In the digital era of remote work, extended teams, culture diversity and results orientation, managing a complex project can be a big challenge. But doesn’t evolution lie in situations that are new and sometimes, uncomfortable? We dare to say that our greatest asset is adaptation, and without a doubt our greatest tool is technology. Nevertheless, the layer between the two is the essence that keeps things cohesive and is based on work principles that often rise above procedures. In other words, we are talking about Agile principles and Scaled Agile – SAFe framework. AROBS has already reached the point where several software development projects are coordinated SAFe(ly).
Even more, we are opening the doors to the IT outsourcing community and ecosystem in Cluj, to learn more about the benefits of adopting it.
The HOW
You would imagine that revolutionary ideas in the digital context, appear somewhere in a skyscraper, in Silicon Valley. Well, it seems that silencing the urban noise and retiring closer to nature, can make space to filter ideas that get soaked up between the daily tasks. The Agile methods are rooted back in 2001 when a group of tech people decided to meet at a retreat and seal the main guidelines of how software should be created and delivered from that moment on.
That’s how the famous Agile Manifesto was born, and later on, spread and translated into 60 languages. Its core is not something reinvented, but rather a sum of common work beliefs and values:
- individuals and the team interactions are treated with priority over processes and tools
- creating software rather than writing comprehensive documentation
- close collaboration with the customer over negotiating contracts
- Adaptable to change over being strictly about a plan
Agile is the HOW you reach higher customer satisfaction, a better work quality, efficiency and overall, return of investment.
SAFe 5.0 – next level
SAFe is the expanded version of the Agile. It takes the principles applied at a team level to the complex organizational level. Of course, introducing it in such a developed system requires commitment and patience for those involved in the process. Furthermore, recently the most advanced version to this point of the framework, SAFe 5.0, has been released. It talks about the Seven Core Competencies of the Lean Enterprise that promise to help you achieve business agility. Two new competencies: Continous Learning Culture and Organisational Agility as well as 5 restructured ones: Team and Technical Agility, Agile Product Delivery, Lean Portfolio Management, Enterprise Solution Delivery, and Lean-Agile Leadership.
Now, more than ever, every industry is driven by technology and every company has at least 50% of its activity based on software. So, in order to exceed the competition, not just survive it, large businesses must be lean and agile in their approach to be able to speed up the delivery process. This version, not only includes improving the operations within the project, but encompasses everyone involved in the company: business and technology leaders, development, IT operations, legal, marketing, finance, support, compliance, security, and others. All this, because at a certain point, the work of each influences the bigger picture, thus, the results that end up on the clients’ table.
Do you speak SAFe?
The SAFe Agile framework is essential to enterprises that work with multicultural teams spread worldwide. It can become your “common language”, in terms of respecting the same work principles, that will assure the connection and workflow you need for your project’s success. It relies on an ongoing process of evolution, one to one, with the IT outsourcing and software development market, and constantly brings new perspectives in the approach. Due to its characteristics, it has built an entire community around the world that adopts its methodology, and evolves along with it.
As a result, in Romania, which already represents an important pole in the IT outsourcing services, there are large companies who not only operate on projects based on SAFe methodology, but also develop local communities dedicated and open to discuss improvement through this framework.
A good example is the one created at AROBS Transilvania Software initiative, a powerful software services company in Cluj-Napoca with over 950+ employees that work on Travel&Hospitality, Life Sciences&IoT, Automotive and Enterprise projects as we speak.
If you wish to read more about the framework, you can do it on their dedicated website here.
And if you are in need of a software services provider, you can find more relevant information on AROBS website.