SAFe-Agilist SAFe 6 Agilist - Leading SAFe (SA) (6.0) Questions and Answers

The Continuous Delivery Pipeline represents the workflow, activities, and automation needed to deliver new functionality more frequently. The Continuous Delivery Pipeline is a key enabler of Agile Product Delivery, which is one of the core competencies of business agility in SAFe. The Continuous Delivery Pipeline consists of four elements: Continuous Exploration, Continuous Integration, Continuous Deployment, and Release on Demand. These elements help teams continuously explore customer needs, develop high-quality solutions, deploy them to various environments, and release them to customers when and where they want. References: Agile Product Delivery, Continuous Delivery Pipeline

Strategic Themes are highlighted in the workbook as:

“Differentiating business objectives that… Connect the portfolio to the Enterprise strategy.”

They provide context for budgeting and vision alignment across the organization.

Source:01 Workbook SA (6.0).pdf, Page 5-13

The "Relentless Improvement" pillar in the House of Lean supports:

“Let facts guide improvements” and encourages a culture of learning and innovation where “hypotheses are tested and changes are embraced without mercy or guilt.”

The SAFe Workbook emphasizes that:

“Large batch sizes increase variability… Small batches go through the system faster with lower variability.”

The workbook includes exercises demonstrating that smaller batch sizes reduce cycle time and increase predictability, while large batches slow flow and introduce delays.

Source:01 Workbook SA (6.0).pdf, Pages 2-54 to 2-56

SAFe describes DevOps as:

“DevOps tries to bridge the gap between new Features and stable solutions… DevOps joins development and operations to enable continuous delivery.”

This integration supports both speed and stability in software delivery.

Cadence and synchronization are applied in events like PI Planning:

“PI Planning provides cadence-based alignment of multiple Agile Teams… Synchronization allows all stakeholders to align and collaborate.”

Planning adjustments are agreed upon during the management review and problem-solving meeting in the PI planning event. The management review and problem-solving meeting is a session that occurs at the end of day one of the PI planning event. In this session, the management team reviews the draft plans of all the teams in the ART, identifies any issues or risks that need to be resolved, and proposes any changes or adjustments that are necessary to achieve the program objectives. The management team then communicates their feedback and recommendations to the teams on day two of the PI planning event. References: PI Planning, Management Review and Problem-Solving

SAFe describes Continuous Deployment as:

“An aspect of the Continuous Delivery Pipeline that enables faster delivery of new functionality to customers.”

By automating the pipeline and decoupling deployment from release, enterprises can release value more frequently and responsively.

From the workbook's role definitions:

"Scrum Master/Team Coach Responsibilities: Supporting Iteration Execution, Improving ART Performance, Facilitating PI Planning, Building High-Performing Teams."

This makes "supporting iteration execution" a primary responsibility.

Source:Workbook, Lesson 3.1, Page 3-7

An enabling team is a type of cross-functional Agile team that is organized to assist other teams with specialized capabilities and help them become more proficient in new technologies. Enabling teams provide coaching, mentoring, training, and technical guidance to other teams in areas such as DevOps, test automation, security, compliance, etc. Enabling teams help other teams achieve the core competency of Technical Agility in SAFe. References: Cross-functional Agile Teams, Technical Agility

This statement is true about batch size. Batch size is the amount of work that moves as a unit through a process or system. Large batch sizes increase variability by creating more uncertainty, complexity, dependencies, and unpredictability in the workflow. Large batch sizes also increase waste by causing delays, queues, handoffs, rework, overproduction, and inventory accumulation. Reducing batch size is one of the key ways to optimize value delivery and improve flow efficiency. References: SAFe Lean-Agile Principles, SAFe Principle #5

Core Values - Scaled Agile Framework

According to the SAFe Agilist 6.0 domain of SAFe Core Values, alignment is one of the four core values that represent the foundational beliefs that are key to SAFe’s effectiveness1. Alignment includes the following practices:

Communicate the vision, mission, and strategy

Connect strategy to execution

Speak with a common language

Constantly check for understanding

Understand your customer

Establish flow

Enable decentralized decision-making

According to the SAFe Agilist 6.0 domain of Lean Thinking, a value stream is triggered by a demand for some value, such as a new feature, a change request, or a defect fix1. A feature is a service that fulfills a stakeholder need2. Therefore, a feature request is a valid trigger for a value stream.

A spike request is a type of exploration enabler that addresses technical uncertainty or risk3. A user story request is a type of backlog item that represents an end user goal or function4. These are not triggers for a value stream, but rather work items that flow through a value stream.

SAFe follows Kotter's 8-step change model. The workbook notes:

"Culture change comes last, not first. It is the outcome, not the precondition, of a successful transformation. Culture changes only after you have successfully demonstrated that the new way is superior to the old."

This confirms thatculture change follows behavioral change.

Source:SAFe Workbook, Section on Leading Change

SAFe emphasizes that effective DevOps implementation is key to enabling continuous value delivery. The workbook highlights that:

“DevOps helps ensure a constant flow of value by automating the Continuous Delivery Pipeline and enabling continuous integration and deployment… A Value Stream with DevOps capabilities implements automation and integration for consistent quality and faster delivery.”

This makes automation a cornerstone in enabling flow within a Value Stream.

According to the SAFe Agilist 6.0 domain of Apply SAFe Principles, this principle is the first Lean-Agile Principle and it describes how to make decisions based on economics1. One of the practices essential to achieving optimum economic outcomes is to deliver early and often, which means moving new system features through the development value stream as quickly as possible1. This practice has a direct economic benefit, as it enables faster feedback, higher value, and lower risk1. You can read more about this principle and practice in this article, under the section “Deliver early and often”.

Empathy maps are a tool associated with design thinking that help to understand the user’s needs, goals, pain points, and emotions. Empathy maps are visual representations of what the user thinks, feels, sees, hears, says, and does in relation to a problem or a solution. Empathy maps help to create a shared understanding of the user among the team and stakeholders, and to generate insights for designing user-centric solutions. Empathy maps can be created based on user research, interviews, observations, or personas123.

 1: Design Thinking - Scaled Agile Framework 2: TEN TOOLS FOR DESIGN THINKING - culturepartnership.eu 3: The Most Complete Design Thinking Tools & Resource Collections - Mockplus

Restoring the speed and innovation of the entrepreneurial network while leveraging the stability of the hierarchical system is a benefit of adopting a dual operating system. A dual operating system is a way of organizing an enterprise that combines two complementary structures: a traditional hierarchy that provides stability, alignment, and efficiency; and a network of empowered teams that provides speed, agility, and creativity. A dual operating system helps enterprises achieve organizational agility, which is one of the core competencies of business agility in SAFe. References: Organizational Agility, Dual Operating System

Strategic themes are an example of differentiating business objectives. Strategic themes are specific, itemized business objectives that connect a portfolio to the enterprise strategy. Strategic themes provide guidance and direction for portfolio vision, budget allocation, value stream identification, epic prioritization, and metric definition. Strategic themes help differentiate a portfolio from its competitors and create a unique value proposition for its customers. References: SAFe Portfolio, Strategic Themes

During the PI Planning simulation, the workbook details that:

“In the second team breakout, Business Owners circulate and assign business value to PI Objectives from low (1) to high (10)... This reflects the importance of the objectives and helps prioritize based on business impact.”

The purpose is toguide teamsin understanding what matters most to the business.

The SAFe House of Lean is based on:

“Goal: Value in the shortest sustainable lead time, with the best quality and people morale.”

This guides decisions and continuous improvement.

From the workbook section on forming cross-functional Agile Teams:

“Agile Teams are cross-functional self-organizing entities that can define, build, test, and—where applicable—deploy increments of value.”

“Optimized for communication and delivery of value” is also mentioned but for this question, the best indicators of a cross-functional team are thecapabilities of the team membersand their ability to deliver value independently.

The Lean Budget Guardrails defined in SAFe include "Guiding investments by horizon" as one of the main components. This ensures strategic alignment and responsible use of funds.

“Fund Value Streams; Lean budgets and Guardrails… Value Stream budgets adjusted dynamically…”