Are we stuck in 'change' inertia?  Reading through 2022 & 2023 reports from the Business Agility Institute, I was struck by a recurring theme: the top challenges companies face in their business agility journey have remained consistent over the last five years.

This could be seen as a grim reality. However, the new challenges highlighted in the 2023 report reveal that we're making progress, even if it’s not always apparent.

As most of us do over summer, I took some time to catch up on my reading, listening, and watching lists, especially reading Diana Larsen's book 'Lead without Blame'. This got me thinking about the environments where teams truly thrive. I started reflecting on how cultures of blame and fear can deeply impact organisations. In my latest article, I dive into some of the most extreme examples and explore the consequences when "Profits over People & Product" becomes the driving force in business.

Having a recent frustrating experience with my business banking provider made me question whether traditional banks are truly prepared to navigate the evolving landscape of banking and financial services. Which banks will ride the wave of change and flourish, and which will falter or fail?

John Deere was facing some significant challenges in 2019, and so decided to launch an agile transformation initiative.  Implementing Agile IT Manufacturing with Scrum@Scale, Scrum, DevOps and a modernised Tech stack. Results far exceeded targets.

In this series of articles we explore how global businesses have adopted Agile Manufacturing to embrace an Industry 4.0 world. In this article we look at Novo Nordisk and explore how an agile transformation helped meet demand surges in a rapidly shifting pharma industry, to reach a market value of $500bn.

Novo Nordisk needed to shift their approach to business operations to tackle some of their greatest business challenges including…

Agile manufacturing evolved from Toyota's just-in-time (JIT) concept, expanding into lean manufacturing, cycle time management, time-based competition, and quick-response manufacturing.

Unlike JIT's focus on production systems, agile manufacturing encompasses both factory floor operations and the growing significance of software in the industry. Its prerequisites hinge on robust digital transformation, emphasising software development facilitating seamless interaction among humans, computers, and production machines.

Rebecca, Enterprise Agile Coach, ICAgile Agile in HR certified, reflects on her experience of the importance of People & Culture to support teams and leaders in navigating cultural dimensions, when working globally.

We take a look at the power of building a people-centric, innovation focused culture, through the lens of Netflix and their values. Our Founder reflects on her experience of how strong values can help companies whether major changes.

What fuels real innovation? Why do some household names fail to keep up with the market? In traditional organisations companies may adopt an accelerated innovation pipeline, or host Ideation competitions. Some incumbents build Greenfield digital teams to support rapid innovation. However, these models tend to have varying success and short-lived results.

In traditional organisations companies may adopt an accelerated innovation pipeline, or host ideation competitions. These models tend to have varying success and short-lived results. Without values and principles such as those at the heart of the Netflix business model, ones which are exemplified by a transformational leadership team, real innovation will not be a staple of an organisation.

نحن في فترة مثيرة من التطور في اقتصاد الشرق الأوسط. وهو وقت يجب فيه على الشركات والحكومات النظر في تأمين مستقبلهم ومستقبل موظفيهم. تحويل "قوة العمل" إلى قاعدة مواهب مُستقبلة مدعومة بالاستثمار المستمر في تطوير المهارات وتعدد المهارات، يمكن أن يحول الشركات إلى منظمات تعليمية. هذا يخلق البيئة المناسبة للابتكار لتأمين شركات المستقبل.

We explore gender parity through the lens of digital inclusion and where the UAE stands in terms of female employee inclusion across industries. The Women in Tech chapter for the UAE is spearheading initiatives to close the 'digital divide'. Women in Tech® Global is undertaking initiatives under their 'Digital & Social Inclusion' pillar, including donating over 350 computers and laptops to schools in underprivileged areas in India and South Africa.

Our founder explores the continued needed for International Women’s Day in elevating he hidden voices across the world that this day helps shine a light on.

An IWD article from the BBC says it plainly and without judgement: sexual violence used as a weapon of war, girls being denied secondary-school education and the continued use of women and their bodies as commodities. If there were ever an argument needed for continued efforts to highlight women’s issues, these are just a few.

We're diving into a series of Q&A sessions featuring our esteemed colleagues and friends from the region. Here Rebecca Hudson, Enterprise Agile Coach, kicks off our inaugural Q&A series. Join us as we ignite a spirit of knowledge sharing within our agile community in 2024!

The idea for this Q&A session came from a number of organic conversations with colleagues and friends around challenges we were facing in our day-to-day roles. At the heart of so many of these challenges seemed to be issues with agile adoption and maturity. Each challenge had its own flavour.

There are some key reasons why high EI is important for leaders. These may seem obvious however, I’ve seen too many times individuals promoted quickly up the ladder who have excellent professional acumen, but poor emotional agility and little self-awareness.

A highly capable leader who feels they are doing their job to the highest level of excellence can still fail themselves, their company and their team if they lack the essential skills of high emotional intelligence.

The main impediment to agile adoption is often the behaviour and mindset of executives and leaders in an organisation. There is a need to understand, embrace, and support agile principles to enable its successful adoption and reap its benefits. Here I’ve covered some of the impediments to a successful adoption of agile, which leaders should tackle when implementing agile ways of working.

As detailed in the excellent HBR article by Darrell Rigby, Jeff Sutherland, and Hirotaka Takeuchi ‘Embracing Agile’, innovation is what agile is all about.

In this article I summarise the six practices Rigby et al discerned through their study and analysis, that are crucial in capitalising on agile’s potential.

We’re at an exciting time of evolution in the Middle East economy. A time when businesses & governments must look to future-proof themselves and their people. Transforming a ‘workforce’ into a future-proofed talent-base fuelled by ongoing investment in upskilling and cross-skilling, can evolve businesses into learning organisations. This creates the right environment for innovation to future-proof companies.

I am part of the ‘Agile Industrial Complex’. However, I’ve always had the same frustration - knowing that what works will only be determined by listening to teams, and frequently seeing this not happen.

In this article I explore what is meant by ‘The Agile Industrial Complex’, and how we can shift the needle back towards the true principles of agile, and away from off-the-shelf models.

Why would teams buy-in to something that they haven’t helped shape? Especially when the benefits have not been made clear or worse, there are no clear benefits to them. In the context of agile adoption at a team level, or agile transformation at a department or company level, a culture shift is involved. This can be hard to define.

In this article I’ll look at some tools and approaches to support agile adoption through sensitive change management.