In-Depth: Is SAFe® Really That Bad?

The mere mention of SAFe® often results in groans among Agilists. It isn't hard to find skeptical views of SAFe® and similar large-scale Agile frameworks. Honestly, we're not a fan either.

We also believe we need to ground our beliefs in solid evidence as much as we can. So what is the actual evidence that SAFe® doesn't work or is outright harmful to organizations and teams?

In this episode, we explore the results of several scientific studies and reviews that have attempted to compare scaling approaches. We also report findings from our academic analyses based on data from ~2.000 Agile teams. And the results are ... not what you'd expect. We discuss the implications of the findings in detail and hope it lays the foundation for better conversations around scaling in and around organizations.

Read the full post here:
https://medium.com/the-liberators/in-depth-is-safe-really-that-bad-ed5c5c706e42

Our peer-reviewer paper on the comparison of scaling methods
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3571849

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The music for episodes 91 and onward was written and produced for us by Basanite. The music for episodes 1-90 was acquired through Yummy Sounds. Post-production by Jasper Huiskamp.