Get Agile in Your Evolving World

Agility has always figured in sports and warfare, and over the past decade it’s loomed large in business, too. But being agile also matters greatly in wider life.

Especially during tumultuous times that are volatile, unpredictable, complex and ambiguous. Surely we need some agility to fulfill our grand potential and thrive. And sometimes we need it just to survive.

Are you agile enough in your changing, uncertain world? I.e., do you know when (and how) to build up or break down, run fast or go deep, hold or release, pivot or freeze — to care well for yourself? For your family? Your work? Your community? To realize your goals and your purpose?

My own grasp of Agility has evolved in recent years, through self-development and also through coaching individuals and teams in their personal and professional growth. I see it as our capacity plus discernment to MOVE INTENTIONALLY among different skills, traits and states, well and with ease, when and how the situation requires.

A few pointers on cultivating and then sustaining Agility:

• It’s NOT the same as Adaptability
  (though the two are often equated in speech and thought).
  
  
• It’s about MINDSET as well as PERFORMANCE.
  
  
• It’s very much about BUILDING CHARACTER. 
  (See “Measuring the Return on Character” in the Apr 2015 HBR)
  
  
• It often means SLIDING between OPPOSING states and traits that are in mutual tension (like improvisational v. systematic).
  
  
• It’s CONTEXTUAL (so a brilliant maneuver that crushed it then and there, might fail here and now).
  
  
• It demands — and fosters — SELF-AWARENESS.
  
  
• It requires us to live intentionally in our HEART, GUT, and SPIRIT just as much as in our HEAD.
  
  
• It insists that we CHALLENGE ourselves to stay FRESH.
  
  
• It needs internal OPENNESS to LEARNING new things and new ways.
  
  
• It also needs external FEEDBACK and SUPPORT.

A few resources that might help…

HBR’s Oct 2016 article "Make Your Strategy Agile" advocates “vision sprint” for business success:

• “Vision” means seeing and holding long-term, inspired aspects of organizational strategy like purpose, principles and legacy.
  
  
• “Sprint” means breaking an otherwise long, complex strategic process into manageable “bites” that can be accomplished faster.
  
  
• Vision sprint is a powerful agility technique for business that can also serve your life at large. See the HBR article for examples and guidelines.

3D Embodied Action Learning catalyzes agility (and agility awareness) like nothing else:

• It's a proven experiential method for individuals and groups to discover what being agile really means for them. 
  
  
• It jump-starts the formation of agile, connected, highly effective teams faster than conventional methods in the classroom, board room, auditorium, or online.
  
  
• In the past seven years, I've facilitated more than 500 professionals and more than 60 business groups through accelerated team-leader development this way. Nothing I know beats it for activating Emotional, Conversational and Relational agility that triggers real performance breakthroughs in a single day.

Tilt Tools cultivate agility by building whole-person, whole-system character strengths over time.

• They're a scalable technology for 21st-Century people innovation that's validated by psychometric testing. 
  
  
• I use Tilt to shift my own attitude and behaviors for the better. I also use it with clients to support their personal and professional development.
  
  
• Leverage Tilt's impact further by launching it from a day of 3D Embodied Action Learning.

CONTACT ME  for more on any of these inside-out approaches to help you or your team evolve.

— Laura J. Nigro, MS

Boosting Business by Coaching Tech Professionals
Into Effective Leaders • Partners • Teams • Cultures
Grounded in Neuroscience, Inspired by You

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