Agile companies are the winners of the crisis

Thomas Reiner | 15.09.2020

Agility helps companies to react quickly to opportunities and threats. Especially in view of the rampant risks and uncertainties, this is a skill that can save a company or lead to more growth.
Whether internal challenges such as failed business processes or external factors such as changing trends, markets or the competitive environment, agility increases the performance and capacity of companies at various levels.

A new, global study by McKinsey also shows how strong the positive influence of agile entrepreneurship is. The study examined 22 companies from six industries. The result: customer experience, employee involvement and the financial performance of the company can be improved by up to 30 percent, and operational performance even by up to 50 percent.

Recent examples of agile behaviour have been shown by companies that use their material and manufacturing know-how to produce products virtually overnight that hardly anyone knew about yesterday, let alone needed. Protective shields and transparent displays against droplet infection or furniture for “pop-up intensive care units” are examples. But they can also be “ordinary” products for greatly increased demand, such as labels for disinfectants. The result is always a rapid increase in turnover.

The bottom line is: agility needs entrepreneurship. Pure “management” is not up to the situation.

Acting agile means being able to adapt dynamically. Those who act agile can use the wind, no matter from which direction it blows. And when the wind turns into a storm, the sails do not need to be pulled in, quite the opposite. Because more wind and stronger gusts then mean above all more energy that can be converted and used.