Our mission at Scaled Agile has always been to help those who build the world’s most essential systems do so better, faster, at less cost—and with more enjoyment in the process. It’s self-evident that a mission like that has no end.

Especially now, as the unprecedented times of the pandemic, global economy, and supply chain issues have driven home a reality that has been decades in the making—enterprises are overwhelmed by constant change. And while all this is happening, advanced technologies such as AI, big data, and the cloud radically transform how we innovate. The complexity and criticality of these new systems have never been higher. Indeed, the general welfare of humanity—and sometimes our very lives—literally depends on them.

As we learn new things from our customers, partners, and market trends, we constantly evolve the Framework with new and updated guidance. Occasionally, we take a critical look at the entire Framework—from the SAFe Big Picture to all of the supporting knowledge base articles, graphics, and courseware—and decide it’s time for a new version. One that will ensure our customers continue to get the guidance and resources they need to adapt to market shifts and transform disruption into opportunity.

To that end, we are excited to welcome you to SAFe^® 6.0,  the latest version of the Framework, courses, certifications, toolkits, and online learning.

SAFe 6.0 Release Themes

This release represents a significant advance in how enterprises integrate SAFe practices in day-to-day work, make the change stick, and achieve the benefits of true business agility. SAFe 6.0 includes many new and advanced practices to support and enable the latest technology and business trends, including eight ways to accelerate the flow of value and guidance for expanding SAFe across the organization into other business functions.

Six release themes highlight the most relevant changes and additions:

1. Strengthening the foundation for Business Agility—The fundamental aspects of business agility, including the Business Agility Value Stream (BAVS) and foundation articles, are substantially improved with a new, leaner mindset and updated core values. Updates to the SAFe Implementation Roadmap and revised responsibilities for SAFe Practice Consultants (SPCs) clarify the path for navigating the change.

2. Empowering teams and clarifying roles and responsibilities—New guidance helps individuals better understand their roles and improve job performance, leading to greater support for the organization’s goals and increased personal satisfaction. An example of the new role’ responsibility wheel’ for the newly titled Scrum Master/Team Coach is shown below.

3. Accelerating Value Flow—A deeper understanding of achieving flow is central to this evolution of SAFe. Our latest guidance defines eight flow accelerators (as shown below) designed to improve flow throughout SAFe. And with our ability to measure flow, we have a new and quantitative basis for understanding what’s happening, how things are working, and what we can do to improve. New SAFe Scrum, SAFe Team Kanban, Built-in Quality, and Value Stream Management articles add flow directly into the teams’ daily work. Four new flow articles provide advanced guidance on how to apply Principle 6 – Make value flow without interruptions—to Agile Teams, ARTs, Solution Trains, and Portfolios.

This may be the most significant breakthrough in SAFe and our industries’ understanding of measuring and improving what was formerly intangible and immeasurable.

4. Enhancing Business Agility with SAFe across the business—The new Business and Technology article highlights five proven patterns that can be used to extend agility throughout the enterprise. These include:

5. Building the future with AI, Big Data, and Cloud—SAFe 6.0 helps accelerate the adoption of the latest advanced technologies through expanded guidance for integrating AI, Big Data, and Cloud into value streams. Applying these technologies has become critical for competing now and in the future.

6. Delivering better outcomes with Measure and Grow and OKRs—SAFe 6.0 helps enterprises provide better business outcomes with expanded guidance on applying Objectives and Key Results (OKRs) and improved techniques for measuring and enhancing competency and flow.

Updated Learning and Practices Resources Studio

And, of course, this latest guidance is reflected in updates to SAFe courseware, online learning, and practice resources. Leading SAFe®, one of Scaled Agile’s most popular courses, is now available in languages including Brazilian Portuguese, Chinese, French, German, Japanese, Korean, and Spanish as part of our ambitious and ongoing localization roadmap.

SAFe^® Studio

As a part of this release, we have launched SAFe^® Studio, our new subscription-based platform that enables SAFe professionals to learn, practice, and manage SAFe. It helps translate guidance into execution, helping employees adopt and excel in a different way of working throughout all the business units in the enterprise.

Want to learn more?

This is just a small appetizer of what’s new in SAFe 6.0. To get the full story, please read the What’s new in SAFe 6.0 article. And be sure to watch the SAFe 6.0 launch announcement videos to learn more about SAFe Studio, SAFe 6.0, and other exciting new products to support you on your SAFe journey.

Welcome to 6.0!

Finally, we owe a special thanks to all of you in the SAFe community for your feedback and support. Your passion for the best SAFe possible has driven us to deliver what we like to believe to be the most capable and adaptable Framework in the world.

Your Framework Team—
Dean Leffingwell, Andrew Sales, Dr. Steve Mayner, Dr. Harry Koehnemann, Marc Rix, Rebecca Davis, and Cheryl Crupi, with special contributors Richard Knaster and Alex Yakyma.