What does agility do with power?

Eine Analyse des Machtphänomens in agilen Organisationen

Abstract

Organizational agility has emerged as a central topic in organizational consulting practice recently. Very often agile concepts are seen as the entrepreneurial »panacea« for more flexibility, employee orientation, etc. However, the topic of power in agile contexts is hardly discussed in contemporary literature. Based on an interdisciplinary approach, this article discusses the question of what role the phenomenon of power plays in agile organizations. We thereby focus on teams, as teams play a central role in agile concepts. We show that while in classically hierarchical organizations formal power is more important than informal power, agile organizations primarily rely on the power of persuasion through informal power and democratic decision-making. Still, formal rules and hierarchy-like »final decisions« play an essential role also in agile contexts. How these formal rules and »final decisions« could best be shaped relies on the respective contextual conditions and restrictions.