Certified Associate in Project Management (CAPM)
SAFe basics: Agile Release Train, PI and roles for the CAPM
The Scaled Agile Framework (SAFe) scales agile by grouping 5 to 15 agile teams into an Agile Release Train (ART) that plans, commits and delivers together in a Planning Interval (PI) of 8 to 12 weeks. Essential SAFe gives the train four roles: Release Train Engineer, Product Management, System Architect and Business Owners.
The Agile Release Train
SAFe calls the ART the heart of Essential SAFe: a long-lived team of agile teams that incrementally develops, delivers and often operates one or more solutions in a value stream. ARTs are self-managing and self-organizing teams of agile teams that plan, commit and execute together.
Each ART has 5 to 15 agile teams. Each agile team is a cross-functional group of ten or fewer people who can define, build, test and deploy an increment of value. ARTs are virtual organizations formed to span functional boundaries and remove unnecessary handoffs, and are typically spread across organizational and geographic boundaries.
The Planning Interval
A PI is a cadence-based timebox in which an ART delivers value in line with its PI Objectives. It is typically 8 to 12 weeks: four or five development iterations followed by an Innovation and Planning (IP) iteration.
PI Planning is a cadence-based, face-to-face event that SAFe calls the heartbeat of the ART. The people who do the work plan the work. Other ART events include the System Demo, Inspect and Adapt, Coach Sync, PO Sync and ART Sync.
ART roles and team roles
Release Train Engineer: a servant leader and the chief Scrum Master/Team Coach for the train. The RTE makes sure ART events such as PI Planning, ART Sync and the Inspect and Adapt workshop work.
Product Management: defines and supports building desirable, feasible, viable and sustainable products that meet customer needs over the product-market lifecycle. It defines features.
System Architect: an individual or small team that applies systems thinking, defines the overall architecture and defines enablers.
Business Owners: a small group of stakeholders with business and technical responsibility for the solution the ART builds. Inside each team, the Product Owner is the content authority for the team backlog and the Scrum Master/Team Coach helps the team remove impediments.
Features and stories
A feature is solution functionality that delivers business value and is sized for one ART to deliver within a PI. Each feature has a name, a benefit hypothesis and acceptance criteria. A capability is larger functionality that often spans several ARTs but still fits in a PI.
Teams split features into stories. A story is a short description of a small piece of functionality from the user's perspective that a team can finish in a few days or less, so it fits within one iteration. User stories give value to the end user; enabler stories cover exploration, architecture, infrastructure and compliance.
Where the exam catches people
- Believing the Product Owner is an ART role: Essential SAFe lists the PO among the team roles; Product Management is the ART-level role.
- Believing the RTE is a project manager who assigns work: SAFe describes the RTE as a servant leader and chief Scrum Master/Team Coach for the train.
- Believing an ART must sit in one place under one manager: ARTs are typically virtual, spanning organizational and geographic boundaries.
- Believing a feature is just a name and description: SAFe gives each feature a name, a benefit hypothesis and acceptance criteria.
- Believing a PI is one long iteration: it holds several development iterations followed by an IP iteration.