Business Agility - Understanding it in Seven Questions

Quick POLL

How strong is your business' agility?  Elaborate in comments.

1. No idea what it is 
2. Once heard of it
3. We are considering a transformation
4. We started our business agility transformation
5. We are going through a transformation
6. Most of our business is using lean-agile methods
7. We have fully embraced business agility in all its forms

This blog is based on the seven reporter questions: what, why, who, when, where, how, and which.  You can read more about this question strategy in other posts on my blog: Simpler Agile. 

If you are interested in Business Agility please contact me directly on LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/paulpazderski/  

What is Business Agility?

Business Agility is the organizational capability to sense upcoming changes externally or internally and respond accordingly in order to deliver value to our customers and business interests.

Business agility is a comprehensive capability that encompass everything and everyone in the business system, including the organization, its vendors, suppliers,  partners, and even customers.  It is founded on a growth mindset (see Mindset by Carol S. Dweck), four agile values, and twelve agile principles (see https://agilemanifesto.org/).  It is instantiated in an innumerable, ever growing set of varied practices organized into frameworks.

Why is Business Agility important?

Since we work in a VUCA world: (Volatility, Uncertainty, Complexity, Ambiguity) we need the capability to respond to whatever changes are thrown at us.  Business Agility enables us to more quickly and easily innovate and quickly deliver iterative, incremental value to our customers.  Also, Business Agility provides better alignment within your business both vertically and horizontally. Lastly, when done correctly it improves work/life balance for all involved.

Who needs Business Agility?

Business Agility is a survival capability.  It is critical to all current and future business endeavors in our VUCA world.  Therefore, anyone desiring a successful business must understand and incorporate Business Agility into their business ventures.   Also, all people working in a modern business venture must get involved and support in Business Agility.

How does Business Agility work?

Business Agility requires a comprehensive all-encompassing transformation of the company.  Every person, every team, every group, every department, and every business unit must go through this transformation.  This Business Agility Transformation starts with all individuals cultivating a growth mindset.  Than understanding, accepting, and living by the four agile values, and twelve agile principles.   Such a foundation then enables to selection and enactment of the appropriate modern lean-agile practices and frameworks.  Yet, to select the appropriate practices and frameworks you need an expert guide.  In the lean-agile community such expert guides are usually called Coaches.  We inherently accept that all athletes and sports teams have coaches, sometimes more than one.  The same is true for Business Agility Transformation.  You must have expert Coaches guiding you.

When is Business Agility engaged?

The movement toward agile methods started over 20 years ago.  Many organizations across the globe are using them.  Therefore, if you and your business are not onboard yet, you are behind the curve.  The unfortunate circumstances are that many first time attempts at transformations fail for numerous reasons - lack of commitment, weak support/leadership, and/or poor coaching for example.

Where is Business Agility visible?

First and foremost, Business Agility shows through customer loyalty and promotion; i.e. the customers are so happy with the business, its products and services that they tell everyone how great those are.  Second, the business tends to outperform their competition.  Third, products and services tend to lead the market in innovation and disruption. Fourth, the employees, vendors and suppliers are very happy and promote the business.  Finally, the community are just as happy and supportive.

Which elements are critical to Business Agility?

Find and engage a well-rounded, experienced Business Agility Coach.  Cultivate that growth mindset.  Follow with the four agile values, and twelve agile principles.   Start learning modern lean and agile practices and frameworks.  Yet, avoid trying to become the agile coach yourself.  Get a professional.

References 

For further insights on Business Agility please follow these links.

• Agile Manifesto - https://agilemanifesto.org/ 
• Simpler Agile blog - https://simpleragile.blogspot.com/
• LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/paulpazderski/  

If you are interested in Business Agility please contact me directly on LinkedIn.

When – When is Agile NOT like Zen

Much of Zen is about meditation, contemplation, and mindfulness.

But Agile is mostly focused on immediate action.

For new Agile activities we say “fail-fast, then learn”, “try it before you decide”, “inspect and adopt”, etc.

The Agile approach is to avoid procrastination at all costs by jumping into immediate action, then based on the results of the action (feedback), learning and adjusting the next iteration.

While in Zen, it is paramount to understand the current situation, environment, impacts, and future state, results, outcomes ... all to avoid any possibility of harm.

From this perspective, Agile and Zen are at the opposite ends of the spectrum.

DONE.

When - When to Define Agile Patterns

Most of us use simple Agile Patterns without knowing it.  The challenge is to occasionally retrospect, identify new Agile Patterns, write them down, and share them with others.

DONE.

When - When to Use the Seven Questions

There are two basic use cases for the seven questions.

First, use the seven questions as a framework to write an agile proposal.

Second, use the seven questions to verify the completeness

of an existing proposal prepared in a different framework.

And because the seven questions are comprehensive and easy to remember,

fundamentally they can be used as a checklist anytime with no preparation.

DONE.

When - When will new post appear

I plan to post between once per week and once per month on average.
The limitations are enough time, interesting topics, and available access.


DONE.