Agile leader, agile leadership, and agile teams are currently being discussed at length in many management guides and business magazines. But what does agility actually mean for leadership?
Wikipedia describes agility as follows:
Agility is a characteristic of management of an organization (commercial enterprise, non-profit organization or public authority), flexible and, moreover, proactive, anticipatory, and proactive in order to introduce necessary changes. ... In agile organizations, leader are leader controlling superiors who put pressure on their employees, but rather they delegate responsibility to teams of employees.
(Author's note: responsibility here responsibility that individual employees and the team manage themselves and make their own decisions within the project.)
The question immediately arises: Can it really be that simple?
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And if it is that simple:
- So why doesn't everyone do it? And
- Why is there so much written about agility at the moment, but so little implemented?
Let's examine agility in the context of leadership from different perspectives. The combination of leadership and agility currently seems to inspire both fascination and fear among managers. But why is that actually the case?
Agility: Fascination and Terror
Agility is fascinating because, when successfully applied and implemented, it appears to unlock enormous potential for leader employees alike. leader in particular leader that implementing these approaches will enable them to delegate more responsibility employees in the future, thereby reducing their involvement in day-to-day operations. The result is finally having more time for strategic issues and leadership. The image of a laptop and smartphone on a white Caribbean beach is simply too tempting—while everything at home in the company runs like clockwork.
But the horror of agility is not long in coming: How can such an agile approach be successfully implemented in management? How do employees cope with both the freedom and the (personal)responsibility agile approach? What happens if the results actually get worse as a result of the agile transition?
What exactly is meant by agile leadership from a management perspective?
I would like to illustrate this using a metaphor. Imagine your employees as individual vehicles driving on a highway. Your task as leader to establish crystal-clear guardrails with your employees, which are reviewed in a fixed control cycle (e.g., biweekly or monthly) using an EOA (Result-Oriented Job Description). Within these guardrails, however, employees can steer their own cars. They can decide for themselves how fast to drive and which route is most comfortable for them. As leader , please do not leader in the passenger seat all the time and verbally or physically interfere with the employee's steering.
Competence in self-management forms the basis
The degree of leadership agility does not depend on the technical competence of the employee, but rather on their individual self-management skills, which also include the ability of team members to effectively monitor each other. This quality forms the basis for the distance employees can cover and the results they can deliver independently. How far do your employees go without your intervention? I suspect that some employees still have room for improvement!
In my view, true and absolute agility does not actually exist—otherwise, an organization would be a communist system in which everyone can do whatever they want. Agility only works when clear results (guidelines) are defined that can also be achieved (preferably in an agile manner).
What is important for successfully implementing agility in everyday management?
- In order to sustainably increase the agile component in leadership, it is important to have the leadership skills to set guidelines. This is precisely where some mistakes are made. When demanding guidelines (results), feel free to take on more and demand more! Clarity in your communication with employees is extremely important here. Get to the point quickly. This is where you are leader in your role as leader . Your task is to clearly show employees the results and define control cycles in which employees deliver concrete results. In an agile context, results are particularly about keeping to deadlines and schedules!
- You will also manage employees for whom the specified monitoring cycles are far too long. How can you ensure that these employees are continuously monitored and supported? Since you want more agility in your management style, it makes sense to have a deputy who can take over the monitoring of these employees for you.
- There will also be employees who Result Orientation agility and, as a result, responsibility, freedom, and Result Orientation (because they either cannot or do not want to). In such cases, it is your duty to continue to manage hierarchically according to clear processes and procedures and to establish systems that help employees deliver results in small steps.
The challenge as leader therefore to be able to use a range of leadership styles in order to lead employees in different situations and develop them further. For this reason, there is no single "right" agile leadership style; instead, the leadership style of the future will be a hybrid of different approaches: agile, cooperative, and authoritarian.
Some personal implementation questions for inspiration:
- Which systems (e.g., for delegating, monitoring, demanding results, etc.) can leader you in your role as leader ?
- What tasks can you delegate? What else? What else...
- Who can be your deputy in monitoring the guardrails? How can you create a monitoring system that benefits both deputies and employees?
- How can you responsibility your team/employees (even) more responsibility ?
- What exactly do you do with the capacity you have gained? How do you make the most of this "freedom"?
That's why you're not really happy.
Why success and fulfillment have nothing to do with each other.
