Agile Purpose: Overcoming Bureaucracy

Abstract

As the twenty-first century progresses, marked by a staggering increase in change, volatility, and complexity, executives need to resolve the tension between innovation and operational discipline. In this challenge, purpose and agility have a fundamental interrelationship. This work offers an integrated view of purpose based on agile organizational practices. First, it shows how purpose can be deployed into the management structure through the use of missions (related to individual and organizational impact) and further, how to create reliability and adaptability with agile purpose-driven structures. As a practical framework, it presents the ‘Agile Purpose Chart’ that combines team and individual missions with hierarchical and self-managed organizational forms in order to unleash the full potential of purpose.