Achieve business agility withthe Scaled Agile Framework^®

Agile product delivery by itself does not do the trick. What you need is Business Agility.

That’s when the entire organization—from business to technology—comes together to implement Lean, Agile and DevOps practices to continually deliver breakthrough solutions faster than the competition. Business agility empowers you to take advantage of emerging opportunities by making quick decisions, aligning fund allocations with business objectives, and putting the right folks on the right tasks.

SAFe integrates the power of Lean, Agile, and DevOps into a comprehensive operating system that helps enterprises thrive in the digital age by delivering innovative products and services faster, more predictably, and with higher quality. Today, SAFe is in its sixth major iteration and has been adopted by more than 20,000 enterprises across the globe.

upGrad KnowledgeHut Services forScaling Agile

Scaling Agile can be overwhelming and confusing, especially if you’re trying to go it alone. The need for alignment, planning, cadence, roles, and communication, which appeared straight-forward among smaller teams, gets tricky to implement across hundreds and thousands of people. While every Enterprise has its own unique journey to implement Agile at scale, we’ve found that this works best with SAFe, the most established scaling approach. It’s no wonder that 70% of Fortune 100 companies actively employ SAFe.

At upGrad KnowledgeHut, we take a comprehensive approach to transformation by integrating people, processes, and technology to create real business value tailored to your organization’s specific needs. Our proven success is evident, having empowered over 300 organizations to adapt their business strategies, capitalize on emerging opportunities, and achieve sustainable growth. As a Scaled Agile Platinum SPCT Tier Business Partner, we are ranked among the top 15 global SAFe Enterprise Transformation Partners and are one of only five in the APAC region offering the full suite of SAFe capabilities.

With more than 35,000+ SAFe practitioners upskilled and over 1,000 SAFe SPCs and evangelists delivered, we are a leader in large-scale Agile transformations. In 2023 alone, we successfully transformed the careers of 500+ SAFe SPCs and 200+ Release Train Engineers, contributing to a 300% growth in SAFe certifications over three years. By leveraging our deep expertise in SAFe, we deliver solutions that extend beyond superficial changes, enabling genuine business agility at scale. Our SAFe Practice Consultants collaborate with you to create a clear implementation roadmap, starting with identifying the foundational elements necessary for scaling Agile within your organization.

As part of our coaching and consulting services, we offer the following services:

1. ASSESSMENT OF AGILE ADOPTION MATURITY

KnowledgeHut SPCs will start by assessing your organization’s SAFe adoption maturity. They will craft an adoption strategy and a transformation backlog including all training needs.

2. TRAINING, COACHING, AND IMPLEMENTATION

KnowledgeHut SPCs will guide you along the SAFe implementation roadmap. This customizable training module will cover best practices, tools, and challenges associated with SAFe adoption.

3. SUSTAINING AND IMPROVING BUSINESS AGILITY

Our elite pool of SPCs will work with you throughout your entire transformation and beyond as an extended part of your team.

Training and Certifications to Aid SAFe^® Implementation
SAFe^® Foundations

Equip your teams with the skills to become high-performance team members on an Agile Release Train (ART) and collaborate effectively with other teams with the SAFe^® 5 Practitioner certification. Teams will learn the importance of mastering Business Agility to thrive in the digital age by leveraging SAFe with the Leading SAFe certification.

The SAFe^® Scrum Master certification prepares attendees to successfully plan and execute the Program Increment (PI) and the SAFe^® Product Owner/Product Manager certification gives them the skillsets needed to guide the delivery of value in a Lean enterprise.

Leading SAFe

Know More

SAFe Scrum Master

Know More

SAFe for Teams

Know More

SAFe Product Owner

Know More

Agile Product Management

Technical Leadership

With the SAFe^® DevOps certification, teams will learn to cultivate a shared DevOps mindset among all the people needed to define, build, test, deploy, and release software-driven systems. The training will help people across technical, non-technical, and leadership roles work together to optimize their value stream from end to end.

The SAFe^® for Architects certification prepares System, Solution, and Enterprise Architects to engage across the organization as effective leaders and change agents who collaboratively deliver architectural solutions. The SAFe^® Agile Software Engineering certification helps teams understand the importance of continuous flow of value delivery and built-in quality in modern practices including XP technical practices, Behavioral-Driven Development (BDD), and Test-Driven Development (TDD).

SAFe DevOps

Know More

SAFe for Architects

Know More

SAFe Agile Software Engineering

Know More

Portfolio Leadership

Empower your teams to overcome issues of legacy governance, contracting and other organizational barriers in the government context with the right skills and strategies.

The SAFe^® for Government certification will give your teams the skills to build high performing, multi-vendor Agile teams and programs and learn how specific leadership behaviors can drive successful organizational change in government.

With the SAFe^® Lean Portfolio Management certification, teams will acquire the skills, tools, and techniques necessary to implement the Lean Portfolio Management functions of Strategy and Investment Funding, Agile Portfolio Operations, and Lean Governance.

SAFe for Governments

Know More

Lean Portfolio Management

Know More

Coaching Excellence

The SAFe^® 5 Program Consultant (SPC) certification helps senior team members become change agents, empowering them to train and certify others in a range of SAFe courses.

The SAFe^® Advanced Scrum Master course empowers Scrum Masters in their leadership role in facilitating Agile team, program, and enterprise success in SAFe implementation. The SAFe^® 5 Release Train Engineer (RTE) certification gives teams the skills to facilitate and enable end-to-end value delivery through ARTs and build high-performing ARTs by becoming a servant leader and coach.

SAFe Advanced Scrum Master

Know More

SAFe Release Train Engineer

Know More

SAFe Implementation

Know More

Case Studies

How companies are benefiting from the Scaled Agile Framework^®

Technology

The company had begun exploring the use of Agile methods to improve processes and increase efficiency across the organization. With a traditional, project-based approach to software development, release cycle time averaged 18 months.

They struggled to streamline their processes and turnaround times were longer than they needed to be. Senior management and leadership team of the organization in this transitional journey were willing to explore SAFe. They had to find a way to accelerate delivery to meet market demands.

Challenge

The company sought to transition from traditional development to Agile, as well as bring an Agile mindset to business units beyond software to address the needs of a dynamic customer environment.

Solution

With the SAFe implementation, the company was able to bring average release cycle times down from 18 months to 6 months. Sprint and PI deliveries were on time, leading to release on demand.

Pharmaceuticals

Although the company had started using Agile practices for several years at a small scale, it had continued to deliver most of its programs using traditional approaches. Taking the decision to adopt Agile methods more broadly across its IT change portfolio, the company sought help to support their transformation effort.

They were looking for a framework to help them scale Agile quickly as they ran large, complex programs. Scaled Agile Framework® was selected as the framework to be applied to support the adoption of Agile.

Challenge

The challenge was to find a framework that would help them scale Agile practices across a large global change portfolio. The Agile adoption approach focused on organization and culture change, supporting Agile teams directly.

Solution

The company focused on the culture shift required to support Agile by creating Culture Leaders. They aligned funding and governance approval with Agile ways of working, enabling teams to make progress quickly and benefit from Agile delivery.

Telecommunications

The company had initiated plans to bring a new TV offering to the market, to go beyond the basic product currently available. They intended to add features that newly available technology would make possible. Adding urgency, the company’s largest competitor had reportedly already begun work on a similar product.

The company ran a waterfall, multi-project environment that was transitioning into a home-grown, scaled Scrum approach. The Engineering group now sought to scale Agile in earnest, leading it to the Scaled Agile Framework (SAFe).

Challenge

The company had to move quickly to bring a new TV product to market since a competitor had already begun a similar effort. They tried to come up with many approaches to scale Agile on their own but were not successful.

Solution

The company reduced end-to-end test team size from dozens to just three, while maintaining quality and deploying those individuals to other value-producing functions. The Program Increment with SAFe led to new alignment and momentum.

Banking

Although the IT team implements upwards of 450 projects every year to help the bank move fast and stay ahead, yet traditionally, teams have completed only a small percentage of projects within the defined timeframe, budget, and scope.

To improve the success rate, the Bank tried a few Lean-Agile pilots. However, their efforts faced headwinds when they attempted to expand beyond a few teams working in isolation. They had tried waterfall, a combined team approach, and other frameworks, but nothing addressed the challenge of delivering value across organizational silos.

Challenge

The bank sought to improve service quality, efficiency, and employee morale, but previous efforts to scale Lean-Agile beyond a few teams had stalled.

Solution

The Bank moved from individual recognition to team awards and KPIs, which increased excitement and engagement through gamification, skills building, and automation. The Bank started the transition with IT and engaged business owners early. SAFe, coupled with a focus on engineering, took the Bank to the next level.

Achieve business agility. At scale.