Lipstick agility: why agility is turning from mind-set to lip service

Big is bad and small is smart. Everyone wants to be nimble. Everyone wants to move fast. Everyone wants to embrace failure. And judging from the number of articles and publications, agile is the new disruptive. However, the pursuit of large organizations for agility is so strong that it overshadows one big inconvenient truth: agility can only be the means to an end. It remains nothing more and nothing less than the rocket fuel to achieve a clear and bold vision how to create customer value in a digitized world. Without believe and persistence, agility not only becomes useless, it also becomes the excuse for failure, confusion and insignificant change. Three pitfalls brought us in that predicament: the lack of a reason (why), courage and focus.

First, the lack of reason. In fear of missing out, organizations often forget why they wanted to become agile in the first place. Why they got rid of all the ties, office walls and meeting chairs. To put it blunt, the push for agility was born in awe of start-ups innovating in never-seen-before speed, scale and strength, outperforming incumbents left and right. However, it was also born in envy of start-ups operating without boundaries. Without limits. Without politics. Placed into an organizational vacuum of regulations, reviews and quarterly results, the air gets thin for an agile mind. Only when agility is deeply embedded in a company strategy and convincingly communicated as the enabler for a bold vision, it gets the necessary room to breathe. If your vision of “becoming the leading and most consumer-centric company in XYZ” (chose a name and an industry that applies) is achievable without becoming more agile, scrap the word agility from your PR and IR decks. Because agility is not the magic pill for every organization.

Second, the lack of courage. In a nutshell, digital agility is about sensing and responding to customer needs in a digitized world efficiently, effectively and with passion. Agility as a capability and a mind-set, closely connected to your culture. Something that you need to carefully develop, not something that you can radically implement. Even if agility is defined as a cornerstone of a company’s strategy (as mentioned before), it often must feel like Bill Murray in Tokyo: Once the baton is handed over from strategy definition to execution, reality kicks in and agility gets lost in translation. As part of a company strategy, agility often gets treated as another “work stream” or a “platform” and translated into more “projects” or “action items”, such as management training, SCRUM crash courses and redecoration of office floors. All check-boxes ticked, right? What is often left untouched are the bloodlines of organizations: responsibilities, processes, working methods and — most of all — people’s mind-set. Afraid of cutting into the lifelines of their beloved culture and comfortable structures, managers stick to incremental changes, making agility just another tool in their toolbox. What is needed are courageous agility champions with passion, authenticity and authority — and a leadership level that allows and embraces the shift from hero to host leadership.

Third, the lack of focus. If we follow the yellow brick road from strategy definition and execution to a company’s daily business operations, we often find managers and teams struggling to meet project deadlines, superiors’ expectations and lunch appointments. Even though everyone nods in awe and agreement about a more volatile and dynamic business environment, those managers and teams are often blinded by blinkers of old habits and a general lack of focus. However, getting rid of the first and committing to the second are prerequisites for agility. Without a clear understanding of where agility can and cannot help in daily operations, agility becomes an excuse for mediocre returns. How often have we seen bold moves being stripped down to glorified Quick Wins. How often have we seen innovative concepts being pushed forward as smart Pilots. Only to be ignored by customers and collapse in the market. Organizations need to understand agility and focus its application on areas where it can make an impact. Not on your personal objectives, but on your company’s customers and bottom / top line.

Ultimately believe in a bold vision gets sacrificed for insignificance. Organizations stay phlegmatic. And agility becomes nothing more than spray-paint on the outside of the company headquarters — not embraced by its people internally.

But believe in agility exists. In June 2016 Daimler’s CEO Dieter Zetsche declared agility a necessity for the digitization of its business model. Shifting 20% of its workforce into a swarm organization, Daimler aims to pursue leadership and integration of future growth platforms without the quicksand of existing offerings. Take a close look. There is strong strategic reason for agility to stay on top. There is courage for entrepreneurial freedom and a more experimental approach to product development. And there is focus, as it targets a select area of the organization with clear framework rules. Big is not bad. And not everyone needs to move fast.

Strategy and agility can go hand in hand. Another example came in handy over the weekend: Henkel presented their new strategic priorities for 2020, with a clear focus on growth, digitization and (you guessed it) agility. Henkel makes agility essential to succeed in a changing business environment: through better anticipation of customer needs, agility is aimed to reduce innovation lead times, drive flexibility with business model MVP testing and yield efficiency through optimized workflows and processes. Agility or nothing. Well done — but not yet implemented. The crucial step will be to find the balance and build the bridge between agile and non-agile teams and work methods across the various functions. Kotter’s “Dual Operating System” anyone?

Don’t sacrifice believe for insignificance, only to be agile on the outside. Digital strategy and persistence do not contradict agility but enforce agility as the rocket fuel it is meant to be. Roll up your sleeves, take agility serious — but don’t use it as an antidote for all intoxication of your organization.

Let me finish by outlining five simple principles of digital believe:

1. Make agility essential by defining it as a believable cornerstone of your strategy and leadership;
2. Make agility understood by communicating its working and impact on the growth of your company (also highlighting the downsides);
3. Make agility real by changing the way people work, think and communicate — don’t stop at your interior decorator, but build agility champions in your organization;
4. Make agility attractive by rewarding people and teams who are creating superior business impact through agility — don’t let agility become an excuse for mediocrity;
5. Make agility stick by letting it become part of your company culture.