Lean Agile Requirements in Large Scale Complex Systems

Building large-scale software and cyber-physical systems (CPS) are one of the most complex and challenging endeavors in the industry today.

Emerging practices from industries like Automotive, MedTec and Finance offer a different approach to handle this inherent complexity. This new approach focuses on a solution-centric development, where the solution itself determines the kind of documentation produced, not necessarily the methodology employed. This leads to a separation of transient (development life cycle dependent objects) and solution objects.

Today, in this VUCA-World, most complex endeavors don’t start as a green field. A considerable amount of existing solution documentation (such as architecture/s, models, design decisions, and requirements) may have been accumulated over several years or even decades. Additionally, in some industries, e.g. automotive suppliers, the expected lifespan of newly built solutions is more than 20 years. This means that future engineers who will work on these systems are currently attending Kindergarten… We must take this into consideration and ensure that current and evolving requirements, design and intent are clearly stated and documented.

To this end SAFe offers ‘Solution Intent’ which serves as a “repository for storing, managing, and communicating the knowledge of current and intended Solution behavior.” This elegant solution allows us to capture the knowledge and the basic understanding of current and evolving requirements, design, and intent—that is, the larger purpose of the solution.

For this recorded webinar, join Peter Pedross, CEO and Founder of PEDCO-Applied SAFe as we outline some of these emerging approaches and discuss the pros and cons (based on experience with Applied SAFe, the implementation of SAFe as a process model).