Just as it seems that the world can’t accelerate any further, it does. Technology continues to redefine what is possible for your business, with emerging capabilities resulting in shifting customer expectations and a redefinition of the level of performance that you must achieve. As a result, no matter how good your plans are, they are going to have to change. And then they’re going to have to change again.
That’s what makes business agility such an important capability today.
Why Business Agility is Essential
If your business is unable to pivot quickly and with minimal disruption to shifting environments and evolving priorities, you will struggle to survive, let alone thrive. Which is why the latest report from the Business Agility Institute is concerning.
That suggests that overall business agility has slipped slightly over the past year, with notable erosions of capability around collaboration and strategic capabilities. Those are two areas where business agility is essential to your success. You must be able to define strategic priorities, goals, and objectives. To approve appropriate investments to achieve those priorities. And effectively execute the work associated with those investments. When things change, you must then recognize the impact on priorities and work, adjusting as required quickly and decisively.
Business Agility Through Collaboration
Collaboration is even more essential to success. Change is driven by people, so by extension, people have a big impact on your ability to achieve and maintain business agility. Once decisions are made to shift investment dollars, adjust approved work, or otherwise evolve the strategic portfolio, you then have to implement those changes.
When your teams are engaged and motivated, they will be able to adjust their projects, shift to new priorities and incorporate shifting constraints relatively easily. This will minimize both their effort that is wasted on things that are no longer priorities. And the time that they need to shift to the new working model. However, when collaboration isn’t effective, and when your teams and individuals aren’t engaged, there will be excessive delays, wasted work. And an overall erosion of your ability to deliver an optimal investment return for the business.
Why are some organizations struggling with capabilities like strategy and collaboration?
As you know, it’s not because you aren’t focused on tiring to improve them. Like most businesses, you recognize the need to create and maintain alignment between your priorities and the work that you are carrying out, and you recognize the importance of strong collaboration. However, you may not have the visibility, and hence the awareness, that you need to manage the situation optimally.
Without effective project portfolio management (PPM) software such as Sciforma’s solution, you will always have a tough time maintaining clear visibility into the work that you are carrying out. Especially as that work is distributed across your enterprise. Additionally, your teams are uncertain as to how their work contributes to the success of the business. Because they are unable to see the direct connection between the work that they are doing and the strategic priorities that you have established.
Put simply, you cannot optimize business agility without an effective PPM solution to support the visibility and adaptiveness that you need. When you have such a solution in place, you can plan, re-plan, and communicate effectively and efficiently. Your teams can collaborate to implement the right changes in the right way, in the minimum amount of time. Your business agility improves. And your return on investment improves.
Take your organization to the next level of business agility, contact us to start exploring how Sciforma’s PPM solution can help you.
