Joe Vergara, SPCT

Incremental value delivery is a key concept of Lean and Agile, but there really isn’t a metric that provides insight into how (or even if) value is being delivered incrementally.  Well, that is until the Value Flow Chart was formally introduced by Joe Vergara, SPCT, and Agile Rising at the SAFe Summit 2023 in Nashville.  During the talk, we showed how the Value Flow Chart augments SAFe’s Flow Metrics to provide a more direct measure and visualization of incremental value delivery by assessing Business Value (BV) during each System Demo at the end of each iteration (or even more frequently if possible).

While the Value Flow Chart itself is an extension of Flow Predictability, we can also apply the concept of using BV to help us shift the focus from the flow of work items (outputs) to the flow of the associated value (outcomes) across each of the SAFe Flow Metrics.  The remainder of this article dives into each of the Flow Metrics to introduce how BV can be used to get a more direct value measurement and why it is important.

Flow Distribution

Current Output Measurement – Proportion of work items by type in a system

Additional Value Measurement – Proportion of value (BV) by type produced by a system

Why this addition is important – In the current output measurement, the proportion can be assessed by either the number of work items or the effort associated with work items for each type (ex. Business, Enabler, Maintenance, etc.).  While this distribution provides insights from the perspective of inside the system, we can also get the perspective of the customers / stakeholders by assessing the proportion of BV produced by the system.  This customer-centric perspective allows teams and organizations to evaluate the outcomes associated with each type, which may in turn influence the desired future distribution across each type.

Flow Velocity

Current Output Measurement – Number of completed work items over a time period

Additional Value Measurement – Aggregate value (BV) over a time period

Why this addition is important – While we should be able to inherently derive value from each work item, this is not always the case, especially for organizations who have adopted SAFe in name only.  And even when each work item is inherently valuable, the amount of value is unknown unless we measure it more directly by assessing BV.  In doing so, we also validate whether the lean-agile practices that are being put into place (or any other experiments / changes to the system) result in more value delivery overall.  It would be good to note, however, that to enable reviewing Flow Velocity trends over time, organizations should consider creating a normalized structure for assessing BV.

Flow Time

Current Output Measurement – Time elapsed from start to completion for a given work item

Additional Value Measurement – Time elapsed from start to delivery of a unit of value (BV)

Why this addition is important – From a SAFe perspective, “work item” refers to Stories, Features, Capabilities, and Epics.  Although we should be able to inherently derive value from each of these work items, value (BV) is typically assessed at the PI Objective level, each of which may be associated with multiple work items.  Though we could simply extend the concept of tracking elapsed time from the start to the completion of a given PI Objective, not every PI Objective produces the same value.  Extending this further, we can divide that elapsed time by the associated BV in order to get the flow time for a single unit of value.  Here again, organizations may want to consider creating a normalized structure for assessing BV to enable reviewing Flow Time trends over time.

Flow Load

Current Output Measurement – Number of work items currently in progress (active or waiting)

Additional Value Measurement – Aggregate value (BV) currently in progress (active or waiting)

Why this addition is important – Similar to Flow Time, the current output measurement could simply be extended to count the number of PI Objectives that are currently in progress.  Though this alone helps us gain a more customer-centric perspective, it is still focused more on outputs.  To focus on outcomes, we could use the BV associated with each PI Objective.  Aggregating the BV across all in-progress PI Objectives can be a bit nuanced, however, because we could (and arguably should) be incrementally delivering value against each PI Objective.  To calculate this then — assuming we are assessing BV at the end of each iteration (or even more frequently) — PI Objectives could essentially be split based on the BV that is incrementally assessed to more accurately show how much value was in progress at a given time.  

Flow Efficiency

Current Output Measurement – Ratio of total time spent in value-added work activities divided by the total flow time

Additional Value Measurement – Ratio of total time spent in value-added work activities divided by the total flow time

Why this change is important – Though I would recommend removing the word “work” from the description, this is essentially a non-change.  That said, it does come with the assumption that “flow time” here is redefined to match the recommendation from the Flow Time section — “time elapsed from start to delivery of a unit of value (BV)”.  This definition should be considered when doing the Value Stream Mapping, from which the Flow Efficiency can be derived.

Flow Predictability

The Value Flow Chart itself is an extension of Flow Predictability.  To learn more about the Value Flow Chart, please refer to the following —

• Article: How do you measure incremental value delivery?
• Slide Deck: Value Flow Chart, A New Flow Metric