Unlocking Agility

Today’s enterprises see smaller, more nimble competitors devouring their businesses and obsoleting their markets at an ever-accelerating pace. “Sustainable” competitive advantages continue to shrink and disappear, as the average age of Fortune® 500 companies keeps declining. Smart executives know they must move from plan-driven, fixed-scope thinking to a discovery-driven approach characterized by learning, continuous improvement, and value delivery. They know they must learn how to capitalize on uncertainty, since it’s now utterly impossible to prevent it. Yet, very few large enterprises have truly succeeded in this agile transformation. Unlocking Agility: An Insider’s Guide to Agile Enterprise Transformation focuses on overcoming the real challenges that stand in their way.

Author Jorgen Hesselberg has spent 15+ years leading successful enterprise transformation initiatives: this book brings together all he’s learned about what works (and what doesn’t). Hesselberg answers crucial questions like:

• What’s the best way to start organizational change in large organizations?
• How can you sustain momentum beyond the initial “honeymoon”?
• How do you create an environment of continuous learning, employee empowerment, and product discovery — while still executing superbly in day-to-day customer commitments?
• What’s the best role for external consultants and consulting firms?
• How do you lead coherent organizational change across multiple geographies, locations, and cultures?
• What organizational structures are likeliest to unlock lasting change, and how should these evolve over time?
• What type of organizational impact is realistic to expect?
• How can you measure success?

Replete with first-hand accounts from transformation leaders at companies including Cisco, HP, Spotify, Yahoo!, John Deere, Salesforce and Wal-Mart, the book provides indispensable practical insights for everyone seeking to build a truly agile enterprise.

Table of Contents

Part I: The Case for Agility

Chapter 1: The Agile Imperative

Chapter 2: Enterprise Agility

Part II: Five Dimensions of Agility

Chapter 3: Technology

Chapter 4: Organizational Design

Chapter 5: People

Chapter 6: Leadership

Chapter 7: Culture

Part III: Unlocking Agility

Chapter 8: Building Your Organization’s Agile Working Group

Chapter 9: An Operating Model for Business Agility

Chapter 10: Unlocking Agility: A Strategic Roadmap

About the Author

Jorgen Hesselberg is cofounder of Comparative Agility, a leading agile assessment and continuous improvement platform. A proven thought leader of numerous successful enterprise transformation efforts since 2009, Jorgen provides strategic guidance, executive counsel, and coaching to some of the world’s most respected companies both as an internal change agent and an external consultant. He has trained thousands of people on agile and Scrum, disruptive innovation, and enterprise transformation strategy.

Passionate about making the world a better place to work, Jorgen is the former director and an active member of Supporting Agile Adoption, an Agile Alliance program dedicated to supporting those who apply agile principles and practices for agile transformation. Jorgen is a frequent speaker at international industry conferences. He earned his bachelor degree in journalism at the University of Missouri, his MBA at Iowa State University, and an MS in information technology at Northwestern University. He completed postgraduate coursework in finance and disruptive innovation at Harvard Business School.