In a disruptive and rapidly changing world, never before has organisational agility been so important.
This is not a new phenomenon however thanks to Covid, Brexit and other economic obstacles, it has been pushed high up in the strategic agendas of companies large and small, and through the lenses of investors and shareholders.
What does the ability of businesses to be agile mean?
Agility in its general sense means to move and to change position quickly and effectively whilst under control. This can be explained using a much-used buzzword of the Covid pandemic, to “pivot”.
Pivoting is changing direction in order to cater to new market opportunities or to survive reduced market demands. Successful pivoting requires excellent organisational agility.
Proactive agility is always better that reactive agility
Any business entering and thriving in investment portfolios need to continuously look ahead to its next stage of growth. They need to understand disruptions and opportunities, and be prepared to rapidly change how they operate at every stage of their evolution.
Growing businesses need to regularly evolve beyond constraints which bind them to their origins or current operational size and form to achieve growth potential. This often means evolving operations, systems and people. And they will need to do this continuously as they continue to grow.
Five core elements to organizational agility
Our experience tells us there are five core elements of organisational agility that should be continuously tested for their proactive direction in growing businesses. These elements need to work in unison, so no one is more important than the other:
· Planning
· Market & Customers
· Delivery
· Data & Technology
· People
At AAB LLP and AAB Consulting, we have brought together our diverse and broad skills in business advisory and consulting to summarise these five elements over the coming days. We will be looking at why they are each important, and what they tell us about businesses. We will discuss why the ability for organisational agility is crucial for the operational health of a company and financial health of investment portfolios.
In this series you’ll be hearing more from Mark Bell, Alasdair Green and Glenn Hogg.
You can read the next blog in the series here