SAFe

Agile Manifesto

We are uncovering better ways of developing software by doing it and helping others do it. Through this work we have come to value: 1. Individuals and interactions over processes and tools 2. Working software over comprehensive documentation 3. Customer collaboration over contract negotiation 4. 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.

Coordination

When a value stream is too big for a single ART, then multiple ARTs are necessary to deliver that value, and they typically have functional, technical, and even personnel dependencies that need to be routinely managed. In this case, delivery of end-user value becomes dependent on synchronization of content management, integration, and releasing.

Program Level

Where funding for personnel and other resources are applied to some important, long-lived, enterprise mission. In the SAFe enterprise, most _______ are a one-for-one relationship with an Agile Release Train, each following the funding, governance and incremental development patterns of the ART to deliver their portion of a Value Stream. In this case, ARTs are generally very long-lived, and therefore have a more persistent structure and mission than a traditional ______, which more classically has a start and end date.

(4.0) Solution Architect/Engineering Team

Provide technical leadership for evolving architectural capabilities of the entire solution. This team operates at the value stream level.

Portfolio Vision

Captures strategic intent and provides guidance for purposeful investments of time, money and resources to achieve program portfolio objectives. Comprised of Value Streams, Strategic Themes, Business and Architectural Epic Kanbans and the Portfolio Backlog, the ______ ______ reflects an elaboration and commitment to action to the enterprise's business strategy.

Kaizen

Continuous Improvement

System Architect

Has the responsibility for maintaining a high level understanding of the user's needs, system requirements, and business benefits for a Release Train. ____ _____ provide guidance on Agile, intentional architecture, system level refactoring and redesign, Nonfunctional Requirements, foster emergent design and architectural flow, assist with understanding interfaces and dependencies, and facilitate interdependent team design decisions

(4.0) Enhanced Program Level

- Manage the flow of work through the Program Kanban System - Apply milestones to plan, execute and measure progress - Enhanced guidance for program execution - Enhanced communication with Vision and Roadmap updates - Customize to your context via Value Stream Level constructs

(4.0) SAFe Principles of Agile Architecture

1. Design emerges. Architecture is a collaboration. 2. The bigger the system, the longer the runway. 3. Build the simplest architecture that can possibly work. 4. When in doubt, code or model it out. 5. They build it, they test it. 6. There is no monopoly on innovation. 7. Implement architectural flow.

Agile Manifesto - 12 Principles

1. Our highest priority is to satisfy the customer through early and continuous delivery of valuable software. 2. Welcome changing requirements, even late in development. Agile processes harness change for the customer's competitive advantage. 3. Deliver working software frequently, from a couple of weeks to a couple of months, with a preference to the shorter timescale. 4. Business people and developers must work together daily throughout the project. 5. Build projects around motivated individuals. Give them the environment and support they need, and trust them to get the job done. 6. The most efficient and effective method of conveying information to and within a development team is face-to-face conversation. 7. Working software is the primary measure of progress. 8. Agile processes promote sustainable development. The sponsors, developers, and users should be able to maintain a constant pace indefinitely. 9. Continuous attention to technical excellence and good design enhances agility. 10. Simplicity--the art of maximizing the amount of work not done--is essential. 11. The best architectures, requirements, and designs emerge from self-organizing teams. 12. At regular intervals, the team reflects on how to become more effective, then tunes and adjusts its behavior accordingly.

Safe Lean-Agile Principles

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. Visualize and limit WIP, reduce batch sizes and manage queue lengths 7. Apply cadence, synchronize with cross-domain planning 8. Unlock the intrisic motivation of knowledge workers 9. Decentralize decision-making

Inspect and Adapt

4 hour meeting at the end of each PI consisting of: 1. PI Demo 2. Performance measures 3. Retrospective 4. Problem Solving Workshop. This is a regular ceremony that provides teams and groups time to reflect, problem solve, and identify improvement actions. Teams Demonstrate the current state of solution to the appropriate stakeholders, thereby getting the fast feedback they need to need to steer a proper course. Performance measures are collected and analyzed. This is followed by a Retrospective and Problem Solving Workshop, which generates improvement stories and other process learnings, which can then be immediately incorporated during Release Planning.

(4.0) Solution

A __________ is uniquely identified with one Value Stream, and is defined by _________ Intent. All the artifacts, roles, activities and principles of SAFe live for only one purpose: to help teams continuously deliver a ___________ that provides value to the customer. That in turn enables them to achieve their goals, which is the ultimate purpose of the endeavor. The __________ Context defines the environment in which the ________ operates.

System Architect/Engineering Team

A cross-discipline team that truly take a system view on solution development. It participates in the definition of the higher-level functional and non-functional requirements, analyzes trade-offs, determines the major components and subsystems, and defines the interfaces and collaborations between them. It understands the Solution Context and works with the Teams, Customers and Suppliers to ensure fitness for use in the Customer's environment. Provides guidance on Agile, intentional architecture, system level refactoring and redesign, Nonfunctional Requirements, foster emergent design and architectural flow, assist with understanding interfaces and dependencies, and facilitate interdependent team design decisions

Iteration Goals

A high-level summary of the business and technical goals that the team and product owner agree to accomplish in an iteration. In SAFe, ____ ____ are integral to the effective coordination of an Agile Release Train as a self-organizing, self-managing team of teams. They provide value by 1) aligning the individual team members and product owner to a common mission for the iteration ; 2) continually aligning the individual teams to the PI objectives, 3) providing a simple communication protocol between the teams, management, and business owners.

Weighted Shortest Job First (WSJF)

A lean method for determining backlog feature prioritization and job sequencing using the Cost Of Delay and remaining Job Size. This algorithm is applied at PI boundaries to continuously update program priorities based on current business context, time, value, development facts, risk, and effort considerations. Calculation ___ = CoD/Job Size where CoD = User/Business Value + Time Criticality + RR/OE (Risk Reduction/Opportunity Enablement) Value

Agile Release Train (ART)

A long-lived team of agile teams, typically consisting of 50-125 individuals, that serves as the program-level value delivery mechanism in SAFe. Using a common cadence, each _____ ______ ______ has the dedicated resources necessary to continuously define, built, test and deliver value to one of the enterprises value streams. Each _____ _____ _____ produces valuable and evaluate-able, system-level increments every two weeks, and additional PI, Program Increment milestones every 8-12 weeks. They can Release at any time in accordance with market needs.

Program Board

A matrix representation of all the features in a PI, across all teams/sprints, with lines connecting any inter-dependent features. Features with dependencies should be slated in sprints AFTER the dependent features are delivered.

DevOps

A philosophy of approach to software development and a set of practices that stresses communication, collaboration and close cooperation between the agile development teams and information technology professionals who are responsible for deploying and maintaining the software systems. This is accomplished, in part, by including IT/deployment/operations personnel as members of the Agile Release Train and by following a set of guidance practices.

(4.0) Set-based Design

A practice that maintains multiple requirements and design options for a longer period in the development cycle. Later, as the deadline approaches, it uses empirical data to collapse focus to the final design option. With such an approach, systems builders can assume variability and preserve options late into the game, providing for maximum flexibility of approach rather than binding early to a final option.

SAFe Economic Framework

A set of decision rules that aligns everyone to both the mission and the financial constraints, including budget considerations driven from the program portfolio. These are: 1. The Prime Imperative: Deliver Early and Often 2. Five Value Stream Economic Trade-off Parameters _i. Development Expense _ii. Cost (mfg, deploy, operations) _iii. Lead Time _iv. Risk _v. Value 3. SAFe Constructs for Economic Decision Making _ i. Lean-Agile Budgeting (fund value streams instead of projects) _ii. Epic Funding and Governance (Portfolio Kanban System and portfolio epics) _iii. Decentralized Economic Decision Making _iv. Job Sequencing Based on Cost of Delay (Program Kanban for flow, WSJF for priority) 4. Constructs Provide the Form; People Make the Decisions

Lean

A set of principles and practices that maximize customer value while minimizing waste and reducing time to market. The goal is sustainably shortest lead time, with best value to people and society. . ____ Thinking incorporates 5 major elements: . 1. the goal 2. kaizen (continuous improvement), . 3. product development flow, . 4. respect for people. 5. ___ -Agile Leadership. . ____ Thinking is essential to scaling agile practices to the enterprise level, and is therefore foundational to SAFe.

Intentional Architecture

A set of purposeful, planned architectural initiatives to enhance solution design, performance and usability - and which provides guidance for inter-team design and implementation synchronization.

Iteration Retrospective

A short meeting held at the the end of each Iteration, wherein team members gather in a private, safe environment to discuss the efficacy of their practices and define improvements for the upcoming period. The quantitative portion reviews any metrics the team is using; the qualitative part discusses the various team practices, and the specific challenges that presented themselves. When issues have been identified, teams identify corrective actions needed to address those issues.

Business Owners

A small group of management stakeholders who have the primary efficacy, governance, and ROI responsibility for the value delivered by a specific release train. They play a key role throughout the flow of value, and have particularly critical roles during Release Planning, where they participate in the management review and problem solving meeting, approve plans, and assign Business Value to Team PI Objectives.

Team PI Objectives

A summarized description of the specific business and technical goals that a team intends to achieve in the upcoming PI. During release planning, each team reviews the vision and any other input objectives, defines initial user stories, and plans them into iterations until their capacity is reached. They then use those results to reflect on the plan and synthesize and summarize the specific technical and business objectives for their team for that PI. The aggregation of each ___ ___ ________ becomes the program ______ ___________

Program PI Objectives

A summarized description of the specific goals and business values intended for the upcoming PI(s). _____ ___ ________ are derived by synthesizing the Team ___ ______ that are established by the teams during Release Planning.

Refactoring

A systematic approach to improving the code base without changing external system behavior. Specific _____ appear as Team Backlog items that are necessary to accomplish such things as increases in processing speed, different sourcing of internal data, security enhancements, or streamlining some aspect of the code to make it more efficient, more maintainable, or more readable.

Scrum Master

A team member with the primary responsibility to help the self-organizing, self-managing team meet its goals and commitments, and continuously improve performance. They understand and teach Scrum, Agile and Lean practices, encourage XP inspired technical practices, and foster the collaboration necessary to help identify and eliminate impediments, and constantly improve its performance.

Spikes

A type of story used for activities such as research, design, exploration, and prototyping. The purpose is to gain the knowledge necessary to reduce the risk of a technical approach, better understand a requirement, or increase the reliability of a Story estimate. They primarily come in two forms, technical and functional. Like other stories, they are estimated, owned by a team member, and are demonstrated at the end of the iteration.

(4.0) Domain Modeling

A way to describe and _______ real world entities and the relationships between them, which collectively describe the problem _______ space. Derived from an understanding of system-level requirements, identifying __________ entities and their relationships provides an effective basis for understanding and helps practitioners design systems for maintainability, testability, and incremental development.

Release Activities

Activities required to deliver software to the end-user, including: 1. Build a deployment pipeline: staging environment with all teams' code (system increment) updated daily, automated builds/deployments. 2. System validation - UAT testing, final NFR testing, integration testing with other systems, regulatory standards and other requirements 3. Documentation - ______ communication, end-user documentation, bill of materials, training, installation/deployment instructions, legal/regulatory/other approvals...

(4.0) Communities of Practice

An informal group of team members and other experts, acting within the context of a program or enterprise, that has a mission of sharing practical knowledge in one or more relevant domains.

Nonfunctional Requirements (NFR)

Describe system attributes such as security, reliability, maintainability, scalability, and usability (often referred to as the "qualities" or "ilities"). They can also be constraints or restrictions on the design of the system. These are persistent qualities and constraints, and unlike functional requirements, are typically revisited as part of the "Definition of Done". ____ exist at Team, Program and Portfolio Backlog levels.

Vision

Describes the stakeholders' (as captured by the Product Manager) view of the solution to be developed, in terms of stakeholders' needs and proposed features. It captures the essence of the envisaged solution in the form of high-level Features, Nonfunctional requirements, and design constraints while providing an overview of the system to be developed. It describes the purpose for the program and provides the boundaries against which future Features, Stories, and decisions are based. Continuously communicating the _____ to all team members is critical to creating alignment and a shared understanding of goals and objectives.

(4.0) Enterprise

Each SAFe portfolio contains a set of value streams and the additional constructs necessary to provide funding and governance for the products, services and solutions that the __________ needs to fulfill some element of the business strategy. In the small to midsize ________, one SAFe portfolio can typically be used to govern the entire technical solution set. In larger __________'s (typically between 500-1,000 technical practitioners), there can be multiple SAFe portfolios, one for each line of business. Regardless, the portfolio is not the entire business, and it's important to ensure that the portfolio solution set evolves to meet the needs of the __________. SAFe provides three (3) primary constructs for connecting the ___________ strategy to a portfolio: 1) Budget 2) Strategic Themes 3) Portfolio Context

Economic View (SAFe Principle #1)

Economic Framework 1. Development Expense 2. Cycle Time 3. Cost (mfg, release, operations, ..) 4. Value 5. Risk Ignore $$ already spent Sequence jobs for continuous flow of value Quantify Cost of Delay

Release

Embody the whole product solution, whereby the end user gets the full benefit of the developed working software, validated, packaged, documented, and supported by all the elements necessary to assure efficacy of the solution in the customers environment.

Epics

Enterprise initiatives that are sufficiently substantial in scope so as to warrant analysis and understanding of potential ROI before implementation. Typically cross-cutting and affect multiple organizations, release trains, and Program Increments. Require a lightweight business case that elaborates business and technology impact and implementation strategies. At the Portfolio level they affect multiple release trains; At the Program level they are contained to a single train. ______ have success criteria, while features have acceptance criteria.

(4.0) CapEx and OpEx

Enterprises provide funding to a SAFe portfolio to support development of the technical solutions that enable the enterprise to meet its business and financial objectives. These budgets may include both _________ and _________ elements. In accordance with accounting standards, enterprises may capitalize some percentage of the labor involved in creating software for sale or internal use. While software capitalization practices are well-established in many enterprises, they typicially are based on waterfall development. However, enterprises are often challenged to effectively treat these costs in an Agile environment. Often Finance will do one of two things: 1) they will block Agile and mandate waterfall development 2) they will expense all Agile development labor costs Neither option above optimizes economics over time.

Program Epics

Epics that are constrained to a single train. Because of their scope, impact and cost, they may be introduced through the kanban systems and portfolio backlog, or they may arise locally, but they require analysis and impact assessment—and some discussion with Program Portfolio Management—before implementation.

(4.0) Solution Context

Identifies critical aspects of the target solution environment and its impact on usage, installation, operating, support, and even marketing, packaging and selling. Understanding _________ ___________ is critical to value delivery; it impacts development priorities, Capabilities, Features, and Non-functional Requirements, and sets the focus for DevOps and other solution-level functions. __________ _________ drives the Solution Intent.

Architectural Collaboration

In the context of Agile enterprise software systems we need BOTH fast, local control of Emergent Design (so teams react appropriately to changing requirements without excessive attempts to future-proof the system) AND global control of Intentional Architecture (the guidance needed to assure that the system as a whole has conceptual integrity and efficacy). Achieving the right balance of Emergent Design and Intentional Architecture drives the effective evolution of the system.

(4.0) Lean-Agile Mindset

Includes the SAFe House of Lean and the Agile Manifesto

ART Metrics

Includes: self-assessments that can be used to assess the organizational health of each Agile Release Train and Agile Team; Iteration and Program Increment ______ are designed to help teams measure their asset health of the software they are building; and progress reports which help all stakeholders understand the progress of each Feature in a Release. The following are different flavors of ____ ____: 1. Iteration Metrics - reviewed at the team retrospective, can include FUNCTIONALITY: velocity (planned vs. actual), stories (planned vs. accepted), QUALITY: %unit test coverage, #defects, #new test cases, #new test cases automated, total tests, total % test automated, #Refactors. 2. SAFe ScrumXP Team Self-Assessment - Done on a periodic basis. produces a radar chart (aka "spider web") highlighting relative strengths and weaknesses. 3. ART Self-assessment - Done on a PI boundary, produces a radar chart with slightly different criteria than #2. 4. Release Progress Reports - overall release burn-down, feature progress report 5. PI Metrics - rollup of iteration metrics (#1), Release Predictability Measure (want to strive for 80-100% objectives achieved)

(4.0) Business Epics

Large customer-facing initiatives that encapsulate the new development necessary to realize the benefits of some new business opportunity. These are captured and analyzed in the Portfolio Kanban System. Those that are approved wait in the Portfolio Backlog until resources are available for implementation.

(4.0) Supplier

Lean-Agile organizations deliver value to their customers in the shortest possible lead time and with the highest possible quality. Wherever applicable, they engage _____________s to develop and deliver components and subsystems that help them achieve their mission. ___________ possess unique and distinctively competent skills and solutions and are experts in their technology. They can provide a high leverage point for fast and economical delivery. _____________ therefore participate in most Value Streams and value delivery is dependent on their performance. ________ play a key role in SAFe. Due to their unique Capabilities and Solutions, they represent significant economic value opportunities. __________ can be internal or external to the enterprise, but they have their own mission and solutions to deliver to other clients as well. In order for both organizations to achieve optimal results, close collaboration and trust are required. ____________ may or may not be Agile, however either way they are treated as a separate Agile Release Train and participate in all the value stream ceremonies. SAFe Enterprises help their __________ become more Lean and Agile, to the economic benefit of both organizations.

Kanban

Meaning "signboard" in Japanese, ________ is a pull system that helps teams facilitate the flow of value by visualizing workflow, establishing WIP limits, measuring throughput and continuously improving their process. A __________ system is built up of workflow states, most of which have WIP limits. A few states (typically the beginning and end states) are not WIP-limited. The team defines the WIP limits and adjusts them. One way to measure flow is via CFD (cumulative flow diagram) that compares the "arrival curve" (to-do) against the "departure curve" (done). Also _________ can implement "classes of service" (standard, fixed date and expedite) to adjust to external pressures, milestones and dependencies. On the ________ board, classes of service are typically depicted as swimlanes.

Scrum of Scrums

Meets weekly (or more frequently) to discuss the health of the release train and to keep all the teams in synch. Gives visibility into progress, risks. dependencies and impediments. Answer typical 3 questions: Y)esterday, T)oday, B)locking. The RTE conducts the _____ _____ ______ meeting and holds a "meet after" session afterwards to address improvements.

(4.0) Team Kanban

Most teams use Scrum as their agile method. But some teams use ______ _______, particularly System Teams, DevOps and maintenance teams. In these contexts the response mandate, the rapid-fire nature of the work, fast-changing priorities and the lower value of planning the next PI make this their method of choice. However, these teams are still "on the train" and certain rules of the train must be applied. Generally, such teams don't invest as much time estimating or tasking as Scrum teams do; rather, they look at the needed work, split the bigger items where necessary and drive the resulting stories to completion mostly without concern for their size. However SAFe teams still need to estimate demand against capacity for PI planning, and they also participate in the economic estimation of larger backlog items. Their velocity is also understood and communicated throughout the entire ART.

Shu Ha Ri

Obey, Digress, Separate - 3 stages of Aikido

System Demo

Occurs every two weeks and provides an aggregate—and integrated—view of a system increment, ALL the new software that has been delivered by ALL the teams in the PROGRAM up to that point. Often hosted by the System Team, this is used to get feedback from the primary stakeholders, including Product Management, management, customers (or customer proxies), on the efficacy and usability of the system under development. This is in contrast to the Team Sprint Demo (also occurring every 2 weeks), which is focused on a SINGLE team's user stories completed during the recent sprint.

System Team

Often responsible for providing assistance in building and utilizing the development environment infrastructure and evaluating the system increments. This can include development and maintenance of continuous integration, build environments, testing platforms, and testing automation frameworks, and integrating code from Agile Teams. Also has the skills and tools needed to perform end-to-end system testing, demonstrate solutions to stakeholders, and assist with Nonfunctional Requirements system testing.

(4.0) Value Stream Engineer

Plays a similar role to the RTE at the Value Stream level. That is, facilitating and guiding the work of all ARTs and Suppliers. Most typically, RTEs and ____'s have a background as program or development managers and operate most effectively as servant leaders. They have a solid understanding of scaling Lean and Agile, and they understand the unique opportunities and challenges associated with facilitating and continuously aligning a large development program.

(4.0) Solution Management

Plays much the same role that Product Management plays, but at the value stream level. There it serves as part of the critical troika -- _________ ________, Value Stream Engineer, and Solution Architect/Engineering -- that shares much of the responsibility for solution success. ___________ __________ is responsible for the solution intent, which captures and documents fixed and variable solution-level behaviors. They also work with Release Management where applicable. Responsibilities include working with portfolio stakeholders, customers and ARTs to understand needs and build/prioritize the solution backlog. They have similar vision, roadmap, value stream Kanban, and solution demo activities as well.

Roadmap

Provides a view of the intended deliverables, such as Features, Epics, Releases and other milestones, over a timeline horizon of approximately 3-6 months. Typically includes HIGH-confidence Feature visibility into the upcoming Program Increment, MEDIUM-confidence visibility into the next, and relatively LOWER confidence thereafter. The ______ is developed/maintained by PM as the vision/release strategy evolve.

Team Backlog

Represents the collection of all the things a team needs to do to advance their portion of the program solution. It can contain user and technical Stories, future Features, defects, infrastructure work, Spikes, Refactors, and anything else a team needs to do. Specific capacity allocations by Story type are often used to guide investment in the various types of work the team needs to do.

Program Portfolio Management

Represents the highest-level fiduciary and content authority in a program portfolio. These responsibilities rest with the business executives who have the necessary knowledge and best understand the internal financial constraints and external market conditions for each Value Stream.

Epic Owner

Responsible for driving individual Epics from identification, through the kanban systems and analysis process, to the go/no-go decision making process, and when accepted for implementation, working with the Release Train to initiate the development activities necessary to realize the benefits of the epic.

Safe House of Lean

Roof = VALUE Pillars: 1. Respect for people and culture 2. Flow 3. Innovation 4. Relentless Improvement Foundation = LEADERSHIP

Done

SAFe definition of _____: 1. Working Software 2. System Increment 3. Release

Innovation and Planning

SAFe provides for this periodically via special sprints, which serve a variety of purposes, including: providing an estimating buffer for meeting objectives; a dedicated time for Inspect and Adapt and Release Planning activities; a cadence-based opportunity for innovation; time for continuing education; time for working on the technical infrastructure, tooling, and any other impediments; and time for backlog refinement. In addition, in the case where the PI milestone also constitutes a Release, the _________ and _______ iteration provides time for any final system validation and documentation activities that may be required.

Product Management

Serves as the content authority for the Agile Release Train and is responsible for defining and prioritizing the Program Backlog, as well as prioritizing Features to be included in a Program Increment and Release. They work with internal and external stakeholders, including Product Owners, to optimize feature delivery in balance with the enterprise's technical, functional, and economic objectives.

Feature

Services provided by the system that fulfill one or more stakeholder needs. They are maintained in the Program Backlog and are sized to fit in a Program Increment so that each PI provides a increment of conceptual integrity. They bridge the gap between User Stories (sized to fit in iterations) and Epics (which span PIs). Because the primary economic program benefit is driven by judicious prioritization and sequencing, SAFe applies the lean economic algorithm of Weighted Smallest Job First (WSJF) for continuous prioritization. Rather than using the Story format, ______ are best described in terms of a _____ / Benefit Matrix, which is more the custom of Product Management.

Problem Solving Workshop

Session wherein teams incorporate root-cause analysis to systematically address the larger impediments that are limiting velocity. Here are the steps: 1. Agree on the problem to solve 2. Apply root-cause analysis - Ishikara fishbone diagram, 5 Why's, Pareto Chart 80/20 ("star vote" on leading causes) 3. Restate the New Problem for the Biggest Root Cause 4. Brainstorm solutions 5. Identify improvement backlog items

(4.0) Capability

Similar to a Feature; however it describes higher-level solution behavior, and often takes multiple ARTs to implement. _________s are sized to fit within individual PI's to assure that each PI delivers incremental and measurable value. May originate in the local context of the solution or occur as a result of splitting portfolio epics that may cut across more than one Value Stream. Another potential source of __________s is the Solution Context, where some aspect of the environment may require new solution functionality. They are written using a phrase, statement of benefits and acceptance criteria. ___________'s are split into Features for implementation.

Strategic Themes

Specific, itemized business objectives, new business differentiators that connect the portfolio vision to the evolving enterprise business strategy. They provide business context for decision-making within the portfolio, affecting investment in value streams and release trains, and serve as inputs to the Portfolio and Program Backlogs.

(4.0) Enablers

Technical initiatives meant to enable and support development of business initiatives. _________ are reflected in red on the Big Picture and exist on all 4 levels of SAFe. __________ generally fall into one of 3 categories: 1. Exploration - used to build an understanding of what's needed, understand prospective solutons and evaluate alternatives 2. Architecture - used to build the Architectural Runway 3. Infrastructure - used to build and enhance development, testing and deployment environments

Release Train Engineer (RTE)

The "Chief Scrum Master" who facilitates program-level processes and program execution, escalates impediments, manages risk, and helps drive program-level continuous improvement. Responsible for facilitating program events such as Release Planning, the Inspect & Adapt Workshops, and the Scrum of Scrums.

Stories

The Agile replacement for traditional forms of requirement specifications. _____ are small, independent behaviors that can be implemented incrementally, each of which provides value to the business. _____ are not requirements, in that they are generally negotiable and represent a statement of intent rather than a contractually required behavior. However, through acceptance criteria, ____ get more specific as they are implemented, providing the necessary specificity for assuring system compliance and regression testing. _____ are split as necessary so they can be completed in a single iteration. _____ also follow the XP alliteration of the 3C's: Card (short statement of intent), Conversation (discussion with the user/product owner and team), and Confirmation (acceptance criteria which define the conditions of satisfaction for the completed ____ ).

Agile Teams

The SAFe atomic software development unit, a cross-functional group of individuals with the ability and authority to define, build, and test value. _______ ________ of 7 +/- 2 members are dedicated to a single Agile Release Train, including developers, testers, any specialized resources, a Scrum Master, and a Product Owner. ________ _______ apply Scrum project management practices, XP inspired Code Quality practices, and have an understanding of lean thinking, flow, and work in process. Some _____ ______ use Scrumban or kanban, depending on their role in the train.

Lean-Agile Development Manager

The __________ _________ ________ _________ (or engineering manager for system development) is a manager who exhibits the principles and practices of Lean-Agile leadership. A summary of responsibilities is: 1) Personnel and Team Development 2) Program Execution 3) Build relationships with suppliers, subcontractors, consultants, partners and stakeholders 4) Alignment 5) Transparency 6) Built-in Quality 7) Foster Communities of Practice 8) Sponsor tech. skills development in support of high-quality code 9) Understand and support Agile Architecture

(4.0) MBSE (Model-based Systems Engineering)

The application of modeling of requirements, design, analysis and verification activities as a cost-effective way to learn about system characteristics prior to construction.

Release Management

The authority responsible for governing releases across one or more release trains. Their primary responsibility is to coordinate and facilitate the delivery of General Availability software, or internal, production-ready solutions.

(4.0) Implementing 1-2-3

The basic pattern for successful SAFe adoption, consisting of the following steps: 1. Train lean-agile change agents 2. Train executives, managers and leaders 3. Train teams and launch the ARTs

Iteration Planning (not PI)

The ceremony during which all team members plan the upcoming iteration. The output of the meeting includes: the sprint backlog, consisting of the stories and acceptance criteria committed to the sprint; a statement of sprint goals, which are the business objectives of the sprint; and finally, a commitment by the team to the work needed to achieve the goal.

Emergent Design

The evolutionary process of discovering and extending the design only as necessary to implement and validate the next increment of functionality. Teams use their new coding languages, testing tools, and refactoring skills to rapidly evolve the design in accordance with the then-current requirements. _____ ______ works well, up to a point.

Architectural Runway

The existing technical infrastructure, instantiated in code, necessary to support the implementation of upcoming features without excessive, delay-inducing, redesign. Each Release Train endeavors to continuously extend this so as to be sufficient to support the successful implementation of features over the next one to two Program Increments.

SAFe Core Values

The fundamental beliefs in SAFe for a person or organization. They are: 1. Alignment 2. Tranparency 3. Built-in Quality 4. Program Execution

Portfolio Backlog

The highest-level backlog in SAFe, and serves as a holding stage for Epics that make it through the Kanban systems and await implementation. It contains the prioritized set of Business and Architectural Epics necessary to achieve market differentiation, operational efficiencies, or competitive solutions.

(4.0) Architectural Epics

The large technology initiatives necessary to evolve portfolio solutions in order to support current and future business needs. _________ ______ are captured and analyzed in the Portfolio Kanban System. Those that are approved wait in the Portfolio Backlog until resources are available for implementation.

Product Owner

The member of the team responsible for defining and prioritizing the Team Backlog so as to streamline the execution of program priorities, while maintaining conceptual and technical integrity of the features or components the team is responsible for. Also serves as part of the extended Product Management-______ _______ team, who together, have the authority for what gets developed. In addition has a significant role in assuring user value and solution quality, and is the only team member empowered to accept new stories into the system baseline.

Release (PI) Planning

The seminal, cadence-based synchronization point of the Agile Release Train. _______ _______ is a routine, program-scale, face-to-face event with a standardized agenda that includes presentation of vision, team planning breakouts, and commitment to objectives for the next Program Increment.

Value Streams

The series of system definition, development, and deployment process steps used to provide a continuous flow of value to the business, customer, or end user. Each should be a compelling, longer-term initiative that drives programs that ultimately differentiate an enterprise from its competitors. Agile Release trains are formed inside ____ _____ to simplify development, eliminate unnecessary steps and handoffs, and to accelerate the delivery of value via implementation of Lean and Agile principles and practices.

Program Backlog

The single, definitive repository for all the upcoming work anticipated to satisfy the Agile Release Train objectives. It primarily includes future Features intended to address user needs and deliver business benefits, and also includes the Architectural Features required to build the Architectural Runway necessary to host the upcoming feature backlog.

Team Demo

The traditional, Scrum-prescribed ceremony where the team demonstrates the results of the work done in the iteration. The purpose of the ____ _____ is to measure the team's progress by showing working software to the Product Owner, other team members, and other relevant stakeholders. The preparation begins when the sprint is planned—teams start thinking about how they will demonstrate the stories during Sprint Planning. Teams should be able to present every Story, Spike, Refactor, and new NFR.

Portfolio Metrics

These include a self-assessment that can be used to better understand the state and progress of the Program Portfolio Management function itself; _____ which track portfolio epics as they move though the kanban system and into implementation; and a summary set of Lean _____ that can be used to assess the overall health of the entire program portfolio. They consist of the following: 1. Lean ________ _________ - used to assess internal and external progress for the entire portfolio. In the spirit of "the simplest set of measures that can possibly work", lays out a simple chart of Benefit, Expected Result and Metric Used. E.g. "Time To Market", "More Frequent Releases", "Number of Releases Per Year". 2. Portfolio Kanban Board - makes cross-program business initiatives visible, with the upper-half containing Architectural Epics and the lower-half containing Business Epics. The categories are: Funnel, Review, Analysis, Portfolio Backlog and Implementing. 3. Measuring Epics - Epic Burn-up Report (using story points), Epic Progress Report (done, in-progress, approved), Epic Success Criteria 4. Portfolio Management Self-Assessment - similar to ART self-ssessment (radar diagram) but different metrics (portfolio kanban, budgets, value streams, program management, portfolio metrics, program portfolio management team, strategy and Investment Funding, governance) 5. Enterprise Balanced Scorecard - assessment for each business unit

Developers and Testers

These people comprise the majority of an Agile Team. _________ write the code for the User Stories and conduct research, design, and prototyping with Spike stories. The _________'s responsibilities include collaborating with the Product Owner and testers to make sure the right code is being developed; pairing, writing the code, unit tests, and automated acceptance tests; and checking new code into the shared repository every day. ______ work collaboratively and in parallel with developers and Product Owners to define, write, and execute acceptance tests, as well as maintain the test cases in a shared repository.

Budgets

These provide the operating boundaries for the investment in people, expenses and other resources for an Agile Release Train. SAFe's Lean-Agile _______ approach eliminates the overhead and friction of project-based cost accounting, and instead allocates resources to long-lived teams of teams, each dedicated to implementing a portion of a value stream.

Iteration

This (synonymous with sprint) is a strict time-box in which teams deliver incremental value in the form of working, tested software. Each has a standard pattern: plan the ___; commit to a goal; execute; demo the work to the key stakeholders; and, finally, hold a Retrospective, wherein the team analyzes and determines changes necessary to improve its performance.

Code Quality

This is a mindset, culture, and set of technical of practices which help teams deliver: higher system quality; high velocity and agility; opportunity for enhanced innovation; and helps support the intrinsic motivation and pride of software development professionals. _____ _____ is one of the four Core Values of SAFe and is achieved in large part through adoption of Test-First Methods, Agile Architecture, Continuous Integration, and Refactoring, all of which are described in SAFe, plus pair work and collective ownership.

Program Increment (PI)

This is to the ART what a sprint is to the team—a cadence-based _______ ________ of time and value suitable for assessing system status, getting feedback, improving processes, re-planning, and portfolio-level review and road-mapping.

Portfolio Kanban

This system brings visibility, work in process (WIP) limits, and continuous flow to Portfolio Level Business and Architectural Epics. This system is typically under the auspices of the CTO/technology office, which typically includes Enterprise and System Architects.SAFe applies a _______ ________ system for the following reasons: * makes the strategic business initiative backlog fully visible * brings structure and visibility to the analysis and decision-making that moves these initiatives into implementation * provides WIP limits to ensure that the teams responsible for analysis undertake it responsibly and don't create expectations for implementation or unrealistic timeframes * helps drive collaboration among the key stakeholders in the business * provides a quantitative, transparent basis for economic decision making for these, the most important business decisions SAFe does this by filtering Epics through these stages: 1. Funnel - capture state 2. Review - preliminary estimates of opportunity, effort and cost of delay are given 3. Analysis - where more thorough work is done to establish viability, measure benefit, development and deployment impact, and potential availability of resources. A lightweight business case is developed. The epic is approved or rejected at the end of this stage. 4. Portfolio Backlog - epics given the "go" approval wait in this stage until capacity is available 5. Implementation - when capacity is available epics are transferred to the relevant program and value stream kanbans, where implementation begins. Epics can subsequently be tracked at the Portfolio using Metrics. 6. Done - the epic is done when it has met its success criteria

User Experience (UX)

While Agile Teams have the full responsibility for implementing the code, including the user interface (UI) elements, the ___ _____ designer works at the Program Level to provide cross-component and cross-program design guidance so as to provide a consistent _______ _______ across all the components and systems of the solution.

Enterprise Architect

Works with business stakeholders and System Architects to drive holistic technology implementation across programs. The ______ ______ relies on continuous customer and team feedback, fosters adaptive design and engineering practices and drives collaboration of programs and teams around a common technical vision.

(4.0) Shared Services

_____ ______ in SAFe are those roles that are necessary for success of a Value Stream, but that cannot be dedicated to a specific train. These resources may include security specialists, information architects, DBAs, documentation, quality assurance, IT, and more. As the resources are specialized, often single-sourced and typically quite busy, each ART has to actively understand and plan to get the resources they need, when they need them. In some cases the resources must be *leading* and proactively track ahead (e.g. security, information architecture), whereby they contribute directly to the Architectural Runway that supports new Capability or Feature development. In other cases, the resources are *trailing* (e.g. IT/Deployment, support, customer training, localization) and being supportive and reactive is sufficient. In either case the _______ ___________ must travel synchronously with the ART to support its programs.

Feature/Benefit Matrix

______ / ______ Matrix _____: short phrase, giving a name and some implied context to the _____ _____: a brief description of the _____ to the user and the business. There may be multiple ______ per _____ which are highlighted here

(4.0) Lean-Agile Leaders

_______ ______ _______ _______ are ultimately responsibility for adoption, success and ongoing improvement of Lean-Agile development. These people are made up of the Enterprise's existing managers, leaders and executives. They are lifelong learners and teachers who help teams build better systems through understanding and exhibiting the Lean-Agile Mindset, SAFe Principles, and systems thinking. Such leaders exhibit the behaviors below: 1. Lead the Change 2. Know the Way; Emphasize Lifelong Learning 3. Develop People 4. Inspire and Align with Mission; Minimize Constraints 5. Decentralize Decision Making 6. Unlock the Intrinsic Motivation of Knowledge Workers

(4.0) Customer

_______ are the ultimate economic buyer of every solution. They are part of the Value Stream, and are inseparable from the process. They work frequently with Solution and Product Management to shape the Solution Intent, Vision and Economic Framework in which development occurs. They have strong influence in defining and prioritizing the solution's development and are active participants in solution planning, demos and process improvement.

(4.0) Solution Intent

________ __________ is the critical knowledge repository to store, manage and communicate what system builders are building and how they are going to build it. It serves many purposes: * provides a single source of truth as to the intended and actual behavior of the solution * records and communicates requirements, design and system architecture decisions * facilitates further exploration and analysis activities * aligns the customer, the system builders and suppliers to a common purpose * supports compliance and contractual obligations The ________ _________ consists of variable and fixed contents. Much of this information reflects the intended behavior of the solution -- Features and Capabilities, Stories, Nonfunctional Requirements, System Architecture, domain-level models and designs (e.g. electrical and mechanical), interfaces, customer specifications, tests and test results, traceability, etc. Other relevant information records some of the key decisions and findings about the system. This may include information from trade studies, results of experiments, rationale for design choices, and so forth.