How to Facilitate a SAFe Inspect and Adapt Event

Blog Author

Siddharth

Published

14 Jul, 2025

How to Facilitate a SAFe Inspect and Adapt Event

Let’s get one thing straight. Inspect and Adapt isn’t just another meeting. It’s the heart of SAFe’s commitment to relentless improvement. You pull everyone involved in the Agile Release Train (ART) into a room (virtual or physical), look at the work done in the last PI (Program Increment), dig deep into what went right, what went off track, and—most importantly—what you’re going to do about it.

This isn’t about blame or showmanship. It’s about transparency, problem-solving, and moving the needle.

Setting the Stage: Preparation Matters

1. Clear the Calendar

Don’t let other meetings compete with your I&A. This event is priority one for the ART. Block out at least three hours. Larger ARTs or those new to SAFe might need four.

2. Gather the Right Data

Pull in all the key metrics:

PI objectives achievement: Did teams hit their commitments?
Quality metrics: Defect counts, escaped defects, automation coverage, etc.
Predictability: Business value delivered vs. planned.
Flow metrics: Throughput, lead time, bottlenecks.
If you need a refresher on which metrics to use, take a look at this SAFe Metrics page for context.

3. Invite the Right People

You need more than just team members and Scrum Masters. Product Owners, Product Managers, RTE, Business Owners, and anyone who influences change should be in the loop. Make sure you’ve got at least one person from every team on the ART.

4. Prep the Logistics

Whether it’s a Miro board, digital sticky notes, or physical walls, make sure everyone can collaborate. Tech problems are the enemy of flow in these events.

The Inspect and Adapt Agenda: How to Run It

The I&A event has three big parts:

PI System Demo
Quantitative and Qualitative Measurement Review
Problem-Solving Workshop

Let’s walk through each.

1. PI System Demo

What this means: Instead of showing random stories, the teams demonstrate the actual, working solution for the business.

Focus on the value delivered in the last PI.
Demo cross-team features, not just isolated team stuff.
Involve Product Management and Business Owners for feedback.

Facilitator’s Role:

Keep demos focused on business outcomes.
Encourage tough questions and honest feedback.
Timebox each segment to avoid rambling.

This stage is a great chance to show how the Leading SAFe Agilist Certification shapes a leader’s mindset for value-driven delivery.

2. Quantitative and Qualitative Review

What to look at:

PI Predictability Measure: How closely did the ART meet business objectives?
Defect trends: Are you seeing improvements, or is quality slipping?
Team health and engagement: Not just “soft” stuff—use quick anonymous polls if needed.
Flow and throughput: Are stories getting stuck? Is WIP under control?

Facilitator’s Role:

Guide the discussion with facts, not opinions.
Make data visible to everyone.
Prompt the group to call out patterns and pain points.

If you want to go deeper, SAFe Scrum Master Certification covers facilitation techniques for driving this kind of meaningful discussion.

3. The Problem-Solving Workshop

Now, here’s the real engine of change in I&A. This isn’t a “complaint” session. This is structured, outcome-focused, and sometimes uncomfortable—because it’s honest.

Step-by-step process:

a) Identify the Biggest Problem

Ask teams and business stakeholders:
“What’s the single biggest bottleneck or pain point from this PI?”

Prioritize using voting (dot voting works well). The point isn’t to solve every problem—just the most impactful.

b) Root Cause Analysis

Use a tool like the 5 Whys or a Fishbone (Ishikawa) Diagram to break the problem down.

Challenge the team to avoid jumping to solutions.
Dig until you hit something actionable, not just “communication” as a root cause.

The SAFe Advanced Scrum Master Certification is loaded with facilitation and root-cause analysis tools if you want to level up here.

c) Brainstorm Countermeasures

Now it’s time to shift gears.

Ask: “What experiments or changes can we run to fix this at the root?”
Make sure these actions are SMART: Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, Time-bound.

d) Create Action Items and Owners

Don’t leave with “we’ll try harder next time.”

Assign a clear owner for each action.
Set deadlines.
Make the follow-up visible and public (Jira, Confluence, whatever your org uses).

This is also a place where SAFe Release Train Engineer Certification comes into play, since RTEs are the glue for driving these improvements.

Tips for Facilitators: How to Keep It Honest and Useful

Set ground rules. No blaming. Focus on learning.
Use timeboxes. Don’t let any stage drag. Keep the energy up.
Foster psychological safety. If people don’t feel safe to be honest, you’ll get platitudes, not progress.
Follow up. The real work happens after the meeting. Make sure action items are tracked, and review them at the next I&A.

Want more practical facilitation tips? Atlassian’s guide to retrospectives has plenty of hands-on exercises you can adapt.

Real-World Challenges and How to Handle Them

1. Too Much Focus on Metrics, Not Enough on Actions

Data is important, but don’t let it crowd out actual problem-solving. If people spend all their time explaining the numbers, you’ll end up with a boring review and no improvement.

2. Surface-Level Root Cause Analysis

If you hit “communication” or “lack of collaboration” as your root cause, you probably haven’t dug deep enough. Push for specifics.

3. Action Items with No Owner

If everyone owns it, nobody owns it. Make it personal. Make it visible.

4. Repeating the Same Problems

If you’re bringing up the same issues every PI, you need to shake up your approach. Try new facilitation techniques, get external coaching, or rotate the facilitator role.

How Inspect and Adapt Events Shape Agile Culture

I&A isn’t just about process improvement. It’s a culture-building moment. Teams that get good at I&A are teams that:

Make learning routine
Tackle hard problems head-on
Hold each other accountable in a positive way

This is where having trained Product Owners and Product Managers pays off. SAFe Product Owner/Product Manager POPM Certification equips people with the skills to speak up, drive clarity, and help teams move from insight to action.

Final Thoughts: Make I&A Work for You

Facilitating a SAFe Inspect and Adapt event is as much about mindset as it is about mechanics. Show up prepared, focus on real outcomes, and keep the conversation honest. When you do that, I&A becomes a catalyst—not a checkbox.

For organizations that want to deepen their facilitation skills, certifications like the SAFe Scrum Master Certification and SAFe Advanced Scrum Master Certification are a smart investment. They turn good intentions into effective results.

For a broader look at how SAFe’s Inspect and Adapt fits into the bigger picture, you can check out the official SAFe Inspect and Adapt page.

Bottom line: When facilitated well, I&A is where Agile transformation stops being a buzzword and starts being a lived reality—one experiment, one improvement, one PI at a time.

Also read - How Inspect and Adapt Drives Continuous Improvement in Agile Teams

Also see - How to Use Root Cause Analysis in SAFe Inspect and Adapt