Agile System Architecture in Large Organizations: An Experience Report from Volvo Cars

Abstract

System architecture is considered a fundamental element in the development of large and complex electrical systems. This is because a good architecture assures that the system fulfils and will fulfil after future upgrades all required quality demands. In addition to the well-designed architecture, the development of such systems today requires agile methods, especially when it comes to the development of software. This is mostly to assure quality and fast innovations cycles reaching customers early and directly incorporating their feedback into the development process. In order to coordinate the work of many agile teams in large organizations, it is usually necessary to employ frameworks for scaling agile development. One such frameworks is SAFe (Scaled Agile Framework) proven to work in many industries. Despite dedicating roles to the development of the system architecture at all organizational levels (e.g., System and Solution Architects), SAFe does not recognize the need for holistic architectural teams responsible for assuring that all architectural decisions are made in the best interest of the entire system. In this paper, we discuss the organization, responsibility and collaboration between such architecture teams - the Complete System Architects - and System/Solution Architects in SAFe. The results are based on the ongoing agile transformation at Volvo Cars based on SAFe.