Just 12% of companies can claim that their entire corporation is on the path to business agility – even though more than two-thirds agreed that agile organisations are better able to quickly respond to dynamic business conditions.
These are some of the findings from the survey “Business Agility throughout the Enterprise” sponsored by CA Technologies.
Respondents expect improved business agility to deliver:
* Better competitive advantage (54% of respondents);
* Higher customer satisfaction and retention (65% of respondents);
* Increased employee productivity and retention (58% of respondents);
* Reduced costs (57% of respondents); and
* Faster time to act on new opportunities (84% of respondents).
Eighty-four percent of survey participants believe that the capability to respond more quickly to new opportunities will give them a distinct advantage but only one in 10 executives said they are leveraging the benefits of agile across their whole organisation to achieve speed and responsiveness.
The majority of respondents attributed the challenges of agile methodology adoption throughout the organisation to complex environments (64%), cultural or political barriers (58%), a lack of financial commitment to change (25%), and outdated apps and tools (25%).
Lack of skills or faith in the process are dismissed as relatively inconsequential problems.
Business agility is recognised and appreciated for the benefits it can deliver in aligned organisations. Even with increased adoption, there is still a lot of opportunity to be gained.
As organisations continue to incorporate agile methodologies and practices across the enterprise, they will see some marked improvements in their business.
Improved business agility was cited by respondents as key to reducing fire-drills (51%), improving process efficiency (47%) and increasing cross-functional visibility (47%).
Additional benefits in collaboration, customer impact and experience, and alignment across planning and investment were also identified in the survey.
“Success today requires that companies quickly sense and adapt to changes, pivot to address market changes and customer needs, and do so at scale,” says Heidi Ziegelmeier, business development manager at CA Southern Africa.
“As organisations become modern software factories, adopting an agile mindset and implementing principles across every department – from manufacturing to marketing to finance – ensures that organisations can speed up performance to remain competitive.”
The slow pace of agility …
