Agility
Agility: an essential evolution
Immediacy and unpredictability have become the norm. “Traditional” organizations are based on hierarchical principles, with a silo structure and top-down management. This “heavy” model is unsuited to today’s constantly evolving environment and creates a disconnect between companies and their clients, beneficiaries and users. To stay in the game, they must transform into organizations that are capable of continuous change. For Julhiet Sterwen, agility is the key.
The agile, customer-focused organization
The future of organizations depends on their ability to be responsive, adapt and innovate. To achieve this alchemy, they need to create the right conditions for mobilizing every internal resource. They also need to refocus on the end-customer. This means setting up a framework that promotes engagement, collaboration, creativity and fast time to market. In other words, companies need to become agile.
Sources of agility
In the 2000s, new so-called “agile” tools appeared in IT, offering an alternative to classic project management. While they enabled companies to rethink the way they handled assignments, they did not help them to become more agile overall. To achieve this, new organizational models emerged: the liberated company, the holocracy, the Spotify model, the agile company, and more.
From theory to practice
All these models imply that deep transformation is required in organizations: more cross-functional teamwork, updated management styles based on more autonomy and group intelligence, new governance processes, and so on.
But how can companies choose the most suitable model for them?