Over the last years, the world of business has changed significantly. The rise of globalization, the introduction of intercultural matrix organisations, and the technological evolution have made business organisations unstable and have pushed them to improve their competencies and adapt to the rapidly changing environment. As a result, the way organisations operate –or should operate- nowadays, is radically different comparing to three, five or ten years ago. Taking into consideration the increasing pace and the unpredictability of change, it’s clear that Organisational Agility is a critical strategic capability for any ambitious business organisation.
Organisational Agility isn’t just a matter of spotting changes in the external environment and responding quickly to them, though that’s clearly part of the picture. Indeed, cultural styles play a key part in agility. While change initiation is about responsiveness or a restless desire to improve, it’s critical that people can organise themselves effectively, stay focused on the strategic priorities, and they are brought along for the journey. Without these ‘traditional’ elements of change delivery, the organisation is characterised by people jumping from one initiative to the next, with no follow through or value.
What Is Organisational Agility? And what is the relation between Agility and performance? How does Agility contribute to a growth in performance? Why is individual and Organisational Agility is becoming a critical goal, and yet a bigger challenge in business?
Agility is the ability for someone to rapidly develop new effective behaviour based on new experiences and to easily move from idea to idea within and across experiences. Reflecting the same definition on organisations, Organisational Agility is the capability of a company to rapidly change or adapt in response to changes in the market.
Organisational Agility means being able to pull on the right levers at the right time in order to innovate and create change. This does not only mean initiating change or coming up with good ideas, but being able to see them through to completion and bringing everyone along on the journey.
Why is it important for organisations to be Agile?
A high degree of Organisational Agility can help an organisation to react successfully to the emerging of new competitors, the development of new industry-changing technologies, or even to the sudden shifts in overall market conditions.
According to the PMI report: “Agility is no longer optional as customer demand and market trends change more rapidly by the year, with ongoing digital transformation accelerating the process.” This is nothing new. In 2008, PMI was advocating changes that would inject “nimbleness and speed into current project management processes.”
It’s just that a decade later, it’s more imperative than ever. Moreover, the 2017 Pulse of the Profession report from PMI pointed out the emergence of Agile, with 71% of organizations reporting they incorporate Agility into projects sometimes or more frequently than in the past.
PMI’s Achieving Greater Agility report states that the time for change is now, not in three or five years. Some organisations, still mired in traditional approaches, face a “pivot or perish” moment, according to the report.
Benefits of Organisational Agility
Besides the quantifiable results such as sales, revenues and other business indicators thathigh management can write on spreadsheets and reports, agility experts move the spotlight to a different corner: the employees. Agile organisations allow their employees to connect in a way which traditional organisations cannot. This connection leads to better collaboration between teams with positive results on their work. For this reason, you will notice that at TTM one of the essential quadrants of our Whole Brain approach to Agility is “People Agility”.
Organisational Agility Challenges and the Successful Agility Model:
According to research, Organisational Agility helps organisations address the ever-changing business environment by improving organisation’s ability to quickly identify and execute initiatives for opportunities and risks that align with overall strategy. However, managing the organization’s agility is not without its own intrinsic challenges.
With these challenges in mind, several individual and organisational agility models have been created to help minimize and possibly eliminate these challenges, helping organisations perform at their best during these critical times!
In line with the above context,in order to tackle all top five challenges of Organisational Agility, TTM has introduced two unique solutions “The Agile Leader” and “The Agile Professional”. Both Leadership Solutions fall under the previous agility model as the arching model for building the necessary Agile Behaviors and Skills within the organisation, powered by our unique Whole Brain Methodology, enabling an organisation to become a more Agile Organisation.
Change Agility- Resilience in reaching your objectives even in a changing environment
Process Agility- Use unified simplified process to increase the efficiency of work
People Agility- Act as a service leader for teams
Results Agility- Get results and achieve objectives in a creative, fast way
Each of these topics is discussed in details according to the level of organisation’s target audience, in our highly interactive workshops after defining agility and its importance in the organisation.