Where the Transformation Begins: Agile Leadership

What Is Agility?

Although the term agility is widely used in athletics to recognize the ability to move quickly, the term has found a place in the business world. In business, agility refers to a company's ability to quickly adapt to environmental changes and fluctuations. The greater a company's business agility, the quicker it can alter its strategic plan. Hence, agility in business can be viewed as an organizational strategy that enables businesses to adapt quickly to external or internal market changes.

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What Is Agile Leadership? 

Agile leadership is a style of leadership that strives to eliminate obstacles to success so employees can be more effective and productive in the workplace. Agile leaders drive better business outcomes by remaining calm under pressure, responding effectively to extraordinary situations, being receptive to innovation, discovering ways to motivate employees, and keeping teams on track. As a result, organizations can unleash the full potential of their employees by empowering their teams as they prioritize people over processes and focus on customer needs. Agile leaders are more compassionate, democratic, and inclusive. They provide the "why" and rely on their teams to discover and deliver the "how." They give their teams the freedom to self-organize, create, and complete tasks. Embracing an agile mindset enables teams to explore new products and processes, which enables organizations to visualize improvement on a micro level.

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Why Does Your Business Needs Agile Leaders?

Unlike in traditional organizations, where all decisions are made at the top due to bureaucracy, agile organizations rely less on rules and procedures and more on updating and optimizing operations to enable better work and faster response time. Because agile organizations recognize the importance of listening to frontline employees and decentralizing power accordingly, they are quick to respond to changes. Knowing that not every team project will yield good results helps agile organizations grow as they take an iterative approach that enables employees from across the organization to experiment with different approaches to determine which adjustments will yield the best results

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The Benefits of Agile Leadership for Your Organization :

Better and more effective communication within the organization: Agile leaders practice and promote open communication with their team members, which prompts them to communicate more effectively amongst themselves. This approach creates transparency in work processes, which can boost the team's efficiency and aid in reaching organizational goals.

Well-motivated employees: Agile leaders give their team members great flexibility in carrying out their responsibilities, which can boost their motivation. Agile employees can use their knowledge and experience to determine the best way to complete a task. As a result, agile leadership can uplift employees to do their best in the workplace, boosting employee retention.

Allows for continuous improvement: Since agile teams can experiment and seek new ways to enhance their workflow, team members experience continuous improvement and better results.

What Makes Agile Leadership Stand Out

Agile leaders understand their team members' strengths and how to facilitate work that plays to those strengths. They know how to develop high-performance teams to keep employees performing at their peak. When employees fall short of their performance goals, agile leaders know how to create performance improvement plans to get them back on track. Instead of elevating themselves or specific team members, agile leaders work in the background to facilitate processes rather than being the center of attention. Rather than accepting the status quo, agile leaders are constantly looking for new ways to improve efficiency as they are open to new ideas and contributions from employees. Agile leadership promotes independent thinking and allows employees to make decisions, share ideas, and experiment. As a new management style, agile leadership has already shown how it can transform organizations and help them increase their output. This is backed by a Goremotely 2022 study that claims 60% of companies experienced revenue growth after adopting agile management. Being agile means being quick and alert, which is  a desirable trait in a leader. Agile leaders respond more quickly to our volatile, uncertain, and complex world, which is critical during crises like the COVID-19 pandemic.

What Makes A Leader Agile? 

Becoming an agile leader does not happen overnight; however, with the right training and mentorship, it can happen. Although institutions like the Scrum Alliance offer agile leadership training with recognized certifications, any organization can have its own in-house training tailored towards agile leadership training. In addition to training courses, workshops may also be held to help empower leaders to create the best work environment. Promoting an agile culture throughout the organization can also help make training much more effective as it helps instill the practices, beliefs, and values of agility in employees’ hearts and minds. 

To become an agile leader, one must be aware of their organization's need to rapidly modify its activities and methods. On the basis of this awareness, they should continuously adapt the organization to the rapid rate of market change. To become a fully-fledged agile leader, one must be observant and receptive. When coworkers address a problem, agile leaders must obtain input from stakeholders in order to develop more effective processes. Listening to frontline employees is essential for agile leaders, who prioritize the feedback and input of their team members. In addition to traditional leadership skills such as being a good communicator, problem solver, and navigator of conflict, agile leaders must possess a high level of self and situational awareness to determine and apply the appropriate type of leadership.

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Through experience and training, traditional leaders can become agile and accelerate their organizations' growth by implementing new leadership approaches, democratizing decision-making, and allowing team members to contribute new ideas and experiment with new methods. Agile leadership training can assist leaders in learning how to support agile teams and promote agility in their organizations. Training enables one to comprehend that agile leadership is not a specific role but a particular method of leadership execution. As with other leaders within an organization, agile leaders typically have a diverse set of responsibilities. Some agile leaders are primarily concerned with organizational development. In contrast, others are concerned with enhancing the performance of the organization's teams and leading efforts that provide value to clients and stakeholders.

Continuous curiosity is an essential quality for any agile leader to possess. This constant curiosity to learn and improve is known as having a growth mindset. As long as you are willing to learn and do not consider yourself an expert, you will improve. This willingness to learn, the discipline to practice, and the ability to respond to feedback are excellent ingredients for becoming a great agile leader. Greenmusk is here to assist you with agile leadership training to help you transform your organization's leadership and management approach. Check out the rest of our website to learn more about our training services, or get in touch with our team to schedule a one-on-one call.

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