PI Planning stands for Program Increment Planning, which is a cadence-based event for the entire Agile Release Train (ART) that aligns teams and stakeholders to a shared mission and vision. It is a meeting of multiple teams working in an ART to plan the roadmap, deliberate on features, and identify cross-team dependencies. The event is typically held every 8-12 weeks, and it lasts for two full days. The following are the essential elements of PI Planning:
- Aligning multiple teams within the same ART to a shared vision.
- Discussing features, planning the roadmap, and identifying cross-team dependencies.
- Creating a set of SMART objectives with business value assigned by the Business Owners.
- Highlighting the new feature delivery dates, feature dependencies among teams, and relevant milestones.
- Building trust among team members.
- Outlining company goals and objectives.
- Empowering Agile project teams.
PI Planning is facilitated by the Release Train Engineer (RTE) and event attendees, including Business Owners, Product Management, Agile Teams, System and Solution Architects, the System Team, and other stakeholders. The active participation of Business Owners in this event provides an essential guardrail on budgetary spending. The event requires preparation, coordination, and communication, and it is scheduled in advance to be well prepared. The ART executes the PI, tracking progress and adjusting as necessary as new knowledge emerges.
