Waterfall
Lots of WIP, end-timed delivery of value

Agile
Reduced & visible WIP, iterative delivery, fast feedback

Agile Value Statements
Individuals and interactions over processes and tools.
Working software over comprehensive documentation.
Customer collaboration over contract negotiation.
Responding to change over following a plan.

6 Agile Frameworks
SAFe, Scrum, Crystal, Kanban, XP, Feature-Driven Development

Agile Practices (8)
Timeboxing, user stories, daily stand-ups, frequent demos, test-driven development, information radiators, retrospectives, continuous integration

Scrum Values (5)
Courage, Commitment, Respect, Openness, Focus

Scrum Pillars (3)
transparency, inspection, and adaptation

Scrum Artifacts
Product Backlog, Sprint Backlog, Burndown Charts

Each iteration does these 4 things
Defines, builds, integrates, and tests stories from iteration backlog

Goal of an iteration
Deliver working software at the end

SAFe Core Values

• Alignment
• Transparency
• Built-in Quality
• Program Execution

Non-functional requirements
Conditions that a proposed IT system must meet, such as working on certain hardware or giving results within a certain time. Should be part of the DoD.

Program Increment (PI)
8-12 weeks or 4-6 sprints. A timebox in which an Agile Release Train (ART) delivers incremental value in the form of working, tested software and systems. The most common pattern for one is four development iterations, followed by one Innovation and Planning (IP) iteration.

Innovation and Planning Iteration (PI)
Occurs every PI and serves multiple purposes. It acts as an estimating buffer for meeting PI objectives, as well as providing dedicated time for innovation, continuing education, and PI planning and Inspect and Adapt (I&A) events.

SAFe Lean-Agile Principles (9 total)

1. Take an economic view.
2. Apply systems thinking.
3. Assume variability; preserve options
4. Build incrementally with fast, integrated learning cycles.
5. Base milestones on objective evaluation of working systems.
6. Visualize and limit WIP, reduce batch sizes, and manage queue lengths.
7. Apply cadence, synchronize with cross-domain planning.
8. Unlock the intrinsic motivation of knowledge workers.
9. Decentralize decision-making.

Agile Release Train (ART)
5-12 teams (tycA long-lived and cross-functional team-of-Agile-teams, which along with other stakeholders, develops and delivers solutions incrementally, using a series of fixed-length Iterations within a Program Increment (PI) timebox. Aligns teams to a common business and technology mission.

Product Management
has content authority for the Program Backlog (owns, defines, and prioritizes it). They are responsible for identifying Customer needs, prioritizing Features, guiding the work through the Program Kanban and developing the program Vision and Roadmap.

Solution Management
has content authority for the Solution Backlog. They work with customers to understand their needs, prioritize Capabilities, create the Solution vision and roadmap, define requirements, and guide work through the Solution Kanban.

Release Train Engineer (RTE)
A servant leader and coach for the Agile Release Train. Facilitates the major events and processes, and assists the teams in delivering value. Communicates with stakeholders, escalate impediments, help manage risk, and drive continuous improvement.

Business Owners
The key stakeholders on the agile release train

System Architect
provides architectural guidance and technical enablement to the teams on the train

SAFe Program Events, time boxes, values
1) PI Planning / 2 days / Teams commit to set of objectives to be delivered in the PI
2) ART Sync / 1 hour / Train teams sync regarding the progress of the PI
3) System Demo / 2 hours / Deliverables reviewed with stakeholders who provide feedback
4) Inspect and Adapt Event / .5 day / Train reviews and improves its process before the next PI

Each Value Stream produces one or more …
Solutions, which are products, services, or systems delivered to the Customer, whether internal or external to the Enterprise.

what is an anti-pattern for the IP iteration?

• to plan work for the IP iteration during PI planning
• to allow for sufficient capacity in the program roadmap
• to ensure all stories and teams’ PI plans are completed prior to the IP iteration
• to minimize lost capacity when people are on vacation or holidays
  -to wait for the IP iteration to fix defects
• to plan work for the IP iteration during PI planning
  -to wait for the IP iteration to fix defects

What is the purpose of the plan-do-check-adjust cycle?

• To provide regular, predictable dev cadence to produce an increment of value
• To give the ART members a process tool to keep the train on the tracks
• To create a continuous flow of work to support the delivery pipeline
• To allow the team to perform some final backlog refinement for upcoming iteration planning
• To provide regular, predictable dev cadence to produce an increment of value

Which meeting should the Scrum Master attend (not facilitate)?

• Iteration Review
• Scrum of Scrums
• Daily Stand-Up
• PO sync
• Scrum of Scrums

Scrum masters help remove impediments, foster an environment for high-performing team dynamics and what else?

• Relentlessly improve
• Continuously deliver
• Form and re-form teams
• Estimate stories
• Relentlessly improve

Each PI planning meeting evolves over time, and ending PI planning with a Retrospective will help to do what?

• Fine tune the Economic Framework
• Meet compliance more rapidly
• Lengthen the Architectural Runway
• Continuously improve
• Continuously improve

What is one truth about teams?

• Development teams can manage daily interruptions
• Products are more robust when individuals on teams have specific skill sets
• Changes in team composition do not impact productivity
• Teams are more productive than the same number of individuals
• Teams are more productive than the same number of individuals

Which type of enabler does a System Architect review during a System Demo?

• Enabler Capabilities
• Enabler Features
• ” Stories
• ” Portfolio Epics
• Enabler stories

Who can change the backlog during an iteration?

• Agile Team
• Scrum master
• Release Train Engineer
• Senior Management
• Agile Team

Which statement is true about scrum?

• It is a software technical practice
• It is an ideal method for static design requirements
• it is based on empirical process control theory
• it is a Lean system Engineering technique
• it is a Lean system Engineering technique ??

What are two common PI planning anti-patterns?

• Too much time spent analyzing each story
• Too much time spent prioritizing features
• Team decides which changes need to happen and when
• Part-time scrum masters do not have time to plan as part of the team
• Stories are created for the PI planning iterations
• Too much time spent analyzing each story
• Part-time scrum masters do not have time to plan as part of the team

What are the three pillars of Scrum?
Transparency, inspection, adaptation

Who is responsible for prioritizing the iteration backlog?

• The product owner

According to the Five Dysfunctions of a Team, what is a team’s ultimate competitive advantage?

• Transparency
• Teamwork
• Accountability
• Commitment
• Teamwork

What is one example of a servant leader behavior pattern?

• Understands and empathizes with others
• Focuses on individual task metrics
• Thinks about the day-to-day activities
• Uses authority rather than persuasion when necessary
• Understands and empathizes with others

Becoming a coach requires a shift from old behaviors to new ones. What are three examples of old behaviors?

• Focusing on deadlines
• Focusing on business value delivery
• Asking the team for the answers
• Driving toward specific outcomes
• Fixing problems for the team
• Facilitating team problem solving
• Focusing on deadlines
• Driving toward specific outcomes
• Fixing problems for the team

Features lend themselves to the Lean UX process model. hey include a description, benefit hypothesis, ??

• Scope and context
• Content readiness
• Acceptance criteria
• IP outcomes
• Acceptance criteria

Scrum masters are effective by using scrum methods, supporting safe principles and practices and what else?

• Serving as a customer proxy
• Writing stories and enablers
• Managing architectural runway
• Delivering through agile practices
• Delivering through agile practices

What three attributes summarize DevOps?

• A shared culture
• A set of technical practices
• A high performing devOps team
• Strong organizational structure
• A mindset
• Combined deployment and release
• A shared culture
• A set of technical practices
• A mindset

What is the basis for most team conflicts?

• Lack of leadership
• Ideological differences
• Lack of common goals
• Unexamined assumptions
• Ideological differences

An effective SAFe scrum master helps the team improve on their journey towards excellence through continuous integration, continuous development and what else?

• Continuous exploration
• continuous release
• wip limits
  -state of the art build tools
• Continuous exploration

An effective Safe scrum master is a team-based servant leader who helps the team do what?

• manage the team’s own backlog
• understand and operate within lean budgets
• embrace relentless improvement through iteration retrospectives
• develop better and more specialized skill sets
• embrace relentless improvement through iteration retrospectives

the business must depend on the team for what in order for the business to do any meaningful planning?

• a cross-functional skill set
• commitment to the plan
  -measurements
  -team capabilities
  -measurements????? it’s the same % whether or not I put either.?????

the skills of a good safe scrum master include which three attributes?

• communicate, coordinate, cooperate

what is the statement describing? Agile team continuously adapt to new circumstances and enhance the methods of value delivery

• continuous integration
• ” improvement
• ” delivery
• ” deployment
• continuous integration / improvement?????

When does the plan-do-check-adjust cycle occur in scrum?

• at the iteration review
  -in the daily scrum
• at all formal scrum events
• as part of the iteration retrospective
• at all formal scrum events

Why do teams have an iteration Retrospective?

• To Adjust and identify ways to improve

Who commits to the plan at the end of iteration planning?

• team
• scrum master
• product owner
• solution owner
  team

A servant leader knows that his or her own growth comes from what?

• Management support
• Facilitating growth of others
• Effective training
• Implementing a CALMR approach to SAFe
  Facilitating growth of others

What are two critical areas that differentiate agile from waterfall dev?

• Architectural runway
• Staggered integration
• Face-to-face interaction
• incremental delivery of value
• fast feedback
• incremental delivery of value
• fast feedback

Cadence and what other action are the key constructs to delivering continuous value?
Synchronization

Good coaches do not give people the answer, but instead they do what?

• They hold them to their commitments
• They make the decisions
• They guide people to the solution
• they limit the number of questions
• They guide people to the solution

What is one time when a scrum master participates but does not necessarily facilitate?

• During team breakout sessions at PI planning
• If the entire team is present during the daily stand-up
• when using ad-hoc teams for inspect and adapt
• when the agile release train does not require any team coordination
  When using ad-hoc teams for inspect and adapt

What is the name of the event where all team members determine how much of the team’s backlog they can commit to delivering during an upcoming iteration?

• iteration planning
  -solution planning
  -solution demo
• backlog refinement
  iteration planning

What are two good scrum master facilitation practices?

• create an environment of safety so that everyone feels comfortable contributing to the discussion
• allow unproductive conflict to encourage open communication
  -allow for deep meaningful conversations even if it is outside the scope of the agenda
• ensure all voices are heard
  -do not enforce accountability as it creates an environment of distrust
• create an environment of safety so that everyone feels comfortable contributing to the discussion
• ensure all voices are heard

The program board highlights feature delivery dates, milestones, and what else for the agile release train teams?
dependencies

What is the recommended frequency range for PI planning in SAFe?
8~12 weeks

During PI planning, which two tasks are part of the scrum master’s role in the first team breakout?

• Provide clarifications necessary to assist the team with their story estimating and sequencing
• review and prioritize the team backlog as part of the preparatory work for the second team breakout
• Be involved in the program backlog refinement and preparation
• identify as many risks and dependencies as possible for the management review
• facilitate the coordination with other teams for dependencies
• Provide clarifications necessary to assist the team with their story estimating and sequencing
• facilitate the coordination with other teams for dependencies

What is the main reason why some teams never reach stage 4 in the stages of high performing teams?

• because no one guides them
• ” leadership is spontaneous
• ” team is not structured correctly
• ” there is too much conflict
• because no one guides them

What is the recommended duration of a SAFe iteration?
2 weeks

Participating in PI planning enables teams to gain alignment and commitment around a clear set of what?

• team dependencies
• prioritized objectives
• user stories
• features and benefits
  prioritized objectives

How are the 3 Whys used?

• to identify a root cause of a problem
• to brainstorm ideas
• to coach a team through powerful questions
• to define acceptance criteria for a story
• to identify a root cause of a problem

There are two primary aspects of a lean-agile mindset lean thinking and what?

• feature enablement
  -lean systems
  -systems engineering
  -embracing agility
  -embracing agility

In SAFe, who owns the decision for releasing changes into production?

• product management
• system architect
  -release train engineer
  -solution owner
  product management

During PI planning who owns the planning of stories into iterations?

• Agile teams
• product management
  -system architect
  -scrum master
• Agile teams

which demo is performed in the IP iteration
the integrated demo from the agile release train’s final iteration

Cadence and Synchronization help reduce uncertainty and manage what?
-Product management
-Capacity allocation
-Other commitments
-The variability in solution development
The variability in solution development

How does SAFe handle the “fear of conflict” team dysfunction?
-Review results to drive accountability
-Empirically review results at the end of every iteration and release
-Have teams engage in Retrospectives
-Use Scrum to create safe environment for conflict
Use Scrum to create safe environment for conflict

What does SAFe’s CALMR approach apply to?
-Servant Leadership
-Economic Framework
-Continuous Deployment
-DevOps
DevOps

An effective SAFe Scrum Master helps the team improve in areas including quality, predictability, flow, and where else?
-Continuous delivery
-Team metrics
-Relentless improvement
-Risk mitigation
Team metrics

What foundational issue most often leads to team dysfunction?
-Weak Lean-Agile leadership
-Avoidance of accountability
-Lack of commitment
-Absence of trust
Absence of trust

What is an IP Iteration anti-pattern?
-Identify opportunities for innovation spikes or hackathons
-Identify infrastructure improvements
-Plan work for the IP Iteration during PI Planning
-Allow for cadence-based planning
Plan work for the IP Iteration during PI Planning

An effective SAFe Scrum Master elevates people problems with strict confidence to the appropriate levels when necessary, but only after what has happened?
-They have repeatedly directed the team member to take appropriate action
-A team member consistently disagrees with the Scrum Master
-The team consistently fails to meet consecutive PI goals
-Coaching and internal processes have failed to achieve the objective
Coaching and internal processes have failed to achieve the objective

What are two common anti-patterns during PI Planning? (Choose two.)
-The Team Backlog is applied to a very targeted part of the organization
-A detailed plan becomes the goal, rather than alignment
-The team determines where changes should be targeted
-Pressure is put on teams to overcommit
Pressure is put on teams to overcommit
A detailed plan becomes the goal, rather than alignment

How can a Scrum Master support a Problem-Solving Workshop?
-By providing facilitation to breakout groups focused on specific problems
-By estimating the work effort required to implement recommended improvements
-By coaching the Release Train Engineer on managing the event
-By acting as a process coach to the teams and providing the right answers
By providing facilitation to breakout groups focused on specific problems

Why is a confidence vote held at the end of PI Planning?
-To build shared commitment to the Program Plan
-To hold the Teams accountable if the Agile Release Train does not deliver on its commitment
-To remove the risks from the PI
-To endure the Business Owners accept the Plan
To build shared commitment to the Program Plan

What is a characteristic of an effective Scrum Master
-Supports the autonomy of the team
-Is a technical expert
-Understands customer needs
-Provides status
Supports the autonomy of the team

The Scrum Master is what above all else?
-A servant leader
-The iteration owner
-A SAFe Agilist
-A team coach
A Servant Leader

Becoming a coach requires a shift from old behaviors to new ones. What are the three examples of new coaching behaviors? (Choose two.)
-Focus on business value delivery
-Focus on deadlines
-Facilitates team problem-solving
-Ask the team for the answers
-Fix problems for the team
-Drive toward specific outcomes
Focus on business value delivery
Facilitates team problem-solving
Ask the team for the answers

The Scrum Master role includes traditional Scrum team leadership and responsibilities to which other group?
-To the business
-To the Value Stream Engineers
-To the teams take make up the Lean Portfolio
-To the Agile teams at the Program Level
To the Agile teams at the Program Level

What is accomplished in the first part of the PI Planning meeting?
-Items are selected from the Program Backlog
-The Scrum Master decides how much work can be accomplished
-All tasks are defined
-The Product Owner defines the iteration goal
Items are selected from the Program Backlog

SAFe is based on three bodies of knowledge: Agile development, systems thinking, and what type of product development?
-DevOps product development
-Lean product development
-Adaptive product development
-Incremental product development
Lean product development

What is one responsibility of a SAFe Scrum Master?
-Coordinating with the Solution Architect and Solution Management
-Maintaining the depth of the Architectural Runway
-Prioritizing the work of the Systems Team
-Facilitating an effective team breakout session
Facilitating an effective team breakout session

What does transparency mean in a Scrum environment?
-The team is constantly improving its process
-The process is visible to all stakeholders
-Team members must immediately share any and all feedback with each other
-Development and Operations teams work together
The process is visible to all stakeholders

The goal of Lean is to deliver the maximum customer value in the shortest sustainable lead time while providing what else?
-Significant team contributions
-The highest Possible quality
-Improved Capacity allocation
-A Continuous Delivery Pipeline
The highest Possible quality

When working with an Agile team, what is expected from Product Management?
-To define the software technical specifications
-To clarify the scope of Feature work
-To coach the team on Agile practices
-To provide iteration vision to the team
To clarify the scope of Feature work

When is a Feature hypothesis fully evaluated?
-When the customer uses the Feature in production
-When the Feature is accepted by the Product Manager
-When the Feature’s return on investment has been realized
-When the Feature has been deployed to production
When the Feature’s return on investment has been realized

When looking at a program board, what does it mean when a feature is placed in a team’s swim lane with no strings?
-That it has dependencies on teams on other Agile Release Trains or Solution Trains
-That the team has not broken the feature into stories yet and has not identified dependencies
-That the feature can be completed independent from other teams
-The team has been assigned but the Feature dependencies have not yet been identified
That the feature can be completed independent from other teams

Which Agile Manifesto principle describes the importance of PI Planning in SAFe?
-The most efficient and effective method of conveying information to and within a development team in face-to-face conversation
-Simplicity, “the art of maximizing the amount of work not done” is essential
-The best architectures, requirements, and designs emerge from self-organizing teams
-Working software is the primary measure of progress
The most efficient and effective method of conveying information to and within a development team in face-to-face conversation

What are two outputs of iteration planning? (Choose two.)
-PI Objectives
-Team Backlog
-Program Backlog
-Iteration Backlog
-Iteration Goals
Iteration Backlog
Iteration Goals

What is an example of SAFe Scrum Master servant leader behavior?
-Focuses on the day-to-day team activities
-Facilitates the major events and processes
-Strives to create a conflict-free environment
-Uses persuasion instead of authority
Uses persuasion instead of authority

PI Objectives summarize data into meaningful information that enhances alignment and provides what outcome?
-Accurate status reporting
-Visibility for all
-A process for defining team goals
-A guiding coalition
Visibility for all

What are two SAFe primary opportunities for driving relentless improvement? (Choose two)
-Iteration Retrospective
-Daily Stand-up
-Inspect and Adapt Workshop
-PI Planning
-PI Planning Management review and Problem Solving
Iteration Retrospective
Inspect and Adapt Workshop

What is the goal of the Scrum of Scrums Event?
-To review the Agile Release Train’s progress toward its PI Objectives
-To review each team’s progress on its stories
-To focus on Agile Release Train process improvement
-To demo features to Product Management
To review the Agile Release Train’s progress toward its PI Objectives

What is the key Scrum Master responsibility when estimating stories?
-Ensure the team gives estimates that do not increase the velocity
-Limit discussion to minimize time boxes
-Ensure everyone on the team participates
-Provide information about customer needs
Ensure everyone on the team participates

Which activity is a Scrum Master’s responsibility?
-Prioritizing the Team Backlog
-Facilitating Scrum of Scrums
-Coaching the Agile Team
-Owning the Daily Stand-up
Coaching the Agile Team

During PI Planning, who owns feature priorities?
-Release Train Engineer
-Solution Architect/Engineer
-Product Management
-Business Owner
Product Management

At the end of the first Iteration, the team finishes user stories A, B, and 50% OF C. The story sizes are set at these points:
Story A = 8 points
Story B = 1 point
Story C = 5 points
Story D = 3 points
What is the teams Velocity?
-14
-11.5
-7
-9
9

What is one of the Scum Master’s responsibilities during the IP iteration?
-Remove scope that exceeds capacity
-Create the team’s PI Predictability reports
-Update the team’s PI Roadmap
-Facilitate the team preparation for PI system demo
Facilitate the team preparation for PI system demo

Why is it important for the Scrum Master to help the team focus on daily and iteration goals?
-To eliminate impediments
-To facilitate the team’s progress toward goal of current PI Objectives
-To help the team maintain their velocity
-To keep the Team Backlog to a manageable size
To facilitate the team’s progress toward goal of current PI Objectives

Which two practices are recommended in SAFe for root cause analysis? (Choose two.)
-Iteration Retrospective
-Weighted Shortest Job First
-Fishbone Diagram
-Post-PI Planning Meeting
-5 Whys
Fishbone Diagram
5 Whys

When is Iteration Planning Completed?
-When the team commits
-When the Scrum Master commits
-When the time box is complete
-When the Product Owner commits
When the team commits

Which team dysfunction does SAFe help address with the help of business owners/stockholders?
-Missed time boxes
-Lack of transparency
-Lack of visibility
-Avoidance of accountability
Avoidance of accountability

Why is it important for a Scrum Master to be a servant leader?
-To help the team become high-performing
-To provide team structure
-To provide the team to succeed
-To coach the team in effective engineering practices
To help the team become high-performing

Which two actions are part of the Scrum Master’s role in PI Planning? (Choose two)
-Manage the program board
-Prioritize features to support the Program vision
-Ensure the team builds a plan they can commit to
-Serve as the customer proxy and work with Product Management
-Align the Value Stream and Agile Release Trains to a common vision
Manage the program board
Ensure the team builds a plan they can commit to

What is the purpose of Iterations and Program Increments?
-To provide and architectural basis for future development
-To provide a regular cadence for producing increments of value
-To provide fixed dates for delivery
-To provide fast feedback learning cycles and frequent integration
-To demonstrate the increment to stakeholders
To provide a regular cadence for producing increments of value

How does the Scrum Master provide the most value to the team?
-By ensuring time boxes are kept during team meeting and working sessions
-By scheduling Scrum0supported event to ensure team alignment
-By facilitating discussions between the Product Owner and the development team
-By ensuring impediments are removed for the development team
By ensuring impediments are removed for the development team

How often should a system demo occur?-After the end of each program increment (PI)-After every release-After every iteration-After every other iteration
After every iteration

What falls outside the Scrum Master’s responsibility? (Choose two.)
-Estimating Stories for the team
-Facilitating backlog refinement
-Assigning Stories to team members
-Facilitating the team’s Innovation and Planning event
-Coaching the team
Estimating Stories for the team
Assigning Stories to team members

The SAFe Scrum Master role includes responsibilities to which other group?
-Business owners
-Solution Management
-Solution Train Engineers
-The other Agile Teams on the Agile release train (ART)
The other Agile Teams on the Agile release train (ART)

What is a characteristic of an effective Scrum Master?
-Gives open, honest opinions
-Understands customer needs
-Is a technical expert
-Removes all conflict
Gives open, honest opinions

What is one benefit of program increment (PI) objectives?
-They describe a process for defining team goals
-They ensure accurate status reporting
-They create a near-term focus and vision
-They form a guiding coalition
They create a near-term focus and vision

What does the letter C represent in SAFe’s CALMR approach to DevOps?
-Collaboration
-Continuous delivery
-Culture
-Continuous deployment
Culture

Scrum Masters help remove impediments, foster an environment for high-performing team dynamics, and what else?
-Form and re-form teams
-Continuously deliver value
-Estimate stories
-Lead team efforts in relentless improvement
Lead team efforts in relentless improvement

What is the Scrum Master’s role in team breakout #1?
-Facilitate the coordination with other teams for dependencies
-Create mitigation plans for each risk
-Raise team level risks
-Resolve dependencies with other teams
Facilitate the coordination with other teams for dependencies

A servant leader knows that his or her own growth comes from what?
-Effective training
-Management support
-Facilitating the growth of others
-Implementing a CALMR approach to DevOps
Facilitating the growth of others

SAFe is based on three primary bodies of knowledge which include Agile development, systems thinking, and what type of product development?
-Iterative product development
-Adaptive product development
-Incremental product development
-Lean product development
Lean product development

What is a common reason why a team is unable to estimate a story?
-The story does not include a role
-The story lacks acceptance criteria
-The team has no experience in estimating
-The team does not understand the tasks related to the story
The story lacks acceptance criteria

Scrum Masters are effective by using scrum methods, supporting SAFe principles and practices, and what else?
-Supporting delivery using Agile practices
-Serving as a customer proxy
-Writing stories and enablers
-Managing architectural runway
Supporting delivery using Agile practices

Which two behaviors should a Scrum Master represent as a coach? (Choose two.)
​-Set long-term goals for the team
-Provide subject matter expertise
-Encourage the team to learn from their mistakes
-Lay out the team’s plan for the iteration
-Focus on deadlines and technical options
Encourage the team to learn from their mistakes
Lay out the team’s plan for the iteration

Two primary aspects of a Lean-Agile mindset
Thinking lean & embracing agility

SAFe is based on three bodies of knowledge – what are they?
Agile development, systems thinking, and lean product development

What are the pillars for the SAFe House of Lean? What is the goal?
Respect for people and culture, flow, innovation and relentless improvement; the goal is delivering value

What is the key to successfully executing SAFe?
Establish a continuous flow of work that supports incremental value delivery, based on constant feedback and adjustment

What is gemba? [Pillar 3: Innovation]
The idea that one should get OOTO and into the actual workplace where value is produced, and products are created and used

What are some of the components of relentless improvement?
Optimize the whole, not the parts; consider facts carefully, then act quickly; apply Lean tools and techniques to determine the root cause of inefficiencies; reflect at key milestones

What are the values of the agile manifesto?
Individuals and interactions over processes and tools; working software over comprehensive documentation; customer collaboration over contract negotiation; responding to change over following a plan

What is the most efficient and effective method of conveying information to and within a dev. team?
Face-to-face conversation

What is the primary measure of progress?
Working software

What is the role of the Scrum Master?
Ensuring the Scrum process is followed; Educating the team in Scrum and SAFe practices; providing the environment for continuous improvement; also typically charged with removing impediments

Why do some teams apply WIP limits?
To create a “pull” process within the iteration and to continuously balance the work to increase throughput

To build quality into the code and component level (and thus being able to scale), what are five practices that supplement the project managements practices of Scrum?
Continuous Integration, Test-First, Refactoring, pair work, and collective ownership

In the Scrum Master role, what do they spend most of their time doing?
Helping other team members communicate, coordinate and cooperate

What is the Product Owner (PO) responsible for in their role?
Defining stories; prioritizing the team backlog; maintain the conceptual and technical integrity of features/components for team

Who has the responsibility of accepting the final iteration plan?
Product Owner

While operating within the context of the ART, teams are…
empowered, self-organizing and self-managing

What are the steps for a team in building incremental value?
Define, Build, Test, Deploy

What is the one real measure of value, velocity and progress?
The demo of fully integrated work from all teams during the prior iteration (System Demo)

Who is ultimately responsible for the adoption, success and ongoing improvement of Lean-Agile development?
An organization’s managers, leaders and executives

What are the four core values that define SAFe’s essential ideals and beliefs?
Alignment, built-in quality, transparency, and program execution

What are the four aspects of transformational leadership?
Vision, authenticity, growth and innovation

When does PI planning occur?
Within the Innovation and Planning (IP) Iteration

A successful PI planning delivers two primary outputs:
Committed PI objectives & program board

What does the program board highlight?
New feature delivery dates, feature dependencies among teams and with other ARTs, and relevant Milestones

During PI planning, risks are categorized into what categories?
ROAM – Resolved, Owned, Accepted and Mitigated

What is one of the critical roles of an Innovation & Planning (IP) Iteration?
Providing an estimating buffer for meeting PI Objectives and enhancing the predictability of PI performance; an opportunity for teams to work on activities that are difficult to fit into a continuous, incremental value delivery pattern

What are the main elements of a successful iteration execution?
Tracking iteration progress, building stories serially and incrementally, constant communication, improving flow, program execution

What is commonly used to track iteration progress?
Big Visible Information Radiator (BVIR)

What is the primary goal of the iteration review process?
For stakeholders to provide feedback on the demos

What is the typical length of a Program Increment?
8-12 weeks, split into 5 iterations (four normal, one Innovation & Planning)

Which events in SAFe represent the Plan-Do-Check-Adjust (PDCA) learning cycle?
Plan – PI Planning; Do – PI Execution; Check – System Demo; Adjust – Inspect & Adapt (I&A)

What are the three primary focus areas for preparing for an upcoming PI?
Management alignment and organizational readiness for planning; backlog readiness; actual logistics for the event (facility readiness)

What does an I&A event consist of?
PI System Demo; quantitative measurement; retrospective and problem-solving workshop

The 5 Whys are used to…
Perform root cause analysis

What is used to identify the biggest root cause?
The Pareto analysis, known as the 80/20 rule (20% of the causes are responsible for 80% of the problems)

What two qualities ensure alignment, one of the core values of SAFe?
Cadence and synchronization

What are the three pillars of Scrum?
Transparency, Inspection and Adaptation

Can team composition change during an iteration?
NO; otherwise the velocity is invalid

What are the three Cs for user story guidelines?
Card (small and concise), Conversation (fleshed out with a PO), Confirmation (acceptance criteria confirm correctness)

What are known as a systematic approach to improving the system without changing observable system behavior?
Refactors

What are known as research activities to reduce risk, understand a functional need, increase estimate reliability, or define a technical approach?
Spikes

Teams should write their PI objectives in what format?
SMART – Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic, Time-Bound

What is DevOps?
An agile approach to bridge the gap between development and operations to deliver value faster and more reliably.

What approach helps DevOps run more smoothly?
CALMR – Culture, Automation, Lean flow, Measurement and Recovery

What are the four stages of high-performing teams?
Forming — Storming — Norming — Performing

What are the five dysfunctions of a team?
Absence of trust, fear of conflict, lack of commitment, avoidance of accountability, inattention to results

job sequencing
the key to economic outcomes

WSJF
weighted shortest job first

How do you calculate WSJF?
WSJF = CoD (estimated value) / Duration (time to ship or Job Size)

RR
risk reduction

OE
opportunity enablement

How to calculate CoD?
CoD = User-business value + Time criticality + RR & OE value / Job Size or “Duration”

PI
program increment

NFR
non functional requirement

3 Pillars of Scrum
transparency, inspection, adaptation

Scrum values make these things transparent:
process, workflow, progress

The 5 SAFe Scrum Values are…
courage, focus, openness, commitment, respect

SAFe Iteration length
2-4 weeks

Team composition does not change during an Iteration, otherwise the __ is invalid.
velocity

product owner
owns, prioritizes and manages the TEAM backlog

team increment
a thin vertical slice of functionality

Three roles in Agile teams
scrum master, product owner, development team

Typical development team size in Scrum
3-9 excluding the scrum master and product owner

The promise of SAFe
Synchronizes alignment, collaboration, and delivery for large numbers of teams

4 core values of SAFe
built-in quality, program execution, alignment, transparency

9 SAFe Lean-Agile principles

1. take an economic view
2. apply systems thinking
3. assume variability; preserve options
4. build incrementally with fast, integrated learning cycles
5. base milestones on objective evaluation of working systems
6. visualize and limit WIP, reduce batch sizes, and manage queue lengths
7. apply cadence, synchronize with cross domain planning
8. unlock the intrinsic motivation of knowledge workers
9. decentralize decision making

Agile Release Train
a virtual organization of 5-12 teams (50-125+) that plans, commits, and executes together

program increment duration
a fixed timebox with a default of 10 weeks.

RTE role
acts as chief scrum master for the train

product manager
owns, defines, and prioritizes the PROGRAM backlog

system architect/engineer
provides architectural guidance and technical enablement to the teams on the train

business owners
key stakeholders on the agile release train

4 program events
PI planning
ART sync
System Demo
Inspect and Adapt event

PI planning timebox
2 days

art sync timebox
1 hour

system demo timebox
2 hours

inspect and adapt event
the train reviews and improves its process before the next PI

pdca
plan, do, check, act

PI planning cadence
2 days every 8-12 weeks (10 is typical)

Product Management role in PI
owns feature priorities

Development teams role in PI
own story planning and high level estimations

Two things every feature has
benefit hypothesis and
acceptance criteria

benefit hypothesis
justifies feature implementation cost and provides business perspective when making scope decisions

When is acceptance criteria typically defined?
during program backlog refinement

What are the 3 C’s of user stories?
card, conversation, confirmation

What are the 3 components of user stories?
role, activity, value

Roles in user stories can be comprised one of the following (3).
people, devices, systems

What does INVEST mean in user stories?
Independent
Negotiable
Valuable
Estimable
Small
Testable

Enabler stores support value and represent Exploration, Architecture, and
Infrastructure

refactoring
a systematic approach to improving the system without changing observable behavior

spike
research activities to reduce risk, understand a functional need, increase estimate reliability, or define a technical approach

Story points represent these (4) things…
Volume – how much is there
Complexity – how hard it is
Knowledge – what we know
Uncertainty – what we don’t know

The PI planning event helps create __ to a common mission
alignment

Risks should be evaluated with the ROAM format, which stands for…
Resolved
Owned
Accepted
Mitigated

stretch objectives
provide a reliability guard band
are included velocity/capacity
are planned (aren’t “extra”)
are NOT included in commitment

SMART
Specific
Measurable
Achievable
Realistic
Time -bound

Iteration Planning timebox
2 – 4 hours

iteration goals
provide Agile Teams with clarity, commitment and management information

agile teams are not just committed to the work, they are committed to (3)…
other teams
the program
the stakeholders

agile teams commit to iteration __ not stories
goals

scrum masters should ensure that time is allocated to this activity when iteration planning
technical debt

the key to team synchronization and self-organization
daily standup

BVIR
big
visible
information
radiator

these stories trump prioritized stories
expedited

CFD
cumulative flow diagram

SoS frequency
twice a week

SoS atttendees
Scrum Masters and RTE

backlog refinement timebox
1 – 2 hours weekly

white elephant sizing
exercise for rapidly estimating a large backlog

iteration review
where teams demonstrate every story, enabler, and NFR

iteration review timebox
1 – 2 hours

iteration review attendees
iteration team and stakeholders

system demo attendees
system team, product management, product owners, stakeholders

architectural runway
existing code, hardware components, etc., that technically enable near-term business features

dev ops
an agile approach to bridge the gap between development and operations to deliver value faster and more reliably

CALMR approach to dev ops
Culture
Automation
Lean flow
Measurement
Recovery

iteration retrospective timebox
30-60 minutes

IP stands for…
iteration planning

3 keys to inspect and adapt are…
the PI system demo
quantitative measurement
the problem-solving workshop

attendees for inspect and adapt
teams and stakeholders

inspect and adapt timebox
3-4 hours per PI

who facilitates the problem solving workship in the IandA session?
RTE

four stages of high performing teams
forming
storming
norming
performing

five dysfunctions of a team
inattention to results
avoidance of accountability
lack of commitment
fear of conflict
absence of trust

iteration review timebox
1 hour

What is the main reason for the system demo?
To enable faster feedback by integration across teams

Who facilitates the PO Sync meeting?
RTE

The scrum master facilitates…
Retrospective, Daily Standup, Iteration Planning

The two inputs to PI planning
Vision and Program Roadmap

Who participates in the backlog refinement event?
The Agile team members and other SME’s

5 parts of every team increment
plan, build, test, integrate, review

Why is it important to organize the work for Iteration Planning
So a realistic work scope can be defined

Who defines the final scope of a committed iteration?
The Agile Team

features
teams on the train collaborate to deliver

user story
features are implemented incrementally via __

stories
fit in one iteration for one team

Enabler stores support value and represent Infrastructure, Architecture, and
Exploration

Enabler stores support value and represent Exploration, Infrastructure, and
Architecture

Estimation anti-patterns
pressure by stakeholders to lower estimations
only a few people participate
not using the adjusted fibonacci scale

team breakouts
where teams develop plans and identify risks and identify impediments

program board
where feature delivery, dependencies, and milestones are displayed

Program objectives
assigned business value at the second team breakout

At the conclusion of PI planning teams should have
Velocity (capacity) and load for each iteration
draft PI objectives
program risks and impediments

confidence vote
during the PI planning, after dependencies are resolved and risks are addressed, a _ is taken at the team and program levels

program PI objectives
the synthesis of each team’s PI objectives

scrum master role in team breakout #1
Ensure the team has a draft plan to present
Identify as many risks and dependencies as possible for the management review
Secure SME’s and Program level stakeholders as needed by the team
Facilitate the coordination with other teams for dependencies

Common Anti-Patterns for team breakout #1

• No plan or partial plan at the end of the timebox.
• Too much time is spent analyzing each story
• Shared Scrum Masters and Product owners are not available enough
• Part-time scrum masters don’t have time to plan as part of the team

Common Anti-Patterns for PI Planning

• pressure is put on the team to overcommit
• team under-commits due to fear of failure
• over-planning ahead of time to make it more efficient loses the essence of PI planning
• the plan, rather than the alignment, become the goal

Common Anti-Patterns for Iteration Planning

• delving too deep into technical discussions
• commitment is unrealistic
• velocity and load are exactly the same
• SM is more focused on technical hat than facilitator hat
• team under-commits due to fear of failure
• no time reserved for support activities

dsu
used to share information about progress, coordinate activities, raise blocking issues.

Common Anti-Patterns for the DSU

• poor collaboration of the team members during the iteration (don’t know/don’t care)
• lack of collective code ownership
• infrequent verification and integration during the iteration
• perpetual, unresolved conflict within the team

Common Anti-Patterns when tracking iteration progress

• team gets no input form sos
• teams are unwilling to change or add objectives mid-PI
• SM does all the synchronization, so team is incapable of doing it themselves.

SM role in Backlog refinement

• maintain timeboxes
• maintain the right level of a deep backlog vs. ready backlog for two iterations
• Make sure all the team members participate
• Invite the right SME
• Hold the event at regular intervals

Common Anti-Patterns in backlog refinement

• Arriving to the iteration with non-ready stories
• Not doing the backlog refinement consistently
• Team sees Stories for the first time during Iteration or PI Planning
• Feature estimations impact Story estimation

MBSE
Model Base System Engineering

Common Anti-Patterns for System Demos

• too much time spent preparing the demo
• demo is mainly talk/slides as opposed to working software/hardware
• meeting doesn’t happen if PO is unavailable
• PO sees things for the first time in the team demo
• System Demo is not doe because the team demo is enough
• team members are not invited to the system demo to save time
  demos that are not interesting/relevant to program level stakeholders

release
For better continuous deployment, decouple deployment from _.

deployment
For better continuous deployment, automate _.

staging
For better continuous deployment, deploy to _ every iteration.

capability
dev ops is a _ of every agile release train

solution
value occurs only when the end users are operating the __.

culture
establish a __ of shared responsibility for dev, deployment, and operations

automation
dev ops response to continuous delivery pipeline

Lean flow
keep batch sizes small, limit WIP, and provide extreme visibility

Measure
do this to the flow through the pipeline. Implement application telemetry.

Recovery
architect and enable low risk releases, fast reversion and fast fix-forward

cultural
the shift to Dev Ops is primarily this.

Common Anti-Patterns in continuous improvement

• the only focus is on what to improve and not what to preserve
• focus on problems that are outside of the team’s control
• failure to achieve results
• inviting people outside the team to the retro.

Common Anti-Patterns in IP innovation and planning

• planning work for the IP iteration in PI planning
• leaving testing or bug fixing to the IP iteration
• leaving integration of the whole system to the IP iteration

PI system demo
at the end of the PI, teams demonstrate the current state of the Solution to the appropriate stakeholders

RTE
facilitate the problem solving workshop after a short retro. This workshop is done in organic or ad-hoc teams.

Common Anti-Patterns in Inspect and Adapt

• only the PO presents in the PI System Demo
• No actionable improvement Features are created
• Improvement items don’t enter the PI Planning process
• Improvement items are not demoed in the PI system demo

Forming
team structure, purpose, safe events, fostering collaboration

Storming
surfacing and resolving conflict, dealing with individual performance, relentless improvement

Norming
team as a community, improving engineering practices, effective team communication

Performing
eliminating team dysfunctions, spontaneous leadership and self-organization, knowledge flow in the team and program

Adding new team members
moves a team back to the forming stage

A good scrum coach moves toward

• coaching the team to collaborate
• being a facilitator
• being invested in the team’s overall performance
• asking the team for the answer
• letting the team find their own way
• guiding
• focusing on business value delivery
• doing the right thing for the business right now
• facilitating team problem-solving

teams
far more productive than the same number of individuals

productivity
changes in team composition impact this

assumptions
many arguments are anchored in unexamined _.

working agreements
facilitate conflict management; so make them visible!

IP
Innovation and Planning iteration

Four roles of a Scrum Master in SAFe

• teaching and coaching ScrumXP and SAFe
• implementing and supporting SAFe principles and practices
• identifying and eliminating impediments
• facilitating flow

The Scrum Master helps other team members
communicate
coordinate
cooperate

The Scrum Master helps teams
self-organize
self-manage
deliver via effective Agile practices

DevOps
is more than a set of practices, it is also about changing the mind-sets of people to break down silos, obtain fast feedback, improve the flow of work, and bring the best economic outcomes

Release managment
holds authority over deployment to production

NFR’s
describe system attributes such as
Security
Reliability
Maintainability
Scalability
Usability

FURPS
Functionality
Usability
Reliability
Performance
Supportability

IP iteration
acts as an estimating buffer for meeting PI objectives and provides dedicated time for innovation, continuing education, pi planning, and inspect and adapt events

Agile frameworks
SAFe
Scrum
Crystal
Kanban
eXtreme Programming (XP)
Feature-driven development

What does a Scrum Master do?

• Servant leaders and coaches for an Agile Team.
• Help educate team in Scrum, XP, Kanban and SAFe, ensuring the agreed Agile process is being followed.
• Help remove impediments and foster an environment for high-performing team dynamics, continuous flow and relentless improvement.
• Facilitates team events
• Works with RTE to ensure train meets PI objectives
• Fosters normalized estimating within the team
• Assists the PO in backlog for PI and IP.
• Attends scrum of scrum meetings.

Scrum Master Responsibilities
Exhibits lean-agile leadership
Supports the team rules
Facilitates the team’s progress toward team goals
Leads team efforts in relentless improvement
Facilitates meetings
Supports the PO
Eliminates impediments
Promotes SAFe quality practices
Builds a high-performing team
Protects and communicates
Responsibilities on the train
Coordinates with other teams
Facilitates preparation and readiness for ART events
Supports estimating

ART
Agile Release Train

PO
Product Owner

Program Increment (PI) Planning
A cadence-based, face-to-face event that serves as the heartbeat of the Agile Release Train (ART), aligning all the teams on the ART to a common mission and vision.

Innovation and Planning Iteration
Occurs every PI and serves multiple purposes. It acts as an estimating buffer for meeting PI objectives, as well as providing dedicated time for innovation, continuing education, and PI planning and Inspect and Adapt (I&A) events.

Inspect & Adapt (I&A)
A significant event, held at the end of each PI, where the current state of the solution is demonstrated and evaluated by the train. Teams reflect and identify improvement backlog items via a structured, problem-solving workshop

Iteration
A basic building block of Agile development. Each is a standard, fixed-length timebox, where Agile Teams deliver incremental value in the form of working, tested software and systems.

Cycle – Defines, builds, integrates, & test.

What is the recommended timebox duration for an Iteration?
2 weeks; however, 1-4 weeks is acceptable, depending on the business context.

Who participates in the Inspect & Adapt (I&A) phase?
All stakeholders, including:

1. The Agile Teams
2. Release Train Engineer (RTE)
3. System and Solution Architect Engineering
4. Product Management, Business Owners, and others on the Train

What results from the I&A phase?
Improvement backlog items that go to the Program Backlog for the next PI Planning event

3 parts of I&A
PI System Demo
Quantitative Measurement
Retrospective and Problem-Solving Workshop

Purpose of PI System Demo
To show all the Features the ART has developed over the course of the PI
Leads: PM, PO, System Team
Attend: BO, Stakehlders, PM, RTE, SM & Teams

PI System Demo Timebox
~1 hr or less

What is one primary measurement to be considered in quantitative metrics?
Program predictability measure
Updated end of inspect & adapt event

Retrospective goal
To identify whatever issues they would like to address

Retrospective objective
To identify a few significant problems that the teams can potentially address – What went well, what didn’t go well, what can do better next time.

PDCA Cycle
Plan
Do
Check
Adjust

Who facilitates the PI Planning event?
Release Train Engineer (RTE)

In which iteration does PI Planning take place?
Innovation and Planning Iteration

_ _ is essential to SAFe; if you are not doing it, you are not doing SAFe.
PI Planning

Business Benefits of PI Planning
Establishing face-to-face communication across all team members and stakeholders
Building the social network the ART depends on
Aligning development to business goals with the business context, Vision, and team project PI objectives
Identifying dependencies and fostering cross-team and cross-ART collaboratio
Providing the opportunity for “just the right amount of architecture and Lean User Experience (UX) guidance)
Matching demand to capacity, eliminating excess WIP
Fast decision-making

PI Planning Inputs
Business context
Roadmap and vision
Top 10 features of the Program Backlog
NFRs (Non-functional Requirements)

PI Planning Outputs
Committed PI objectives (A set of SMART objectives that are created by each team with the business value assigned by the Business Owners)
Program board (this highlights the new feature delivery dates, feature dependencies among teams and with other ARTs, and relevant milestones)
Plan is the goal

3 Areas of Preparation for a Successful PI Planning
Organizational Readiness
Content Readiness
Facility Readiness

Organizational Readiness
Strategic alignment and teams trains setup

Content Readiness
Management and development preparedness

Facility Readiness
The actual space and logistics for the event

Organizational Readiness Considerations
Planning scope and context – is the scope (product, system or technology domain) of the planning process understood? Do we know which teams need to plan together?

Business alignment – is there reasonable agreement on priorities among Business Owners

Agile teams – Do we have Agile teams? Are there dedicated developer and test resources and an identified Scrum Master and Product Owner for the team?

Content Readiness Considerations
Executive briefing – a briefing that defines the current business context

Product vision briefing(s) – briefing(s) prepared by Product Management including the top 10 features in the product backlog

Architecture vision briefing – a presentation made by the CTO, Enterprise Architect, or System Architect to communicate new enablers, features, and Nonfunctional Requirements (NFRs)

Facility Readiness Considerations
Facility – this room must be roomy enough for all attendees, with breakout rooms if necessary

Facilities/tech support – these people need to be identified in advance and reachable during setup and testing, and the event itself

Communication channels – for distributed planing meetings, primary and secondary audio, video, and presentation channels must be available

Stretch Objectives
Goals built into the plan (e.g., stories that have been defined and included for those objectives), but are not committed to by the team because of too many unknowns or risks. These are NOT extra things to do in case there is time. Instead, they increase the reliability of the plan and give management an early warning of goals that the ART may not be able to deliver

Time & capacity to do it, we plan for it, but are not committed to it

PI Planning Day 1 Agenda
Business context
Product/solution vision
Architecture vision and development practices
Planning context and lunch
Team breakouts #1
Draft plan review
Management review and problem-solving

Business context
A senior executive/line-of-business owner describes the current state of the business and presents a perspective on how well existing solutions are addressing current customer needs

Product solution/vision
Product management presents the current program vision (typically represented by the next top 10 upcoming features) and highlights any changes from the previous PI Planning meeting as well as any forthcoming Milestones.

Architecture vision and development practices
System Architect/Engineering presents the architecture vision. Also, a senior development manager may introduce Agile-supportive changes to development practices such as test automation, DevOps, Continuous Integration, and Continuous Deployment, which are being advanced in the upcoming PI

Planning context & lunch
The RTE presents the planning process and expected outcomes of the meeting

Team Breakouts #1
Teams estimate their capacity (velocity) for each Iteration and identify the backlog items they will likely need to realize the features. Each team creates their team plan, visible to all, iteration by iteration

Draft plan review
Tightly timeboxed; teams present key planning outputs, including draft objectives, potential risks and dependencies. Business Owners, Product Management and other teams and stakeholders review and provide input

Management review and problem-solving
During this, management may negotiate scope changes and resolve other problems by agreeing to various planning adjustments. The RTE facilitates and keeps the primary stakeholders together for as long as necessary to make the decisions needed to reach achievable objectives

PI Planning Day 2 Agenda
Planning Adjustments
Team breakouts #2
Final Plan Review and Lunch
Program Risks
Confidence vote
Plan rework
Planning retrospective and moving forward

Planning Adjustments
The 2nd day of PI planning, the meeting begins with managers describing any changes to planning scope and resources

Team breakouts #2
Teams continue planning based on their agenda from the previous day, making the appropriate adjustments. They finalize their objectives for the PI, to which the Business Owners assign business value

Final Plan Review and Lunch

1. Changes to capacity and load. 2. Final PI Objectives with business value. 3. Program risks and impediments. 4. Q& A Sessions. – Collected in front of room. Reviewed by team. Business Owners asked to accept plan. If yes, plan/prog risk sheets next. If no, plans stay, teams cont. to work after review.

Program risks
During planning, teams have identified program-level risks and impediments that could impact their ability to meet their objectives. These are resolved in a broader management context in front of the whole train. One by one, the risks are addressed with honesty and transparency, and then categorized into one of the following categories:

• Resolved: the teams agree that the issue is no longer a concern
• Owned: someone on the train takes ownership of the item since it cannot be resolved at the meeting
• Accepted: some risks are just facts or potential problems that must be understood and accepted
• Mitigated: teams can identify a plan to reduce the impact of an item

Confidence vote
Once program risks have been addressed, teams vote on their confidence in meeting their program PI objectives. Each team conducts a fist of five vote. If the average is 3 fingers or above, then management should accept the commitment. If it’s less than 3, the team reworks the plan. Any person voting 2 fingers or fewer should be given an opportunity to voice their concern. This might add to the list of risks, require some replanning or simply be informative.

Plan rework
This is done until a high confidence level can be reached. This is one occasion where alignment and commitment are valued more highly than adhering to a timebox.

Planning retrospective and moving forward
Finally, the RTE leads this for the PI Planning event to capture what went well, what didn’t, and what can be done better next time.

3 pillars of scrum

1. Transparency
2. Inspection
3. Adaption

How are the 5 Whys used?
To identify a root cause(s) of a problem)

When does the Plan-Do-Check-Adjust cycle occur in Scrum?
At all formal Scrum events

Which type of enabler does a System Architect review during a System Demo?
Enabler portfolio epics

Enabler Stories
Support the activities needed to extend the Architectural Runway to provide future business functionality. These include exploration, infrastructure, compliance, and architecture development. They are captured in the various backlogs and occur at all levels of the Framework

Spikes
A type of exploration Enabler Story in SAFe. Defined initially in Extreme Programming (XP), they represent activities such as research, design, investigation, exploration, and prototyping. Their purpose is to gain the knowledge necessary to reduce the risk of a technical approach, better understand a requirement, or increase the reliability of a story estimate.

Functional Spikes
They are used to analyze overall solution behavior and determine:

How to break it down
How to organize the work
Where risk and complexity exist
How to use insights to influence implementation decisions

Technical Spikes
They are used to research various approaches in the solution domain. For example:

Determine a build vs buy decision
Evaluate the potential performance or load impact or a new user story
Evaluate specific technical implementation approaches
Develop confidence about the desired solution path

What is the name of the iteration where all team members determine how much of the team’s backlog they can commit to delivering during an upcoming iteration?
Backlog Refinement

How often should a system demo occur?
Every Iteration (2 weeks)

Which activity is the Scrum Master’s Responsibility?
Coaching the Agile Team

How many team members make up an Agile Team?
5-9 members

ScrumXP
A lightweight process for self-organizing and self-managing cross-functional teams of five to nine people. To continuously value, _ uses the Scrum framework for project management and XP-derived software engineering practices.

Team Kanban
Is a Lean method that helps teams facilitate the flow of value by visualizing workflow, establishing Work in Progress (WIP) limits, measuring throughput, and continuously improving their processes.

Who has content authority for the Team Backlog?
Product Owner

Who is responsible for defining stories and prioritizing the backlog?
Product Owner

What are the 3 purposes of a Scrum Master?
Remove impediments
Facilitates Team events
Fosters an environment for high-performing teams

Team PI Objectives
Are a summarized description of the specific business and technical goals that an Agile team intends to achieve in the upcoming PI. Often map to features but not always.

Exploration Enablers
These support research, prototyping, and other activities needed to develop an understanding of Customer needs, including the exploration of prospective Solutions and evaluating alternatives.

Architectural enablers
These are created to build the Architectural Runway, which allows smoother and faster development

Infrastructure enablers
These are created to build, enhance, and automate the development, testing, and deployment environments. They facilitate faster development, higher-quality testing, and a faster Continuous Delivery Pipeline

Compliance enablers
These facilitate managing specific compliance activities, including Verification and Validation (V&V), documentation and signoffs, and regulatory submissions and approvals

Agile development is…
incremental

__ over processes and tools
Individuals and interactions

Working software over…
comprehensive documentation

Customer collaboration over…
contract negotiation

_ over following a plan
Responding to change

Agile Manifesto
Individuals and interactions over processes and tools
Working software over comprehensive documentation
Customer collaboration over contract negotiation
Responding to change over following a plan

Agile Manifesto Principles 1-6

1. Our highest priority is to satisfy the customer through early and continuous delivery of valuable software
2. Welcome changing requirements, even late in development. Agile processes harness change for the customer’s competitive advantage
3. Deliver working software frequently, from a couple of weeks to a couple of months, with a preference for the shorter timescale
4. Business people and developers must work together daily throughout the project (Have a role for business sides, then roles for IT. Show your work, transparency builds trust)
5. Build projects around motivated individuals. Give them the environment and support they need, and trust them to get the job done
6. The most efficient and effective method of converying information to and within a development team is face-to-face conversation

Transparency builds…
trust

Agile Manifesto Principles 7-12

7. Working software is the primary measure of progress
8. Agile processes promote sustainable development. The sponsors, developers, and users should be able to maintain a constant pace indefinitely
9. Continuous attention to technical excellence and good design enhances agility
10. Simplicity – the art of maximizing the amount of work is not done – is essential
11. The best architectures, requirements, and designs emerge from self-organizing teams
12. At regular intervals, the team reflects on how to become more effective, then tunes and adjusts its behavior accordingly. (Retrospective “retro”; reuse/revision)

Develop on cadence…
Release on demand

Agile is value…
and quality driven

Agile teams show that __ matter
dates

Business owners show how __ matter
priorities

Fix _, not scope
quality

Backlog is NOT a…
commitment

Agile practices
Timeboxing
User stories
Daily stand-ups
Frequent demos
Test-driven development
Information radiators
Retrospectives
Continuous integration

Timeboxing
a technique that delivers information systems functionality and requirements through versioning.

Scrum involves…
planning

Kanban involves less…
planning, more of a reaction. Filling people’s queues based on capacity.

What is the single most important component for ensuring the success of the program?
The Scrum Master

SAFe recommends /___ involved in every demo
clients/consumers

Scrum Values
Courage
Commitment
Focus
Respect
Openness

Iteration length is…
one to four weeks

What is the SAFe recommendation for the length of an iteration?
2 weeks (small batch size)

Goal is to deliver _/_ at the end of each iteration
working software/hardware

Avoid adding _ once the iteration has begun
scope

Team Backlog
Represents opportunities, not commitments.
Is created by the Agile Team.
Is owned and prioritized by the team’s Product Owner
contains user and enabler stories

Backlog refinement (timebox/value?)
~1 hr
Prepare requirements for Iteration Planning

Iteration Planning (timebox/value?)
2 – 4 hrs
Team commits to a set of goals to be delivered in the Iteration

Daily Stand-up (timebox/value?)
<= 15 minutes
Team members sync regarding the progress of the Iteration Goals

Iteration Review (timebox/value?)
~1 hr
Deliverables reviewed with stakeholders providing feedback
Also the demo, all attend.

Iteration retrospective (timebox/value?)
1 – 1.5 hrs
Team reviews and improves its process before the next iteration. Attendees – Agile Team only.

_ facilitates the Scrum-of-Scrum
RTE

Scrum Master Characteristics
Coaches team improvement using values, principles, and best practices
Facilitates Scrum team events
Protects the development team
Helps to remove impediments
Is a servant leader (an optimizer, groups people, supports members. Figure out ways to help others improve.)
Interact w/ people on a one-to-one basis. Help them along the way

Product Owner Characteristics
The single voice of the customer and stakeholders in the team
Owns and manages the Team Backlog (prioritizes it)
Defines and accepts requirements (builds quality w/in the team)
Makes the hard calls on scope and content

Development Team Characteristics
Typically 3-9 people (excluding Scrum Master and Product Owner)
Everyone who is needed to define, build, and test
Team members are only on this team
Self-organizing and accountable
Collaborative
Cross-functional
Empowered (sometimes have to protect team from PO and even from SM. Have to learn to let people fail, when it is safe to fail)

Development Team Responsibilities
Listen and talk to people
Seek and accept help
Embrace change
Work on items in an order set by the PO
Be proactive and self-motivated
Be honest (w/ yourself and others)
Be passionate about what you do
Embrace “all sink or swim”
Everyone involved shares the risks. Make sure you are transparent

SAFe Core Values

• Alignment
• Transparency
• Built-in Quality
• Program Execution

SAFe Lean-Agile Principles (9 total)

1. Take an economic view
2. Apply systems thinking
3. Assume variability; preserve options
4. Build incrementally with fast, integrated learning cycles
5. Base milestones on objective evaluation of working systems
6. Visualize and limit WIP. Reduce batch sizes. Manage queue lengths
7. Apply cadence, synchronize w/ cross-domain planning
8. Unlock the intrinsic motivation of knowledge workers
9. Decentralize decision-making
10. Organize around value

A “feature” is a collection of _
stories
Fits one PI for one ART
Includes acceptance criteria
larger system behaviors that fulfill user’s needs
Plain language (not tech speak)

Agile Release Train
a virtual organization of 5-12 teams (50-125+) that plans, commits, and executes together

• Aligns team to a common business and technology mission to deliver a continuous flow of value.

A () is a fixed timebox; default is 10 weeks
Program Increment (PI)

Agile release train
Define new functionality
Implement
Acceptance test
Deploy

ART Roles: Release Train Engineer (RTE)
acts as the Chief Scrum Master for the train

ART Roles: Product Management
owns, defines and prioritizes the Program Backlog.

ART Roles: System Architect/Engineering
provides architectural guidance and technical enablement to the teams on the train

ART Roles: System Team
provides processes and tools to integrate and evaluate assets early and often

ART Roles: Business Owners
are the key stakeholders on the Agile Release Train

Program Events for the ART
PI Planning
ART Sync
System Demo
Inspect and Adapt event

ART Program Events: PI Planning
Timebox: 2 days, every 8-12 weeks (10 weeks ave)
Value: Teams commit to a set of objectives to be delivered in the PI

ART Program Events: ART Sync
Timebox: 1 hr
Value: train teams to sync regarding the progress of the PI

ART Program Events: System Demo
Timebox: 2 hrs
Value: deliverables reviewed with stakeholders providing feedback

ART Program Events: Inspect and Adapt event
Timebox: 1/2 day
Value: The train reviews and improves its process before the next PI
1) PI System Demo
2) Quantitative measurements
3) Problem-solving workshop
Attendees: Teams/stakeholders
Led: PO, PM and System Teams
End – planned vs. actual business value )BV) rolled up to program predictability measure.

SPC
SAFe Program Consultant

1 Increment equals…
… 5 iterations

For a large solution, how many people can be on one ART?
50 to 125

The 5th sprint is the…
Innovation and planning sprint. Sometimes lasts 3 weeks. Sometimes works to have a longer time. Need to build in flexibility in your cadence

How a Scrum Master supports and Agile Team
Coaches the team to create better Solutions, improve business results, and better their processes
Facilitates team and program events
Removes impediments to the team’s progress
Assists the team in implementing SAFe and working with other teams who may or may not be using SAFe
Fosters adoption of Agile technical practices
Assists the PO in preparing and refining the backlog for PI and Iteration Planning
Coaches the team on the best ways to refine their backlog and create Stories

The Scrum Master is the great __
optimizer

Ensure demos are . Strive for code.
integrated

How to be a servant leader (DW p45)
Listens and supports team members in problem identification and decision-making
Understands and empathizes with others
Encourages and supports the personal development of each individual
Persuades rather than uses authority
Thinks beyond day-to-day activities
Looks to help without diminishing the commitment of others
Coaches the team on Agile best practices

What makes up PI Planning?
2 days every 8-12 weeks (10 weeks is typical) – all members should be involved
Everyone attends in person if at all possible
Product Management owns Feature priorities
Development teams own Story planning and high-level estimates
Architect/Engineering and UX work as intermediaries for governance, interfaces, and dependencies

A benefit hypothesis…
justifies feature implementation cost and provides business perspective when making scope decisions

User Story Guidelines (the 3 Cs)
Card – written on a card or in the tool and may annotate with notes
Conversation – the details are in a conversation with the Product Owner (PO)
Confirmation – Acceptance criteria confirm the Story correctness

User story template
As a , I want to so that .

Acceptance Criteria
Provide the details of the Story from a testing point of view
Are created by the Agile Team
Express the conditions that need to be satisfied for the customer (acceptable behavior)
Provide context for the team, more details of the Story, and help the team know when they are done
Are written by the customer/PO and refined by the team during backlog refinement and Iteration planning
Use User Acceptance Test Scenarios typically as a starting point

Advantages of Acceptance Criteria
Continue the conversation between the PO and the team
Helps solidify expectations for the Story
Spawns negotiation, trade-offs, and options to split a large Story into smaller Stories
Establishes a high-level test plan
Provides a basis for Solution design

Acceptance Criteria Formats
Test that
Demonstrate that
Verify that when does they get
Given when then

How much acceptance criteria?
Stop when:
You have enough to size the story
Testing will become to convoluted
You have made 2-3 revisions of the criteria

INVEST Acronym (in a good User Story)
Independent
Negotiable
Valuable
Estimable
Small
Testable

Enabler Stories
Can represent different types of work: Exploration, Architecture, Infrastructure.
Demonstrated just like any other Story
Enables functional value by another future story
Don’t deliver actual business value

Types of Enablers
Spikes and Refactors

Refactors
Systematic approach to improving the system without changing observable system behavior
Example: improving maintainability, performance, or scalability

A Story Point is a singular number that represents:
Volume: how much is there?
Complexity: how hard is it?
Knowledge: what do we know?
Uncertainty: What’s not known?

SM’s role in facilitating estimations
Make sure everyone participates
Ensure relative estimates are used
Focus the discussion on contested items
Keep time spent estimating Stories to a minimum
Identify SMEs who need to be present

Common anti-patterns for estimations
Pressure by stakeholders to lower estimations
Only a few people participate
Not using the adjusted Fibonacci scale

Normalized estimation technique
For every full-time developer and tester on the team, give the team 8 pts (adjust for part-timers)
Subtract 1 point for every team member vacation day and holiday
Find a small Story that would take about a half-day to develop and a half-day to test and validate, and call it a 1
Estimate every other Story relative to that one
Never look back (don’t worry abut recalibrating)

PI Planning Briefing Typical Schedule
RTE Facilitates the PI Planning event and kicks off the briefings
The executive, Product Manager, System Architect/Development Manager/UX role conduct their briefings to the entire ART
The RTE briefly reviews the purpose of the meeting (alignment) and presents the agenda, planning guidance, and planning requirements
The executive presents the business context slides
PM presents Vision and Feature and Benefits slides
System Architect/Dev Manager/UX role presents the Architecture, UX, and Developer manager briefing slides

Management Review and Problem-Solving
At Day 1 end, management meets to make adjustments to scope and objectives based on the day’s planning.
During Inspect & Adapt event.
Scrum Master’s role (p153)

Common questions during Managers’ Review Session
What did we just learn?
Where do we need to adjust Vision? Scope? Resources?
Where are the bottlenecks?
What Features must be de-scoped?
What decisions must we make between now and tomorrow to address these issues?

Possible changes that result from Manager’s Review
Business priorities
Adjustment to plan
Changes to scope
Movement of people

ROAM Risks – Addressing program risk
Resolved – has been addressed; no longer a concern
Owned – someone has taken responsibility
Accepted – nothing more can be done. If risk occurs, release may be compromised.
Mitigated – team has plan to adjust as necessary

Confidence Vote
Teams agree to do everything in their power to meet the agreed-to objectives
In the event that fact patterns dictate that it is simply not achievable, teams agree to escalate immediately so that corrective action can be taken

1 – no confidence
2 – little confidence
3 – good confidence
4 – high confidence
5 – very high confidence

Anyone who puts up a 1/2 is asked to speak. They may have a risk that was not previously considered. Goal is to have everyone at a 3 or above. Encourage everybody to speak up. This helps build further trust

Goals to review during a Retrospective Meeting

1. What went well
2. What didn’t
3. What we can do better next time

Scrum Master’s role in team breakout #1
Ensure team has a draft plan to present
Identify as many risks and dependencies as possible for the management review
Secure subject matter experts and Program Level stakeholders as needed by the team
Facilitate the coordination with other teams for dependencies

Common Anti-Patterns for team breakout #1

• No plan or partial plan at the end of the timebox.
• Too much time is spent analyzing each story
• Shared Scrum Masters and Product owners are not available enough
• Part-time scrum masters don’t have time to plan as part of the team

Scrum Master’s Role in PI Planning

• Maintain the timebox
• Make sure the team builds a plan they can commit to
• Ensure that the team is honest in their confidence vote
• Facilitate the coordination with other teams, but don’t do it FOR the team
• Act as a request buffer for a team that has a lot of dependencies
• Manage the program board
  Facilitate the retrospective

Common anti-patterns in PI Planning
Pressure is put on the team to overcommit
Team under commits due to fear of failure
Over-planning ahead of time to make it more efficient loses the essence of PI Planning
The plan, rather than the alignment, become the goal

Goals
Help align team, determine quality levels, risk mitigation at its core. They provide flexibility

Iteration Planning Flow
-Establishing capacity

• Story analysis & estimation
• Detailing Stories
• Developing iteration goals
• Committing to iteration goals
• Continues until estimation of stories reaches capacity of team

Iteration Goals
Provide clarity, commitment (other teams, the program and stakeholders) and management information.

Serve 3 purposes:

1. Align team members to a common purpose
2. Align Agile teams to common PI Objectives and manage dependencies
3. Provide continuous management information
   -Commitment/adaptability

A common approach is to _ _ into during Iteration Planning
split stories _ tasks

Scrum Master’s role in Iteration Planning

• Maintain timebox
• Ensure that the team commits to the Iteration Goals
  Verify that the PO or other managers don’t influence the team to overcommit
• Challenge the team to exceed their previous accomplishments
• Ensure that improvement items from the retrospective are put into effect
• Ensure time is allocated for technical debt activities

Common anti-patterns in Iteration Planning
Delving too deep into technical discussions
Commitment is unrealistic
Velocity and load are exactly the same
Scrum Master is more focused on technical hat than facilitator’s hat
The team under-commits due to fear of failure
No time is reserved for support activities

5 dysfunctions of a team & help for each (DW p61-63)
1) absence of Trust – safe environment
2) Fear of Conflict – SM encourages disagreements
3) Lack of Commitment – shared commitment to each other/external stakeholders
4) Avoidance of Accountability – stakeholders, peer pressure & review of results
5) Inattention to Results – review at end of IP and release.

Resolving Conflict (DW p65)
1) Working Agreements
2) Achieving consensus

Agile Teams

• Cross-functional, self-organizing entities
  Create and refine User Stories and acceptance criteria
• Define, build, test, and deliver Stories
• Develop and commit to team Pl Objectives and Iteration plans
• Five to eleven members
• Plan their work at periodic, largely face-to-face PI Planning events

Product Owner

• Defines and accepts Stories
• Acts as the Customer for developer questions
  -Works with Product Management to plan Program Increments (Pl)

Built-in Quality Practices
Lean and Agile principles & practices
Behavior-driven development (BDD)
eXtreme Programming (XP)
Code quality
Design patterns and practices
Agile modeling

ART Events

• PI Planning – 2 days – teams commit to set of objectives
• ART Sync – 1 hr – regarding progress of PI
• System Demo – 2 hr – review with stakeholders for feedback
• Inspect & Adapt – 4 hour – review and improves its process before next PI

Common attributes of high-performing teams
► Self-organizing ► Understand work’s impact on organization
► Effective decision-making ► Aligned and collaborative
► Open and clear communication ► Safe atmosphere to take risks ► Valued diversity ► Effective timely feedback ► Mutual trust ► Sufficient resources for local control
► Healthy conflict
► Success focus over failure avoidance
► Clear goals and purpose
► Abilities balanced with challenge
► Concentration and focus
► Engagement
► Fun with work and each other
► Ownership and accountability

Stages of high-performing teams
Forming, storming, norming, performing, adjourning

Challenge with meetings
Meetings can be challenging because:

• The purpose is not clear
• There are no actionable outcomes
• They may result in unproductive conflict
• They may be boring
• Conversation may divert from the agenda to deep discussion
  ► Such meetings add almost no value
  ► Ineffective meetings can (and should) be fixed

Running Successful Meeting (1 of 2)
► Prepare for every meeting , no matter how short
► Communicate a clear purpose and agenda
► Identify a directly responsible individual (ORI) for maintaining agenda/action items
► Expect participants to know why they are attending , what contributions they will make, and expected outcomes
► Leave with clear action items
► Promote and keep to timeboxes
► Be prepared to challenge and be challenged
► Get participants moving and ensure active engagement

Running Successful Meeting (2 of 2)
► Establish default decisions-decisions should never wait for a meeting
► Don’t bring a problem without bringing at least one possible solution
► Review actions taken to meet commitments-enforce accountability
► Use “Yes, and …” instead of “No, but … ” to keep inputs positive and flowing
► Take frequent breaks
► Go the extra mile to bring remote participants into the discussion
► Maintain communication beyond the meeting

Powerful questions (DW p54-56)
though-provoking, generate curiosity, channel focus, generate energy, stimulate reflective conversation, surface underlying assumptions, invite creativity, inspire questions, reach deep meaning.

Scrum of Scrums (SoS) Meeting
For Scrum Masters and the RTE to gain visibility into team progress and program impediments, 2x week.

User Stories are:
Short descriptions of a small piece of desired functionality, written in the user’s language
Recommend form of expression is the user-voice

Persona
Detailed fictional characters acting as a representative user.

Acceptance Test
Derive from acceptance criteria
Define specific pass/fail behavior

Estimating Poker
Combines expert opinion, analogy, and disaggregation for quick reliable estimates (Story points)
Includes whole team
Builds understanding
Shared commitment

Velocity
Sum of pts for all completed stories that met Definition of Done (DoD)
Use output from last iteration, if possible.

Uncommitted Objectives
Identify work that can be variable within the scope of PI. Only if time permits within the PI.

Planning Guidance

• Product Owners: You have the content authority to make decisions at the user Story level
• Scrum Masters: Your responsibility is to manage the timebox, the dependencies, and the ambiguities
• Agile Team: Your responsibility is to define users Stories, …. plan them into the Iteration, and work out interdependencies with other teams

Daily Stand up Patterns (DSU)

• Yesterday’s accomplishments
• Today’s accomplishments
• Any roadblocks impeding on iteration goals?

Daily Stand-up (Meet-after agenda)

• review topics SM wrote on Meet-after board
• Involve parties discuss. Others leave.

BVIR
Big Visible Information Radiator (team board to track progress) during DSU. Tracks iteration progress.

Iteration burn-down chart

• Count remaining efforts
• Focus on tasks completed vs stories completed
• Hard to distinguish between work added and not done

Work In Progress (WIP) limits
Improve work. Some steps, no limit, other serve as buffer with min/max.

Scrum Master’s role in tracking Iteration progress

• Facilitate mid-Pl re-planning
• Encourage the team to point out as early as possible if they think they will miss Iteration goals or Pl Objectives . – Communicate to and from the scrum of scrums
• Encourage the use of engineering practices
• Make sure defects are not pushed to the IP Iteration
• Facilitate preparation for the next Pl
• Support release activities

Scrum Master’s role in Backlog Refinement

• Maintain timeboxes
• Maintain the right level of a deep backlog vs ready backlog for two Iterations
• Make sure all the team members participate
• Invite the right subject matter experts
• Hold the event at regular intervals

Scrum Master’s Role in Team/System Demo

• Begin to consider how and what to demo in Iteration Planning
• Make sure the right participants are present
• Ensure that the team celebrates its accomplishments and that stakeholders acknowledge them
• Make sure different team members have the opportunity to demo
• Ensure that the team is ready for the System Demo and coordinates with the System Team

Iteration Metrics

stores, # accepted stories, % accepted, # not accepted, # pushed to next Iteration, # deferred, # deleted, # added.

DevOps (Speed & Stability together)
C- Culture (shared responsibility)
A – Automation (Cont. delivery pipeline)
L – Lean flow (Batch size small, limit WIP, visibility)
M – Measurement (flow thru pipeline.)
R – Recovery ( implement low risk releases, fast recovery/reversions/fix-forward)

Operations, development, security, architecture, Business, Compliance