Agile Methodolgies Offer Much

There is much to like about the Agile approach when you read about it and listen to others sing its praises. It embraces adaptability, flexibility, speed of response and continuous interaction with the customer.

Agile can be defined as the ability to rapidly and efficiently adapt to changes in our environment.

Agile seems ideally suited to our VUCA (1) environment that is characterised by constant change and disruptions.

Our traditional mechanistic organisations are not enabling the natural creativity of people, and their top down, slow strategy processes cannot keep up with the demands of the fast-moving environment. In contrast, Agile offers rapid decision-making and learning by way of its iterative processes and adaptability.

But let’s examine the concept a little more closely to see how it copes with all the aspects of our VUCA environment — particularly the inherent complexity that makes strategy and decision-making that much more challenging.

The iterations are a learning and decision-making process that is an important part of the strategy process. This is the way the organisation remains flexible and adapts to change and the feedback from the environment.

The assumption is that these rapid learning and decision-making cycles enable the organisation to evolve and adapt the strategy to a fast moving VUCA environment.

But, is this a valid assumption?

Let us explore the strategy process in a VUCA environment…

Strategy is Different in VUCA



Because of the complexity and inherent uncertainty in a VUCA environment, there are two important differences required for the strategy and decision-making processes to be effective.

1.   A reductionist approach (4) to strategy and decision-making is not effective in a complex environment. A complex system cannot be understood by breaking it down into small parts and addressing each part separately. The system is only properly understood by examining the whole system and observing how the various parts interact.

2.   Speed is often the enemy in problem solving and decision-making in a complex environment. There are rarely ‘best-practice’ solutions that apply in these contexts. In the main, complex problems are solved by innovative, breakthrough approaches. And this requires reflection and insight — an approach usually achieved by pausing, stepping away from the problem and achieving some perspective.

My observation is that these two important differences are often misunderstood when organisations pursue an Agile methodology in running their organisation.

In general, I have observed organisations applying Agile incorrectly by:

• Failing to develop a coherent strategy at the outset. Instead they assume that agile IS the strategy and hope to address the resultant challenges by developing a series of poorly thought-through plans and an iterative process (this is the reactive organisation)
• Maintaining the pressure on speed through the whole process — thereby encouraging a series of reflexive5 decisions that rarely bring any new insights or innovative solutions to bear on the overall challenge.

Making Agile Strategic

Agile is indeed a valuable approach for creating greater flexibility and adaptiveness in our organisations. We should not throw the baby out with the bathwater. Agile is still useful but you need to take care in the way it is applied.

We should recognise the potential pitfalls that often accompany the implementation of an Agile approach.

These can be largely overcome by shifting the organisation from being simply reactive to being truly Agile (ie: a clear strategy is an important part of Agile).

This can be done in two ways:

1. Use scenario thinking to develop alternative futures that may unfold into the uncertain future. Strategies can then be developed to allow for success in each of these scenarios.
2. Emphasise the need for a pause when teams encounter unfamiliar problems that do not have readily available ‘best-practice’ solutions or the ‘right’ answers. These require individuals to ‘step back’ from the challenge and be given an opportunity to reflect and develop new insights into the situation. The availability of alternative scenarios in the strategy will guide them in their deliberations.

(1) Volatile, uncertain, complex, ambiguous

(2) The five trademarks of agile organisations, McKinsey and Company, January 22, 2018

(3) Dr Munib Karavdic, www.wave.design

(4) Reductionism is the traditional management process whereby we break down a big challenge into smaller parts, and then attempt to solve each part separately.

(5) Reflexive decisions are those formed by habit and previous experiences in other situations

About the Author

Dr Norman Chorn is a highly experienced business strategist helping organisations and individuals be resilient and adaptive for an uncertain future. Well known to many as the ‘business doctor’!

By integrating the principles of neuroscience with strategy and economics Norman achieves innovative approaches to achieve peak performance within organisations. He specialises in creating strategy for the rapidly changing and uncertain future and can help you and your organisation.