Lighthouse

  1. The Definition of Business Agility
  2. Examples of Business Agility mindsets in the real world
  3. Resources
    • Case Studies
    • White Papers
    • Webinars
    • Agile Amped Podcasts
    • Blog Posts
  4. Partnering with the Business Agility Institute
    • 2019 Report
    • 2020 Survey
  5. Strategizing your Business Agility Transformation
  6. Capabilities
  7. Upcoming Events
updated Sept 25, 2019

What is business agility?

Business agility is the ability of a business to realize and sustain its full potential both in terms of its profits and its people, regardless of internal or external environment changes. It enables organizations to innovate and deliver more effectively, thus turning market disruption into competitive advantage, while thriving in complex environments.

The Definition of Business Agility

Business agility is the ability of a business to realize and sustain its full potential both in terms of its profits and its people, regardless of internal or external environment changes. We define business agility as an emergent property demonstrated by organizations who have four essential capabilities:

  1. Deliver Fast and Responsively (Delivery Agility)
  2. Innovate and Disrupt (Product Innovation)
  3. Adapt Organization and Culture (Organizational Adaptability)
  4. Lead through Complexity (Leadership Effectiveness)

Business agility enables organizations to innovate and deliver more effectively, thus turning market disruption into competitive advantage, while thriving in complex environments. An organization that has attained business agility is able to adapt their structures to rapidly deliver products or services, innovate beyond market changes, and grow leaders that can effectively support all of this across even large and complex businesses.

Examples of Business Agility mindsets in the real world

Finding Agile in the real world is easy for most: go to any software company and ask to see their development team – chances are, they have converged on an Agile hybrid working process integrating Scrum, Kanban, and Extreme Programming (XP). If they are advanced, they will have a full continuous delivery pipeline up and running and are taking steps to address DevOps.

It is becoming just as easy to find evidence of business agility in the real world. It becomes palpable first in the growing number of voices calling to overhaul, reimagine and evolve the rest of the business so it too can benefit from Agile mindsets. When businesses have integrated agility into their everyday work, they are able to look to the future, to build a strong capability of sensing and responding to change, and to drive disruption – to become disruptors before they can be disrupted. This takes concerted efforts from leadership and supporting functions, like HR, portfolio and budgeting and more.

    Blog Post

    7 Things You Need to Know About Agile Product Management

    Blog Post

    8 More Things You Didn't Know About Agile HR

    Blog Post

    10 Things You Didn't Know About Agile HR

    Blog Post

    The 5 Simple Rules of Agile Portfolio Management

Resources

The path to business agility is long and difficult, but it is the only way forward. We have painstakingly collected and created resources to help light the way, whether it's case studies that prove out the success of business agility transformation, to webinars that connect you to our thought leaders and processes for championing change, to our popular Agile Amped podcast – the voice of the agile community. Dig in, dive deep – you may be surprised by what you find.

Case Studies

A transformation is a tremendous undertaking. How do you start? What does success look like? How do you measure progress to ensure you're heading in the right direction?

We've got you covered. Here we share our experiences helping to guide clients across the US and the world with their business agility transformation efforts. Our clients hail from every industry and come in all shapes and sizes, and whatever their troubles may be, we helped them approach transformation with an Agile mindset to increase the chances of success.

    Case Study

    A Vision of Delivery Agility & Innovation

    Case Study

    From Growing Pains to Embracing Change

    Case Study

    A Ticket to Transformation

    Case Study

    An Investment in Innovation

SEE MORE CASE STUDIES >

White Papers

Accenture | SolutionsIQ has been a thought leader in the Agile space for more than a decade. Being agilists ourselves, we are always learning, always experimenting – and we turn our learning into artifacts that have helped thousands make sense of the opportunities that stand before businesses in the shape of business agility transformation, the problems agilists and our clients face on that path, and lessons that help all of us grow.

    White Paper

    Resources for Agile Humans

    White Paper

    Unlocking Business Agility

    White Paper

    Insights into Agile Transformation Success

    White Paper

    The Third Wave of Agile

SEE MORE WHITE PAPERS >

Webinars

In the digital age, visual media is ubiquitous and webinars are just another platform where we can engage with thought leaders, our clients, our followers and our wider community. We favor webinars for the opportunity to share our thoughts live with participants and hear from them. Our community favors webinars because they are engaging, dive deep into a topic, and provide them the chance to speak to experts in the field. Everyone wins!

    Webinar

    Delivery Agility: The (Imaginary) Battle Between Agile & DevOps

    Webinar

    Enabling Product Innovation Through Agile Product Management

    Webinar

    Organizational Adaptability Through Active Executive Sponsorship

    Webinar

    Leadership Effectiveness Webinar

SEE MORE WEBINARS >

Agile Amped Podcasts

The Agile Amped podcast is the shared voice of the Agile community, driven by compelling stories, passionate people, and innovative ideas. With more than 300,000 downloads across iTunes, SoundCloud, YouTube and more, this vehicle for learning is only growing with each day. Our Business Agility and Women in Agile Series have struck a chord with our community because, respectively, it inspires us to see the future as bright and full of opportunities and it also empowers us to support diversity and inclusion in our work place.

    Agile Amped Podcast

    Beyond Scaling and Onto Descaling with XSCALE | Business Agility Series

    Agile Amped Podcast

    Holacracy: A Complete System for Self-Organization | Business Agility Series

    Agile Amped Podcast

    Kanban and Mob Programming in Action | Business Agility Series

    Agile Amped Podcast

    "The Agile Marketer" Author Roland Smart | Business Agility Series

SEE MORE PODCASTS >

Blog Posts

What's new, what's hot – that what we cover in our blog posts. We provide updates about our company, share tips and tricks that agilists can use in their day-to-day work, and also tackle big ideas and gather feedback from the community. Many of our biggest ideas and most impactful offerings start small – in a blog.

    Blog Post

    Welcome to the Age of Business Agility

    Blog Post

    Addressing "Management Defects"

    Blog Post

    5 Steps Leaders Can Take Toward Business Agility

    Blog Post

    Design Thinking and the Business Agility Ecosystem

SEE MORE BLOG POSTS >

Partnering with the Business Agility Institute

Business Agility Institute LogoThe mission of the Business Agility Institute (BAI) is to "advocate for, connect, educate, and inspire people within these organizations, encouraging them to create an environment of shared knowledge and trust that will usher organizations around the world into the future of business." The Business Agility Institute believes the next generation of companies are "Agile, innovative and dynamic."

That is why Accenture | SolutionsIQ is a founding member and global sponsor of the BAI. We actively participate in improving the engagement and impact of the Business Agility Report.

2019 Business Agility Report

2018 Business Agility ReportCollaborating with forward-thinking organizations across the Agile community – including the BAI and AgilityHealth – we dedicate our research efforts toward understanding shifting market trends, data and business needs. And we do this with a single objective in mind: to continually enhance our ability to deliver the best outcomes for our clients and the wider community.

As a founding member and global sponsor of the BAI, we have an unwavering commitment to this goal. One of the most impactful ways we can contribute is by helping to gather more insights into what people all over the world are experiencing at work and how it enables or impedes their agility. This is where the power of the Business Agility Report stems from.

In the 2019 Business Agility Report, 453 respondents from 274 companies around the world share their insights, challenges and successes. The most exciting result was the discovery that organizations who report higher ratings in three specific characteristics also report higher overall business agility and associated benefits. The three characteristics are: adaptive funding models, alignment to value streams, and relentless improvement.

Download 2019 Report

2020 Business Agility Survey

This is your opportunity to share learnings from your organization's journey by participating in the 2020 Business Agility Report, which is already underway.

Collaborating with forward-thinking organizations across the Agile community, like the BAI and AgilityHealth, we dedicate our research efforts to understanding shifting market trends, data and business needs – all with a single objective in mind: to continually enhance our ability to serve clients and the wider community.

TAKE SURVEY >

Strategizing your Business Agility Transformation

Business agility represents the capabilities that businesses need to be competitive in today's marketplace often people think of agile and business agility as Scrum or SAFe, but those while good are not enough. One of the hardest parts about achieving business agility is realizing it requires real cultural change in your organization. Understanding how to move those levers of change requires leadership commitment and fortitude to change. Understanding some of those institutional habits that slow you down – particularly in support functions like HR and budgeting, which are newer to Agile – and having the willpower to change those habits is critical for success.

Sustained culture change, leadership buy-in, and reimagining support functions must be central to your business agility transformation strategy.

Capabilities

Business Agility Capability Model

The rate of competitive disruption and the emergence of new business models threatens traditional market leaders. Leading businesses must innovate and deliver more effectively than smaller competitors, while being willing to disrupt their own products and business models to survive and thrive into the future.

With business agility, organizations can outlearn and outperform their competition. They can become learning organizations that improve continuously, their success fueled by passionate, empowered employees.

Business agility comprises several critical organizational capabilities:

  1. Deliver Fast and Responsively (Delivery Agility)
  2. Innovate and Disrupt (Product Innovation)
  3. Adapt Organization and Culture (Organizational Adaptability)
  4. Lead through Complexity (Leadership Effectiveness)

Building strength in all of these capabilities prepares you to create and execute on your Vision, Strategy, and Goals.

Upcoming Events

As a global sponsor for the BAI, Accenture | SolutionsIQ will participate in the following conferences:

  • Business Agility Conference – NYC (past)
  • Business Agility Conference – Vienna, Austria (May 20-21)

You can also learn more about Business Agility Meetups here.
We also continue to support the Agile community by participating in these events in 2019:

  • Deliver: Agile
  • Scrum Gathering, Austin
  • Agile Australia
  • Agile2019
  • Agile Brazil

See you there!