Agile has long been guided by the Agile Manifesto, which consists of four values and twelve principles. While these principles are fundamental, they were initially designed for small agile teams. As organizations scale, additional principles are needed to ensure alignment, efficiency, and value delivery at scale. This is where SAFe (Scaled Agile Framework) principles come into play.
One key challenge of scaling Agile is architectural consistency. The Agile Manifesto states that "the best architectures, requirements, and designs emerge from self-organizing teams." However, in a scaled environment, where multiple teams collaborate, architecture must be both intentional and emergent. Every team cannot define its own architecture independently—there must be a unified approach to ensure seamless integration.
Moreover, Agile is not limited to software development alone. In a scaled environment, Agile must also be applied to solution and product development, not just software products. This broader application requires additional guiding principles.
Applying the SAFe Principles to RTEs
One of the key SAFe principles is taking an economic view. This principle is primarily directed at portfolio and product leadership, but Release Train Engineers (RTEs) can derive valuable insights from it. It emphasizes delivering value early and often, leveraging incremental development.
In traditional waterfall development, the full value is only realized at the end of the project. However, with iterative and incremental delivery, value is generated progressively, allowing for early feedback and course corrections. Additionally, requirement decay is mitigated—if a feature is scheduled for development several months down the line, there is an opportunity to reassess its necessity before investing effort into it. This ensures that only valuable features are developed.
Real-World Example: Airline Website Development
Consider an airline company developing a new website. Their development process followed an iterative approach:
• Months 1-2: Search page
• Months 3-4: Results page
• Months 5-6: Passenger information and loyalty integration
• Months 7-8: Check-in and baggage information
While this appears to be an incremental approach, it failed to deliver real value—because by the time the project was near completion, the payment system was still not configured. Despite iterative development, the website was not functional for customers.
A more effective approach would have been to deliver value in a horizontal slice:
• Step 1: Enable basic flight booking
• Step 2: Add check-in functionality
• Step 3: Introduce loyalty programs
• Step 4: Enhance baggage and special equipment options
By structuring development this way, the airline would have had a functional website much earlier, rather than waiting until the end to integrate critical features like payment processing.
The Role of an RTE in Value Delivery
As an RTE, one of your primary responsibilities is to coach product management on sequencing releases and prioritizing work in a way that ensures value delivery. It’s not enough to develop iteratively; the goal is to deliver value incrementally—meaning that at every stage, the system should be useful to end users.
For example, imagine receiving a job offer worth a million dollars—but the job requires relocating to a war zone, covering your own expenses, and arranging your own accommodations. Now, compare that to an offer of £800,000 for six months of remote work from London. Most people would choose the second option because value delivery isn’t just about total money—it also considers risk, cost, and lead time.
This is precisely how product teams should approach prioritization. When sequencing features, we must consider multiple trade-off parameters beyond just business value:
• Risk
• Lead time for delivery
• Product cost
• Development expenses
Using WSJF for Effective Prioritization
To make effective prioritization decisions, SAFe introduces Weighted Shortest Job First (WSJF). WSJF helps balance speed and accuracy when determining which features to prioritize.
WSJF is calculated as: WSJF = Cost of Delay / Job Duration
The cost of delay itself is determined by summing up:
• User or Business Value
• Time Criticality
• Risk Reduction or Opportunity Enablement
For example, if you are considering three features:
• Mobile App: Baseline business value
• Cloud Migration: 3x the business value of Mobile App
• Single Sign-On: 5x the business value of Mobile App
Each feature is assessed relative to the others in terms of time criticality, risk reduction, and opportunity enablement. The highest WSJF score indicates the most urgent feature to develop first.
Choosing the Right Prioritization Model
WSJF is one of many prioritization techniques. Others include:
• MoSCoW (Must have, Should have, Could have, Won’t have) – High speed, lower accuracy
• Net Present Value (NPV) or Internal Rate of Return (IRR) – High accuracy, slower decision-making
• RICE (Reach, Impact, Confidence, Effort) – Used by some organizations, but may not always be the most efficient
Choosing the right technique depends on the needs of the organization. If you require fast decision-making, MoSCoW might be suitable. If precision is crucial, financial models like NPV may work better. WSJF provides a balance between speed and accuracy, making it a preferred choice for SAFe environments.
Conclusion
SAFe principles, particularly taking an economic view and using prioritization techniques like WSJF, are crucial for Release Train Engineers to guide teams and product managers in making informed sequencing decisions. Delivering value early and often ensures that Agile at scale remains effective, minimizes waste, and maximizes user satisfaction. Understanding these principles can make a significant difference in how teams approach product development and ensure true business agility.
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