As a business owner, you must get comfortable with uncertainty. That means understanding and recognizing its presence without becoming paralyzed or fear-possessed. Easier said than done, right? But this is possible to do if you transform the business and build agile business processes.
Especially since March 2020. If the COVID-19 pandemic didn’t create an environment for small business testing, I don’t know what will. Yet, we’ve all gotten to this point, having gained new insights and strengths along the way.
Nevertheless, the question arises, “How do we move forward effectively?” By transforming your enterprise into an agile business. A company capable of weathering the storms of Volatility, Uncertainty, Complexity, and Ambiguity (VUCA).
Organizations must shift into more agile ways of doing business. Keep reading to learn how to see the world through a VUCA lens. You’ll also see why iterative planning and feedback remain so vital.
We’ve Always Lived in a VUCA World
Entrepreneurs are masters of dealing with VUCA. We do it all the time, but it’s understandable to feel pushed past your normal limits. This year has also highlighted areas where we need to grow and improve our business processes.
The concept of VUCA, around since the 1980s, raises some interesting questions. Chief among these are two:
- How well can you predict the results of your actions?
- How much do you know about the situation?
The two capabilities highlighted in these questions are tough to do. Since we ultimately can’t predict our actions’ outcomes, we live in a world of uncertainty and ambiguity. What’s more, without knowledge of the situation, we get mired in complexity and ambiguity.
I don’t want to delve too deeply into VUCA today. Although here’s a podcast where I dig into the concept and its implications for your business life. But I bring it up to demonstrate that we’ve always operated against a backdrop of VUCA. It just feels more acute these days.
Fortunately, there’s a path forward when it comes to fostering stability for your company, despite uncertain times. Through investing, scaling, and focusing on core business operations, you can create a more agile organization.
Create and Build Agile Business Process
How do we claim a sense of vision, security, and stability despite the constant presence of VUCA? By transforming our companies so that they achieve organizational agility.
We need the ability to turn assets and resources into value-creating and value-protecting opportunities rapidly. What do I mean by assets and resources? They include your company’s:
- Strategy
- Structure
- Processes
- People
- Technology
Whether you’re dealing with rapid changes in demand, technology, or competition, implementing agile processes matters. These implementations may come in the form of company-wide moves or smaller performance units.
No matter the approach you take, the rewards should be rapid and valuable. After all, organizational agility leads to better performance and tremendous success long-term.
We must build our businesses on both stable and dynamic practices. These practices should allow for flexibility and scalability.
Where to start? By engaging in automation and digital transformation.
This approach involves engaging tech tools and Saas (e.g., agile software) to streamline processes, reduce errors, and enhance productivity.
How to Make Your Business Agile
Are you interested in learning more about how to transform your organization and build agile business processes?
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