Why Agility Initiatives Fail: The Importance of Accurate Sense-Making

Many 'agility' initiatives fail for a mundane reason: they try to change delivery without changing the organisation’s sense-making.

If the organisation can’t interpret signals reliably, it will:
* over-react to noise
* under-react to real change
* chase fashionable solutions

There's an implication in Karl Weick's famous (stolen) story about the team of soldiers that miraculously survived in the Alps having found a map - which was then discovered to be a map of the Pyrenees - that good sensemaking is valuable in itself. I think that's true - but many large organisation lack BOTH good data AND good ways of learning from it.

My working hypothesis: Requisite Agility is less about speed, more about accuracy.

Accuracy of perception. Accuracy of explanation. Accuracy of decision.

Where do you see organisations getting less accurate as they get bigger?

We’ve been exploring a lightweight way of surfacing this across organisations - not a model, more a mirror. I'm keen to hear your views that might feed into this. I will share our model soon!

#agilityfailure #organizationalsensemaking #businessstrategy #leadershipinsights #innovation