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When the Agile manifesto was launched in 2001, most companies were skeptical. Today, agility is on everyone’s agenda. From Microsoft to Google, every successful organization is looking for ways to implement agile principles into its workflow.
The point here is simple - Agile transformation helps organizations build a stable backbone that allows them to adapt, adjust, and respond to ever-changing customer requirements.
Studies have shown that highly successful agile transformations typically deliver a 30% gain in efficiency, operational performance, and customer satisfaction. But how can you make these transformations happen for your organization?
Enter SAFe.
The scaled Agile framework is a set of organizational and workflow patterns that help organizations adopt Agile principles and practices at scale. Let’s explore in-depth how SAFe can unlock the power of agility and how it can impact your career.
Top Ways SAFe Can Unlock Business Transformation!
- Focusing on User Experience
Change is indeed the only constant in the business world. Yet even the changes happening today are different - They have become increasingly complex. Traditional software development methods won't help you respond to these disruptions.
Let’s justify the above statement!
The so-called waterfall model follows a sequential process - From requirement gathering to design to development to testing and deployment. This method has a linear and logical approach where the team needs to complete one project phase before moving on to the next. It requires extensive planning up front and allows little flexibility for the teams to make changes.
Imagine this: Your team is working on a crucial project, and halfway through, you realize there was a problem with a design concept from the start. With the waterfall method, it can take a lot of time and effort to fix this issue. You may even have to start the project from scratch.
The actual cost of using this method is compromising the user experience. Since it is difficult to make changes in the waterfall model, you cannot tweak the features of your application as per changing requirements to solve user problems.
SAFe Empowers Teams to Deliver Value Fast!
Businesses focus on scaled agile framework adoption to keep the user experience at the center of the development process. SAFe breaks down organizational silos into cross-functional teams and empowers them to respond to changes to build a solution that delivers value to users.
And it's more than delivering business outcomes. Scaled agile framework adoption fosters a learning environment and boosts collaboration to keep multiple teams in sync. One of the core principles of SAFe is to assume variability and preserve options meaning that development teams consider multiple design concepts from the start and continuously evaluate the economic and technology trade-off. With better collaboration and proper evaluation, you can amplify the product experience for users.
- Accelerating Time-to-market and Going After Value
Delivering constant value to customers is business 101 in the digital age. In a market where customers don’t hesitate to switch to competitors due to a bad experience, bringing your products to the market at the right time and in the right way gives you a significant competitive advantage.
Yet adding speed and agility to project management processes is not as easy as it seems. In a survey by Mckinsey, most executives report that organizational silos, unclear strategy, and slow decision-making process often delay the time to market and affect product quality.
Scaled agile framework adoption can help you change this. Many organizations report they have increased the time to market their product by 30-75% using SAFe. This is because the framework follows a series of steps to help you break down organizational silos.
Here’s how SAFe helps you create value for your organization:
- Working in smaller teams: With a smaller and more efficient team, you can build an ownership model for each team member so that they can focus on value creation instead of project completion.
- Enhanced collaboration: Communication and collaboration can drastically increase the speed at which the organization acts. With cross-functional teams regularly sharing their updates through stand-ups and meetings, there is transparency and a shortened feedback loop to ensure that the project does not get delayed.
- Faster decision-making: SAFe framework supports lean-agile development where information sharing is efficient to enable faster decision-making. The rapid learning model also facilitates shorter time-to-market.
- Giving Rise to Innovation
For most successful businesses like Amazon and Tesla, the source of their repeated success lies more directly in innovative thinking patterns. While agility and innovation are different things, they go hand-in-hand. You cannot imagine rapid innovation happening without agile development. And vice-versa.
Agile frameworks like SAFe inherently promote embracing the unknown through a mentality rooted in experimentation and iterative development.
Scaled agile framework adoption allows developers to focus on what matters the most - building a solution that solves an underlying problem customers face. It has strong principles and lean processes that help you navigate through uncertainties confidently and disrupt the market with innovative solutions.
How Can Learning SAFe Impact Your Career?
In the above conversation, we talked about how agility is the perfect replacement for traditional project management processes like the Waterfall methodology.
But it can also have a profound impact on your career.
Believe it or not, the pandemic has changed the organizational culture on many frontiers - where we work, when we work, and even how we work. The same situation rings true for post-pandemic work scenarios. With inevitable challenges arising in the workplace, thriving in such disruptive times requires a different mindset. Learning agile methodologies can help you develop that mindset. Knowing SAFe can help narrow gaps between insights, action, and impact.
Studies show that 70% of organizations either have a digital transformation strategy or are working on one. In such a changing environment, you need a solid career roadmap to grow your career. Whether you are stuck in a career rut or looking for opportunities to jump into a leadership role, learning SAFe can prove advantageous.
Go Forth with Agility Towards Career Growth!
The truth is that every business function is transforming - from marketing to analytics to administrative. Technologies like AI, RPA, and Blockchain are fueling this transformation further and giving business leaders many touchpoints to connect with their customers. During such times, it's time for you to step up and move forth with agility towards achieving your career goals.
And if you want to strengthen your foundation in SAFe and other agile methodologies, our training courses can help you. We offer SAFe, AWS, PMI PMP, and Scrum Alliance instructor-led training programs. Contact us today!
