- Cultural drift occurs when the contingencies of the day overwhelm the means and/or the will to shape tomorrow's culture; where the drive for short-term results becomes the leadership raison d'etre; where anxiety and risk-aversion dominate day-to-day decision-making. Operating for extended periods of time in shortterm crisis mode and/or high leadership turnover makes cultural drift almost inevitable. Remember, if you're not managing your culture, someone else is!
- A strong culture but one that lacks agility may be successful for extended periods of time, but is poorly equipped to deal with truly significant/rapid change in the business environment. Inward looking and often wedded to past practice, organizations that lack agility reach for yesterday's solutions as the best way (often the only way) forward. (Myopic).
- Risk, candor and flexibility are highly desirable qualities. Unless married to discipline, alignment and cohesion, however; unless the organization concerned develops the cultural anchors needed to build sustained success, agility, on its own, breeds confusion. (Chaotic).
- A culture that displays "StrAgility" has a profound influence on sustainable competitiveness. A strong culture aligns behaviour with the organization's purpose, direction, values and the drive to deliver. A strong culture is built on, and supports, strong teams. A culture that displays agility nurtures diversity, stresses challenging the status quo, emphasizes the customer's voice, and builds a talent management system that assumes growth is, in no small measure, about giving people the freedom to act. The natural outcome of an agile organization is high employee engagement, innovation, and openness to risk. In an uncertain world, organizations need a culture that is both strong and agile: "StrAgility."
One of the dilemmas with language is that words such as "strong" and "agile" conjure up images that, although appropriate, do not always convey the emotion behind that intended. Perhaps a better way to describe a strong/agile culture (StrAgility) lies in the Spanish word "duende." Duende comes from the Flamenco dance tradition. It describes a moment in time when the dancers are at one with the music, a moment when they display so much passion that they are lost to the dance; when they, indeed, become the dance. Strong and agile are appropriate terms but they do not convey the passion demanded to get there.
