Your Scale, Your Rules! :: Mercedes-Benz.io 2022

1. Your Scale, Your Rules!
and how to survive SAFe
by Pedro Gustavo Torres
November 2022

2. Hello there!
Unicorn
“meter”
(10x)
Senior Engineering Leader
Leading Engineering for 14 years
Portuguese living and working from Portugal
CTO Portugal co-founder || Hey CTO! co-host
Investor and Advisor
Star Wars and Lego fan
Mostly vegetarian and Non-drinker
2015
2018
2022
(IPO)
Pedro Gustavo Torres

3. Disclaimer
This is based on my opinion and from others and should not be considered an absolute
truth.
I’m not a SAFe expert… I just know one thing or two about agility and software delivery
This will not be a presentation bashing SAFe.
This will not be a presentation bragging SAFe either.
No animals were harmed in the making of this presentation.

4. What is Agile?
How it all began…

5. What is Agile?
How it all began…

6. What is SAFe?
Scaled Agile Framework

7. What is SAFe?
Sale Agile Framework

8. What is SAFe?
Scaled Agile Ewok

9. Scaled Agile Framework
Dean Leffingwell, Creator of SAFe® and Chief Methodologist at
Scaled Agile, Inc.
Initial release in 2011
Core Values
Lean-Agile Mindset
SAFe Principles
What is SAFe?

10. What is SAFe?

11. What is SAFe?

12. What do (notable) people say
about it?
“Interesting” points-of-view 👀

13. SAFe isn’t the most loved framework out there
What do (notable) people I say about it?

14. SAFe isn’t the most loved framework out there
What do (notable) people I say about it?

15. SAFe isn’t the most loved framework out there
What do (notable) people say about it?

16. SAFe isn’t the most loved framework out there
What do (notable) people say about it?

17. SAFe isn’t the most loved framework out there
What do (notable) people say about it?

18. SAFe isn’t the most loved framework out there
What do (notable) people say about it?

19. SAFe isn’t the most loved framework out there
What do (notable) people say about it?

20. SAFe isn’t the most loved framework out there
What do (notable) people say about it?

21. SAFe isn’t the most loved framework out there
What do (notable) people say about it?

22. SAFe isn’t the most loved framework out there
What do (notable) people say about it?

23. SAFe isn’t the most loved framework out there
What do (notable) people say about it?

24. SAFe isn’t the most loved framework out there
What do (notable) people say about it?

25. SAFe isn’t the most loved framework out there
What do (notable) people say about it?
Tobias Mayer looking at the SAFE’s diagram during his keynote at CAS 2013:
“This one makes my head hurt… it makes me want to turn away from this… in sort of with a sense of despair to be honest”

26. Are there alternatives?
Other flavours of scaling 🍦

27. Other “paid” scaling paths
Are there alternatives?
PMI Disciplined
Agile® Delivery
(DAD)

28. Other “free” scaling paths
Are there alternatives?
Scrum of
Scrums

29. But you are “stuck” with SAFe
So now what? 󰤇

30. So you are left with a couple of choices
Disagree and Commit
Take inspiration from other implementations
Using it in a way that makes sense to you
Roll up your sleeves and own it
But you are “stuck” with SAFe

31. Disagree and Commit
Amazon’s secret sauce 🥫

32. Disagree and Commit

33. SAFe at Lego
Henrik Kniberg to the rescue! 🚑

34. SAFe at Lego

35. SAFe at Lego

36. F stands for Framework
So we can create or own flavour! 🎉

37. F stands for Framework

38. Take ownership
Make the most out of it! 💪

39. Take ownership

40. Take ownership

41. Closing thoughts
Takeaways 🛍

42. What do I think about SAFe?
There are some interesting ideas behind it (e.g. Iterations, PI Planning, Portfolio view, Continuous
Learning)
There are some things that I really dislike (e.g. Scrum Master, Product Owner, Solution Architects,
ART, lengthy PI, corporate buzzwords, agile buzzwords)
Just like Scrum you can (and should) customise it
Do whatever works for you
Transparency, Inspect and Adapt
Closing thoughts

43. What do I think about SAFe?
There are some interesting ideas behind it (e.g. Iterations, PI Planning, Portfolio view, Continuous
Learning)
There are some things that I really dislike (e.g. Scrum Master, Product Owner, Solution Architects,
ART, lengthy PI, corporate buzzwords, agile buzzwords)
Just like Scrum you can (and should) customise it
Do whatever works for you
Transparency, Inspect and Adapt
Closing thoughts

44. Your Scale, Your Rules!
Thank you!
November 2022