One of the most over used but clearly relevant words in IT is agility, and virtualisation surely has to be the main culprit for this.
Technologists often see agility as the ability to move in any direction with equal ease. An agile organisation with agile technology does not limit their strategy as they can change direction based on investments to support flexibility.
The demand for technical agility is a hope that technology will not get in the way or limit strategic options. The desire to be agile drives investments in modular technologies and architectures.
Agility is not as important as being responsive. Responsiveness recognises that value comes from actions that create results. Rather than hedging bets with offsetting options, responsive leaders recognise the need to do the first things first and fast.
Enterprises need to be more responsive, than agile. A responsive organisation knows how to executive its strategy and day-to-day options, make the constant adjustments to customer, market and internal changes and thrive in an environment of dynamic competition.
It is more common for leaders to recognise and leverage their path-dependencies – which can also be called core competencies, to compete in a changing market. That is how Amazon can move from being an online retailer to offering cloud services.
If I had the choice of being agile or being responsive I would choose responsive every time for two reasons. Being responsive means I have the focus needed to execute my plans effectively and drive enterprise performance. Second, I know that I can always gain access to my needed capabilities from suppliers whose strength is my weakness. That gives me the ability to act with the ability to partner to be agile.