top of page

What is new in SAFe 6.0?

Updated: Jul 24, 2023

What is SAFe 6.0?

SAFe 6.0 is an all-inclusive update of SAFe 5.1. This updated version has a new Big Picture, terminology updates, advanced practices, and new features. SAFe courses have also been updated as per the latest version.


What is new in SAFe 6.0?

The updated version of SAFe 6.0 has 6 primary themes-

1. Strengthening the Foundation for Business Agility- To face the challenges of the competitive world many upgrades have been made in the foundation as well as the Value Stream. To improve the business agility many details has been revised. Let’s take a look at the changes in brief-

  • Business Agility Value Stream has been introduced at the top of the Big Picture.

  • The articles in SAFe Foundation have been enhanced with the following changes-

  • Changes in the Lean-Agile Mindset

  • The House of Lean has been removed as all its features have been applied throughout the framework.

  • Principle #6 of the SAFe Principles is changed to “Make value flow without interruptions”.

  • SAFe implementation Roadmap has been updated with critical changes-

  1. Waterfall/Ad Hoc Agile step is removed.

  2. SAFe Executive Workshop toolkit is added to the ‘Go SAFe’ step.

  3. Lean-Agile Center of Excellence has clarified its responsibilities.

  4. Organize Around Value is renamed.

  5. SAFe Value Stream and ART identification workshop toolkit is added.

  6. Enhance the Portfolio is renamed.

  7. Accelerate signifies never-ending transformation journey.

  • SAFe Program Consultants have been renamed as SAFe Practice Consultants.

  • Continuous Learning Culture is added to the foundation.


2. Empowering Teams and clarifying responsibilities- many changes in the roles and responsibilities of the agile team has been done to improve efficiency. The roles that have been redefined and added are as follows-

  • Agile Release Train

  • Agile Teams

  • Scrum Master/Team Coach

  • Epic Owners

  • Business Owners

  • Enterprise Architects

  • Product Owner

  • Lean Agile Center of Excellence

  • Product management

  • Release Train engineer

  • System Architect

  • Solution Train Engineer

  • SAFe Practice Consultant

  • Solution Management

3. Accelerating value flow- In SAFe 6.0 many changes has been made in order to keep the value flow at pace with the challenges. Those changes are-

  • Eight value flow properties have been defined.

  • Eight value flow accelerators have been introduced.

  • SAFe Principle #6 has been updated.

  • The article Kanban has been renamed as SAFe Team Kanban.

  • SAFe Scrum has replaced Scrum XP.

  • Built-in Quality key domains and practices have been redefined.

  • Value Stream Management has been added to the Big picture as a Portfolio Level responsibility.

  • There is a change in focus of Agile Program Management Office, which is now renamed as Value Management Office.

  • Applying Kanban in SAFe has been created in the SAFe extended guidance article.

4. Enhancing Business Agility with SAFe across the business- All the parts has to undergo changes for Lean-Agile Transformation. Business and Technology patterns have been defined. SAFe practices have been extended beyond IT department.


5. Building the future with AI, Big Data and Cloud- The advancement in technologies help in simplifying the work. In SAFe 6.0 three new articles have been added to the Big Picture-

  • Artificial Intelligence

  • Big Data

  • Cloud

6. Delivering better outcomes with Measure and Grow and OKRs

  • Measure & Grow is the new name of the metrics icon on the spinning palette.

  • OKRs are added to the spanning palette that describes the portfolio’s Strategic Themes.

Why was a version upgrade needed?

The pandemic overwhelmed us with harsh realizations not only on individual level but also at an organizational level. The rapid change in need, expectations and complex technologies stirred a commotion in the business world but at the same time it opened a vast ocean of opportunities and innovations. SAFe has become an integral part of many organizations in different sectors worldwide to implement business agility. But, to balance the changes after the pandemic, new challenges had to be encountered. The latest version was thus required to bring in the solution for the latest problems and also to deal with the change in customer expectations. The official tagline of the latest version summarizes the point of its need:

“Work Differently. Build the Future.”



Other changes in the version

  • Each backlog system and its Kanban article have been merged.

  • Changes have been made to the spanning palette.

  • The Solution Delivery has been improved with the help of field experience and customer feedback.

  • ART Terminology has replaced the terminology for program throughout the framework.

  • In this version Solution Train artifacts and events are standardized.

  • Many other terminology changes have been made to maintain consistency.


What is new in SAFe 6.0?
Exploring the Exciting Features of SAFe 6.0: Discover the Latest Enhancements in the Scaled Agile Framework.

What is Scaled Agile Framework?

The Scaled Agile Framework or SAFe is a set of patterns, tools, and practices that helps to implement Agile principles at an enterprise level. It is one of the most popular scaling frameworks in different sectors due to its accuracy and disciplined work ethics. Primarily, SAFe was referred through a big picture view that showed the workflow from product management to customers. However, it was only formally described in 2007 in a book. SAFe has been continuously developed and updated since its first release in 2011. Six major versions have been released with the latest one being SAFe 6.0.


Conclusion

Conclusion on What is new in SAFe 6.0? The introduction of new features, changes, and removal of unnecessary old articles in SAFe version 6.0 serves the purpose of competing with the challenges of the new era. The version has simplified and clarified the artifacts/process to get the best results. There are many platforms that have updated their courses as per this version. One such platform is Acekube which offers training and certification in SAFe courses.


FAQs

1. What are the phases of Agile Methodology?

There are six phases in Agile Methodology:

  • Conception

  • Inception

  • Iteration

  • Release

  • Maintenance

  • Retirement

2. Which are the best SAFe courses available?

Some of the SAFe courses available online are:






Kommentare


  • Instagram
  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • LinkedIn
  • YouTube
bottom of page