Strategic Nimbleness as a Business Culture

There is a lot said about how fast things change today. This has always been true to some extent and is not a recent event, but some types of change happen more frequently than others depending on the business climate. Examples include the increase in merger and acquisition behavior of the 1980’s, the “exuberance” of the late 1990’s, or the recession in the early 1980’s. All of these cause a surge in one type of change in most industries in a relatively short time frame.

Nimbleness
Put simply, nimbleness is being able to quickly and easily adapt to changing conditions and continue to perform at a high level. But that statement camouflages the complex and difficult nature of becoming a nimble organization.

Certain characteristics mark nimble organizations:

• Quick and effective decision making,
• A marked degree of autonomy among the employees and managers,
• High performing teams,
• An ability to work through ambiguity quickly and correctly,
• Professional and technical competence among the employees,
• An engaged workforce,
• Managers dedicated to their reports,
• And an executive commitment to the employees.

Any one of these adds some nimbleness, but they feed off of each other and the net effect is greater than the sum of the parts.

Additionally, nimble people or organizations demonstrate a knack for anticipating and preparing for changes in their business environment. This becomes increasingly important, as the business environment becomes more competitive.

Strategic Nimbleness
Also referred to as strategic agility, this is the ability to deploy the nimbleness or agility of the organization in a way that gives strategic advantage. A nimble business then responds almost immediately to changes in the business environment. These changes can be regulatory, competitive, customer, or market driven and can vary across the geography of a company.

It is in this role that nimbleness or agility creates value for a company. When the business environment shifts, for whatever reason, those that react fastest and most effectively can capture or gain market share, reduce business or regulatory risk, identify new market segments, etc. Thus nimbleness can become a strong competitive enabling force in a company.

Nimble Behaviors
Nimble behaviors tend to be very similar across industry and company size, but they differ depending on the level of responsibility of the individual.

Nimble executives. At the executive level at most companies, nimbleness is almost a de facto requirement. Many of these behaviors are already exhibited in most executives, but it is any that are not present that should be the primary concern. Nimble executives:

• Search the external environment and anticipate changes
• Understand how the various systems in the company interact
• Balance business systems between fit (efficiency) and flexibility (adaptability)
• Learn and adapt to new situations quickly
• Sort through large amounts of data and make good decisions based on the data
• Identify when they have made a mistake early, communicate that, and fix it
• Demonstrate to employees that they care about employee welfare

Nimble managers. The behaviors demonstrated by nimble managers differ from those needed for executives in that they are more focused on the operational aspects of any changes that arise. Nimble managers:

• Anticipate changes in the external environment that might affect their business
• Understand the role of their part of the business in driving the bottom line
• Seek out new experiences and value diversity in their employees
• Have a track record of resiliency
• Demonstrate flexibility and creativity in dealing with new challenges
• Encourage calculated risk (and forgive reasonable mistakes)
• Hold people accountable for the commitments and goals they have made
• Learn from both good and bad experiences

Nimble employees. Nimble behaviors also differ for individual contributors. Individual behaviors will tend more toward resiliency than toward anticipating possible changes. Nimble employees:

• Are curious about everything going on around themselves
• Learn from experience, whether good or bad
• Have a high level of self-confidence and self-esteem
• Adapt to new situations quickly
• Seek new and diverse enriching relationships
• Demonstrate openness and candor
• Demonstrate integrity and honesty
• Handle conflict well
• Know how to create their own luck

Creating a Nimble Culture
The first steps to creating a corporate culture around nimbleness begin by adding the nimble behaviors to leadership competencies and holding individuals responsible by tying those behaviors then to performance and compensation. By integrating it into the measures of performance and values in the company and then tying it to compensation, you can be sure that individuals will take the initiative to understand and incorporate the values and behaviors of the new business culture.

Now that you have created the need for employees to learn about the new behaviors, you need to educate about these new values. Common methods include:

• The wallet-sized card with values printed on it,
• Training programs or videos,
• Small group discussions,
• Executives and managers discussing it regularly,
• And even the perennial posters.

What is important is to talk about the new culture too much, to over-communicate (you can’t really, but it will seem like it), in order to ensure understanding of the new behaviors