Retaining Organizational Agility : How to Stay Competitive Without Competing

Abstract: While conventional approaches of managing organizations have been considered to be outdated, Organizational Agility has been acclaimed for its prowess to cope with today's increasingly volatile and dynamic environment. Yet the predominant focus has been directed towards how agility is achieved, while its retention as organizations grow has to a great extent been unexplored. Through a qualitative case study of a renowned organization for its unorthodox approach, this study aims to contribute with an extension to the current scope of organizational agility by stretching beyond the focus on mere transformations in an attempt to understand in what ways organizational agility is retained as they grow. The findings of this study challenge the common conceptions found within literature suggesting that changes in the external environment are what drives organization’s to be agile in order to sustain its competitiveness. Organizational agility has thus primarily been considered to be constituted by dynamic adaptations in accordance to forces of the external environment. In contrast, this study finds that the retention of organizational agility during growth is an evolutionary process that is internally driven by placing indispensable value on the employees and by focusing on the organization itself, its desire and community. Retaining organizational agility is thus something that grows “from the inside and out”.