SAFe (Scaled Agile Framework) — if SAFe were a school, it would be much like a huge public school with 1000 + students. A small magnet school scaled up!
It can also be scaled up to a huge University!
SAFe’s core — at the team-level — is Scrum (albeit, any Lean Agile way of working is acceptable). Scaled up to a team of agile teams (Agile Release Train (ART)) at a program-level. Scaled up to a team of team of agile teams at a large solutions level. On top of that, there is a portfolio-level with themes to connect to the enterprise’s strategy.
Its power is implied in the company’s name: 1) Scaled Agile (it has various levels: Portfolio, Large Solution, Program, Team) and … 2) it is a framework that you can customize (use spanning pallet) to fit your needs.
These are the two of many reasons why — I surmise — a lot of huge businesses (i.e. Finance, Technology, Fin-Tech businesses) are going for or has gone with and adapted SAFe with their transformation from waterfall to lean-agile.
How do we then take advantage of this scalability and customizable framework?
To be continued.
October 15, 2022: My new book, “SAFe Is Like …“, is now available on Amazon. 
You will get a FREE SIGNED COPY if/when you register, pay, and complete a class by the Lean Agile Guru.
