Qualities and Achievements of Agile Companies

More than ever, IT professionals are helping their organizations increase agility. For example, they are deploying advanced technology tools to better anticipate business changes and overhaul outdated processes. Beyond that, agile companies are embracing diverse backgrounds and skill sets, while giving their employees and teams the resources and freedom needed to make quick, informed decisions. To determine what separates agile frontrunners from followers, Accenture conducted a comprehensive survey of global senior executives. The resulting report, "Traits of Truly Agile Businesses," covers the deployment of analytics, social media, data sharing and other tech-related functions, in addition to specifics on organizational shifts. It also divides companies into the categories of "leaders" and "laggards." Leaders are defined as organizations that increased sales more than 10 percent in the last fiscal year, while laggards are experiencing sales declines. "Leaders stand apart from other companies on nearly every dimension of agility," according to the report, "from speeding up decision making, to knowing what is strategic and what is operational, to aggressively investing in and using analytics to run their organizations." An estimated 1,300 global C-suite and senior-level executives took part in the research.