. You can register at https://lagant.co/bestellen/leading-safe-training-examen/
Web team Lagant

Many organizations involved in large-scale complex developments feel the need for large-scale change. Their ambition is to deliver better, more innovative products at a lower cost in order to stay ahead of the competition. Then why not with SAFe®. SAFe® stands for Scaled Agile Framework and has long been the most widely used framework in corporate Netherlands for organizing Agile. We see this question being addressed in three ways:

  1. Sounds hip, let's do that;
  2. Let me explain why SAFe® is not going to work for us;
  3. Which elements from SAFe® could help us?

The latter is the most healthy, but unfortunately we do not encounter much in practice. In this blog series we look for frustrating patterns in your organization and elements in SAFe® to break them.

Pattern 1: Employees too full of work

At our customers we see many places where employees never get their work done. The workload is so overwhelming that the comment "Not right now, can't you see that I'm busy!" more the rule than the exception. This means that, at best, a lot of work ends up on a waiting list and is picked up later. Management becomes impatient and intervenes, creating “side steering”. The same management sees too little result and therefore starts new projects, which increases the work stock and reduces the amount of work done. Recognizable?

Youtube video
The above video by Henrik Kniberg illustrates the effect of this method for the organization.

How does it work?

SAFe®, like Scrum, works with dedicated teams that work together, from one prioritized list, according to the pull principle. Team members are thus available to help each other to handle a customer request, so that more customer requests are handled and the work stock is shrinking.

But wait, don't some experts regularly run out of work in dedicated teams? We'll look at that pattern next time.

If you would like to know more about SAFe®, register for our Leading SAFe® training. The next one will take place on January 6 and 7, 2020. You can register at https://lagant.co/bestellen/leading-safe-training-examen/

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