What’s New in SAFe® 6.0?
Thriving in the Digital Age with Business Agility
SAFe: Past, Present, and Future
2011
© Scaled Agile, Inc.
Field experience at enterprise scale
2023…
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Why SAFe 6.0?
 SAFe has become integral for
adapting to change, building
resiliency, and thriving as a
modern, digital business.
 Meeting the new realities of
the marketplace requires
SAFe to evolve continuously.
While we’ll never lose sight of
SAFe’s core benefits, our
guidance continually
improves to address new and
emerging challenges.
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Six themes of SAFe 6.0
© Scaled Agile, Inc.
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Strengthening the foundation for Business Agility
2
Empowering teams and clarifying responsibilities
3
Accelerating value flow
4
Enhancing Business Agility with SAFe across the business
5
Building the future with AI, Big Data and Cloud
6
Delivering better outcomes with measure and grow and OKRs
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Say hello to SAFe 6.0!
© Scaled Agile, Inc.
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1
Strengthening the
Foundation for
Business Agility
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Business Agility Value Stream gets a promotion
Establishing true business agility requires flow to be cultivated and accelerated through
the entire Business Agility Value Stream (BAVS), from sensing an emerging opportunity to
delivering the right solution.
This agility requires all functions, processes, activities, teams, and events from end to end to be aligned and optimized for maximum
speed and quality.
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SAFe Foundation
 The Continuous Learning Culture (CLC) competency was added to the foundation, making it part of
all SAFe configurations.
 CLC represents a more modern approach to managing organizations. In this paradigm, organizations
evolve into adaptive engines of change to thrive, powered by a fast and effective learning culture.
 The SPC icon was redesigned to emphasize its role in coaching
© Scaled Agile, Inc.
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Updated SAFe Lean-Agile Mindset
Agile Values
We are uncovering better ways of developing
software by doing it and helping others do it.
Through this work we have come to value:
Individuals and interactions over processes and tools
Working software over comprehensive documentation
Customer collaboration over contract negotiation
Responding to change over following a plan
That is, while there is value in the items on the right,
we value the items on the left more.
agilemanifesto.org
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Updated SAFe Core Values
Alignment
Transparency
Communicate the vision, mission, and strategy
Create a trust-based environment
Connect strategy to execution
Communicate directly, openly, and honestly
Speak with a common language
Turn mistakes into learning moments
Constantly check for understanding
Visualize work
Understand your customer
Provide ready access to needed information
Respect for People
Relentless Improvement
Hold precious what it is to be human
Create a constant sense of urgency
Value diversity of people and opinions
Build a problem-solving culture
Grow people through coaching and mentoring
Reflect and adapt frequently
Your customer is whoever consumes your work
Let facts guide improvements
Build long-term partnerships based on mutual benefit
Provide time and space for innovation
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Updated SAFe Principle #6
 SAFe Principle #6 was changed to ‘Make
value flow without Interruptions’ and is
better aligned with the five principles of
Lean Thinking.
 It highlights the eight common properties
of a flow-based system and provides
specific accelerators for eliminating
impediments to flow (more on this later)
#1 Take an economic view
#2 Apply systems thinking
#3 Assume variability; preserve options
#4 Build incrementally with fast, integrated learning cycles
#5 Base milestones on objective evaluation of working systems
#6 Make value flow without interruptions
#7 Apply cadence, synchronize with cross-domain planning
#8 Unlock the intrinsic motivation of knowledge workers
#9 Decentralize decision-making
#10 Organize around value
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Revised Implementation Roadmap
1. Waterfall / Ad Hoc Agile step was removed since SAFe adoption
does not always begin with one of these two starting points.
2. SAFe Executive Workshop toolkit was added to the
‘Go SAFe’ step.
3. Leading in the Digital Age, a program that equips leaders with
the knowledge and skills to support their Agile Teams and manage
change effectively, was added to
the roadmap.
4. Organize Around Value was renamed from Identify ARTs and Value
Streams to reflect its purpose and connection to Principle #10.
5. SAFe Value Stream and ART identification workshop toolkit was
added to the ‘Organize Around Value’ step.
6. Enhance the Portfolio was renamed. It was previously called Extend
to the Portfolio. This updated step recommends that organizations
start exploring some LPM practices earlier in their journey.
7. Accelerate emphasizes that the transformation journey is
never-ending and a brand new article provides guidance for
creating a Continuous Learning Culture and amplifying the
benefits of applying the 5 Lean Thinking principles across the
Enterprise
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SAFe Practice Consultants (SPCs)
 Formerly known as SAFe Program Consultants,
SPCs provide coaching for many of the practices
and critical moves described in the SAFe
Implementation Roadmap
 SPCs work beyond the roadmap as a group of
change agents with unrelenting energy, bringing
business agility to the organization over time
through executing the areas of responsibilities
 The name change is part of phasing out the
term ‘program’
 Responsibility wheel tracks to
“Implementing SAFe”
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2
Empowering Teams
and Clarifying
Responsibilities
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Updated role articles and responsibility wheels
New role articles for:
Epic Owners
Enterprise Architects
Solution Train Engineer
Business Owners
Product Management
Release Train Engineer
System Architect
Product Owner
Agile Teams
 Agile Release Train
 Agile Teams
 Business Owners
 Enterprise Architect
 Epic Owners
 LACE
 Product Owner
 Product Management
 Release Train Engineer
 SAFe Practice Consultant
 Scrum Master/Team Coach
 Solution Management
 Solution Train Engineer
 System Architect
 System Team
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Example: Agile Release Train (ART)
 The ultimate purpose of an ARTs is to
deliver effective solutions to customers.
It’s fundamental for establishing a fast
flow of solution features.
 Understanding the ARTs responsibilities
is critical for success. A ‘responsibility
wheel’ was created to clarify the ARTs
duties at-a-glance
© Scaled Agile, Inc.
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Scrum Master / Team Coach
 Introduced a new, broader Scrum
Master / Team Coach role whose
focus extends to optimizing flow,
building high performing teams, and
supporting organizational agility
 Organizations can use either Scrum
Master or Team Coach role names,
whichever best fits their
organization’s context.
© Scaled Agile, Inc.
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Key collaborations for four of the content authority roles
 Converting ideas into a steady
stream of valuable products and
services is a complex endeavor
System Architect
Solution Architect
Product Management
Solution Management
 Requires ongoing coordination
and communication
 Four role articles with content
authority were updated
 Figures describes and visualizes
the collaborative partnerships
needed to enable quick and
efficient product development flow
© Scaled Agile, Inc.
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3
Accelerating
Value Flow
#6
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Eight properties of a flow-based system
#6
 Flow occurs when there is a
smooth, linear, and fast movement
of work product through the steps
in a value stream
 Flow properties describe the
elements that always exist in a
flow system
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Eight flow accelerators
#1 Visualize and Limit WIP
#2 Address Bottlenecks
#3 Minimize Handoffs and
Dependencies
#4 Get Faster Feedback
#5 Work in Smaller Batches
#6 Reduce Queue Length
#7 Optimize Time ‘In the Zone’
#8 Remediate Legacy Policies
and Practices
#6
 Every accelerator
offers an opportunity
to optimize each
flow property
 This is the topic of the
updated Principle #6 Make value flow
without interruptions
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Accelerators apply differently to each SAFe level
 Four new articles, Team Flow,
ART Flow, Solution Train Flow,
and Portfolio Flow, describe
applying the eight flow accelerators
 Each article offers techniques
for addressing, optimizing, and
debugging issues with achieving
continuous value flow at that
specific level
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SAFe Team Kanban
 A method that helps Agile Teams
facilitate visualize flow, establish
WIP limits, deliver value
continuously, measure flow, and
improve their process
 Renamed Kanban icon to ‘SAFe
Team Kanban’ and explained how
to apply Kanban for Agile Teams
on an ART
 Teams can use SAFe Scrum,
SAFe Team Kanban, or a hybrid to
their liking
© Scaled Agile, Inc.
SAFe Team Kanban method
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SAFe Scrum
 SAFe ScrumXP has been renamed to
SAFe Scrum, and the XP-inspired
practices were moved into Built-in
Quality and other articles
 The icons for Plan (Iteration Planning),
Review (Iteration Review), Retro
(Iteration Retrospective), and Execution
were removed from BP but can be
accessed from the new Scrum article
 The new SAFe Scrum article includes
enhanced guidance for Scrum teams
and includes a Kanban system to
manage backlog
© Scaled Agile, Inc.
SAFe Scrum cycle
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Applying Kanban in SAFe - Extended Guidance
What is a Kanban board?
Identifying steps in the Development Value Stream
Design
Define
Identifying Kanban Classes of Service
3
Funnel
Defining
4
Ready
2
|
4
Building
Code
Test
Understanding how the Enterprise Kanban works
6
Integrating
Validating
and testing
Done
Ready
Standar
d
Fixed date
DateExpedite
Fixed
In
progress
6
SME
Review
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Built-in Quality supports flow
 Totally new model starts with
Basic Agile Quality Practices that
apply universally:
 Shift learning left
 Pairing and peer review
 Collective ownership and
T-shaped skills
 Artifact standards and
definition of done
 Workflow automation
 Builds on that foundation with
specific quality practices for
each domain
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Value Stream Management gets a promotion
 VSM was previously an extended guidance article. It has been added to the Portfolio Level to emphasize it as a
SAFe Portfolio responsibility.
 It anchors flow.
 The article was enhanced to provide new guidance about the people that manage the value stream.
© Scaled Agile, Inc.
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From PMO to VMO
The Value Management Office (VMO) supports portfolio flow, and its responsibilities include:
►
Helping define the scope of the portfolio
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Supporting improvement to value delivery flow
►
Facilitating strategy formulation and helping communicate
strategic themes
►
Facilitating the Portfolio Sync
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Collaborating with the LACE to develop, harvest, and apply
successful ART execution patterns across the portfolio
►
Facilitating Lean budgeting and governance
►
Fostering decentralized PI Planning and operational excellence
►
Fostering more Agile contracts and leaner supplier and Customer
partnerships
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4
Enhancing Business
Agility with SAFe
across the Business
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Extended SAFe Business & Technology Patterns
 SAFe moves beyond IT and Dev
Extended SAFe Business and Technology Patterns
 A Lean-Agile transformation will
touch every part of
the organization. As one part
accelerates, it reveals
bottlenecks in the others
 The updated Business and
Technology article highlights
Extended SAFe Business and
Technology Patterns
© Scaled Agile, Inc.
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SAFe Beyond IT Home Page
The SAFe Beyond IT home page provides access to articles about real-world business agility experiences in Operational
Value Streams. Contributed and written by SAFe professionals, they describe their successes and challenges in
extending Lean, Agile, and SAFe practices to Finance, Marketing, Human Resources, Legal, Operations, and other
functions beyond IT.
© Scaled Agile, Inc.
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5
Building the Future
with AI, Big Data,
and Cloud
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Building the future with AI, Big Data, Cloud
AI
Big Data
 AI can revolutionize solutions developed by SAFe
organizations. Has the potential to dramatically
influence the operational and business models of
enterprises as well
 Big data is a portfolio concern as it requires
vision, investment, centralization, and governance
at the highest levels in the organization
 Cloud increases product development speed
and agility
Cloud
© Scaled Agile, Inc.
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Artificial Intelligence (AI)
Artificial intelligence (AI) is a term used to describe a wide range of smart machines
capable of performing tasks that typically require human intelligence.
 The new guidance describes how to apply AI in
the enterprise and how SAFe can accelerate the
successful adoption of this advanced technology
The three primary ways to apply AI in an organization
 Key topics covered include:
• AI as a Competitive Advantage
• Applying AI to Achieve Better Business Results
• Understanding the Fundamental Types of AI
© Scaled Agile, Inc.
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Big Data
The roles and practices required to collect, manage, normalize and deliver large and useful
datasets to enterprise stakeholders so that they can be used to achieve business agility.
 Data has become critically important across the
entire enterprise.
Big Data products support all parts of the enterprise
 It influences business decisions, helps create
better products, improves product development,
and drives operational efficiencies.
 This new guidance describes data’s critical
role in the enterprise, the DataOps process to
manage and deliver extensive volumes of data,
and how to apply DataOps in SAFe.
© Scaled Agile, Inc.
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Cloud
Enterprises are increasingly turning to the cloud to create the agility they need to
survive and thrive in the digital age.
 Migrating enterprise systems from onpremises to the cloud must also include
automating and accelerating valuegenerating activities across the
organization.
The cloud accelerates the development value stream
 Topics in this article include:
•
•
•
•
Aligning the cloud to value
Cloud for Infrastructure and Operations
Cloud for DevOps
Cloud for AI
© Scaled Agile, Inc.
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6
Delivering Better
Outcomes with
Measure and Grow
and OKRs
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Metrics is now Measure & Grow
Measure
& Grow is the new name for SAFe’s metrics model. It is a comprehensive, yet simple, approach
.
for measuring progress toward business agility, built around three measurement domains:
 Outcomes: Do our solutions meet the needs of our customers and the business?
 Flow: How efficient is the organization at delivering value to the customer?
 Competency: How proficient is the organization in the practices that enable business agility?
© Scaled Agile, Inc.
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SAFe highlights three primary key use cases for applying OKRs
© Scaled Agile, Inc.
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Use case 1: Enhance alignment across a SAFe portfolio
OKRs can work together to provide alignment and transparency at multiple levels
 The work to achieve a particular
strategic theme will differ for each
value stream
 It can be helpful to create specific OKRs
for each value stream that aligns with
the portfolio’s strategic themes
 For large value streams, it may be
helpful to create a set of OKRs that
define the goals for each specific ART
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Use case 2: Define business outcomes for Lean business cases
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Use case 3: Set improvement goals for the transformation
Apply OKRs to establish outcome objectives for the SAFe transformation itself. This can include
a hierarchy of outcomes, as shown in the figure below:
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Other Important
Changes
• SAFe backlogs
• Spanning Palette
• Enterprise Solution Delivery
• Terminology changes
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All SAFe Backlogs are managed with Kanban
 Each backlog highlighted on the Big Picture
was merged with its associated Kanban article
to simplify guidance and emphasize flow
 Removed the vertical Kanban label from all
backlogs to reduce visual clutter
 The Backlog state was replaced by Ready to
reduce confusion between the process state
and actual backlog
 For Scrum, a separate Kanban system
manages the Iteration Backlog and uses the
‘Iteration Backlog’ state for work that is ready
Backlog
© Scaled Agile, Inc.
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Spanning palette changes
 Added OKRs to the palette
 The Milestones icon was removed, and its
content was merged into the new
Roadmap article.
 Added AI (Artificial Intelligence), which was
previously an extended guidance article
 Lean UX was moved to the body of the BP
 Measure & Grow article combines the
content from the previous metrics and
measure and grow articles. The icon was
renamed accordingly.
© Scaled Agile, Inc.
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Enterprise Solution Delivery
 Updated Enterprise Solution Delivery best practices
 New Pre-Plan describes the Solution Train activities necessary to prepare ARTs for PI
Planning
 New Coordinate and Deliver describes the practices necessary to deliver large solutions
across multiple ARTs and suppliers in a Solution Train
© Scaled Agile, Inc.
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Program Terminology has been phased-out
 Program is often associated
with traditional project and
program management.
 Program Increment is now PI
(Planning Interval)
© Scaled Agile, Inc.
From
To
Agile Program Management Office
Value Management Office
Program Backlog
ART Backlog
Program Board
ART Planning Board
Program Epic
ART Epic
Program Execution
ART Execution
Program Increment
Planning Interval
Program Kanban
ART Kanban
Program PI Objectives
ART PI Objectives
Program Predictability Measure
ART Predictability Measure
Program Risks
ART PI Risks
SAFe Program Consultant
SAFe Practice Consultants (SPCs)
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Standardize Solution Terminology
 Solution Train artifacts and events
were standardized for consistency
 Solution Arch/Eng was replaced by
Solution Architect (same for
Sys Arch/Eng)
© Scaled Agile, Inc.
From
To
Solution Arch/Eng
Solution Architect
Solution Backlog
Solution Train Backlog
Solution Board
Solution Train Planning Board
Solution Epic
Solution Train Epic
Solution Kanban
Solution Train Kanban
Solution PI Objectives
Solution Train PI Objectives
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Other Terminology Changes
 Changed DSU and SoS to be consistent
with other similar SAFe’s events:
•
•
•
•
PO Sync
ART Sync
Architect Sync
Portfolio Sync
 Sync better reflects that these events are
primarily for coordination not status reporting
From
To
Daily Standup
Team Sync
Lean Systems And
Solution Engineering
Lean Systems Engineering
Scrum of Scrums
Coach Sync
ScrumXP
SAFe Scrum
 Scrum Master can be called a Team Coach
or Scrum Master depending on context
© Scaled Agile, Inc.
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