Case Study
When agile meets the army: Can SAFe® survive military culture? Lessons from the Swiss Armed Forces Cyber Command
At first glance, agility and the military seem fundamentally at odds: decentralized decision-making versus hierarchy and command structures. But what happens when these two worlds meet?
This talk shares insights from the transformation of the Swiss Armed Forces Cyber Command, where the Scaled Agile Framework (SAFe®) has been introduced since 2022 as part of a broader evolution across organizational, technical, and cultural dimensions. The journey combined iterative SAFe® adoption, extensive training, and the parallel build-up of a modern private cloud “New Digitalization Platform.”
While the technical and organizational changes were significant, the real challenge lay in bridging agile values with a deeply rooted military culture. What initially appeared as a contradiction proved to be more compatible than expected.
Join this session to discover how these seemingly opposing paradigms can successfully come together—and what this means for organizations operating in complex environments.
The talk will be in German.
Severin Pfammatter
RTE and Deputy Head of Organizational Development | Federal Department of Defence, Civil Protection and Sport (DDPS)
Severin Pfammatter is an RTE and Deputy Head of Organizational Development at the Federal Department of Defense, Civil Protection, and Sport (DDPS). As a multilingual leader and experienced servant leader, he has a proven track record in program and project management, as well as in-depth IT and management expertise.
He is responsible for 11 direct reports and played a key role in establishing two Agile Release Trains comprising over 20 teams and approximately 250 employees. He is also an active member of the Domain Board and the “Swisscom – ICT Deployment” Steering Committee.
Severin Pfammatter holds a Master of Science in Business Administration (Information Systems) as well as continuing education (CAS) in organizational development and project management. His profile is complemented by extensive SAFe® certifications, including Practice Consultant, Release Train Engineer, Lean Portfolio Manager, Advanced Scrum Master, and Agile Product Manager.