In this chapter, we explore the nature of organizational agility within the broader context of organizational effectiveness and a dynamic environment. As a broad, overarching construct, agility has most often been examined in the strategic management literature using a family of constructs, including dynamic capabilities, ambidexterity, flexibility, strategic renewal, and pivots-each of which is examined. Agility, as an organization’s ability to leverage existing capabilities, to reconfigure existing capabilities, and to create new capabilities, allows an organization to transform its use of resources, systems, people, technology, and in some cases, strategies, with the aim of survival and success. Yet far from being a panacea, agility is costly to pursue and may not guarantee the ultimate effectiveness or survival of an organization when pursued blindly.
