Agile methodologies are meant to bring organisations closer to the customer by meeting their needs. Many companies are getting stuck in the middle of the transformation, and it is a major reason behind the failure of SAFe transformations today. Organisations should first understand that SAFe transformation is a continuous process and that it may take years to implement SAFe successfully. The organisations that deliver insufficient results start to blame agile or stop striving for agility. The current article sheds the spotlight on the reasons for the failure of SAFe transformation and how the SAFe agilist will fix them.
Reasons for the Failure of Agile Transformation
Lack of Leadership Participation
A successful SAFe transformation requires participation from senior leadership. Though many leaders want to go agile, they lack a clear understanding of the agile transformation. They fail to empower employees to make the necessary changes to make the SAFe transformation successful. The reasons could be a lack of trust among the team members. They start making all important decisions, and teams are not empowered with the autonomy needed to function successfully in the agile environment. The disconnection between the leadership and teams is a reason for the failure of the SAFe transformation. The leaders who want to become truly agile can opt for leading SAFe certification training.
Fix
The SAFe agilist should encourage participation of top management in the agile transformation rather than just supervising the process. The management should participate in sprint reviews removing impediments. They should adopt and encourage teams to adopt new work patterns.
Incompatibility with the Organisation
The second biggest reason behind the failure of the SAFe transformation is the leadership that claims to support agile but still follows a command-and-control approach. Even when the organisation is able to run successful sprints, they may have to wait for the approval of the management to implement the outcome. This says that teams were successful in adopting agile, but the organisation is not yet.
Fix
SAFe agilists help the leaders to shift from decision-makers to impediment resolvers. The agilists encourage becoming coaches instead of controllers. The top management should encourage adaptive strategies among the team members rather than annual plans in traditional management. There should be a change in the fundamental role of the leaders.
Treating Agile as a Destination
Many organisations think of agile transformation as a destination, and this is one of the prominent reasons for SAFe transformation failure in many organisations. With this kind of treatment, the teams focus on doing it right, leaving the focus on their current job roles. They enforce strict adherence to agile ceremonies without understanding the purpose. Focus more on process than outcomes. Organisations only track the velocity of the tasks performed rather than outcomes. They treat agile as a destination rather than a journey. Teams spend more time adhering to agile practices rather than spending time with the customers to understand their needs.
Fix
The organisations that implement agile practices at scale using the SAFe framework need to understand various agile principles like Scrum, Lean, and Kanban to build the transformation process effectively. By helping the teams understand these agile practices effectively, SAFe agilists can help the teams build better and faster products after understanding customer requirements. It also improves the ROI of the business. Agile transformations become successful when they are a journey rather than a destination.
Resistance to Cultural Change
Resistance to change is often the biggest challenge and reason for failure of agile transformations. Even expert teams may fear uncertainty during agile transformation. Major resistance is seen in adopting customer feedback during project or product development. The fear of losing control over their job and the reluctance to adopt new working styles seem to be major reasons for resistance in agile transformation.
Fix
Resistance to culture change seems to be one of the major reasons for resistance to agile transformation. The SAFe agile coach should encourage leaders to build psychological safety for the teams during the transformation. The teams should be allowed to learn things from failures. The leaders should change performance metrics and reward experimentation and innovation rather than just completion of tasks. By addressing resistance to change effectively, organisations can not only make the SAFe transformation successful but also increase employee engagement.
Focus on Technology
A greater focus on technology over productivity is also a reason for the failure of the SAFe transformation in the organisation. When the teams are highly focused on technology instead of customer value, the projects may fail because they cannot address customer needs.
Fix
The SAFe Agilist addresses the issue by encouraging teams to focus on agile methodologies. They want the teams to develop the products as per the changing needs of the customer. By using frameworks like Scrum, the teams can build the products as per customer requirements.
Transformation as a Whole
Agile methodology is a long-term journey and not a said-and-done job. Many organisations commit the mistake of adopting agile with a massive company-wide shift. This is a classic example of why agile transformations fail. With a massive adoption at scale, teams will not get any opportunity to learn new concepts. It could create resistance in the organisation, leading to failure of the SAFe transformation.
Fix
The SAFe Agilist would replace the failed big-bang approach with incremental change. They encourage leaders to initiate pilot programs for the teams to create visible wins for them and encourage them to use agile practices to enhance their productivity, rather than push them. The organisations that implemented incremental change achieved great results in SAFe transformation.
Conclusion
There are plenty of reasons for the failure of agile transformation. The SAFe agile team chooses the right and tailored approach to implement SAFe in the organisation and improve the chances of success. Both the leaders and teams should be educated about agile practices. There should always be room for the teams to experiment to rule out uncertainty and resistance in handling agile practices.
