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Synopsis
AGILE ENTERPRISE STRATEGY
Paul T. Kidd
Cheshire Henbury, Tamworth
House, PO Box 103, Macclesfield, SK11 8UW, United Kingdom. Phone:
+44 (0)1625 619313; Fax: +44 (0)1625 619060; Email: paulkidd@cheshirehenbury.com;
WebSite: http:///www.cheshirehenbury.com
It has been evident since the
1970s that mass production economies have been in crisis. Since
1970 observers and thinkers have been describing the emergence
of a post-mass production economy and the associated characteristics
of a post-mass production enterprise. With the collapse of mass/lean
production oriented competitive conditions a need has arisen
to develop new types of enterprises capable of dealing with and
thriving in a complex and ever changing business environment
? enterprises that can continually reinvent themselves. The strategic
vision is therefore the development of enterprises totally committed
to embracing the emerging business environment. This involves
creating a strategy that moves enterprises forward in three interrelated
areas:
- The niche enterprise - develop
and exploit capabilities to thrive and prosper in the face of
increasing diversity arising from individual customers, markets
and to deal with wider issues of a fragmenting and diverse world;
- The knowledge-based enterprise
- develop and exploit capabilities to use knowledge and information
for sustainable competitive advantage (in effect acknowledging
information and knowledge as a source of wealth);
- The agile (or adaptive) enterprise
- develop and exploit capabilities to thrive and prosper in a
changing, nonlinear, uncertain and unpredictable business environment.
Agile manufacturing takes its
name from the last of these three interrelated areas. However,
agility is just one component of a 21st century manufacturing
enterprise strategy - the issues of knowledge-based and niche
enterprise need also to be considered and most importantly, the
interrelationships between the three elements addressed.
The key points to understand
are:
- Agile manufacturing is a strategy
aimed at developing capabilities (the enterprise platform) to
prosper in the next century. In this respect it is similar to
a manufacturing strategy in that it should support business and
marketing strategies. However, these strategies also need to
be modified to take advantage of agile manufacturing capabilities.
- As a strategy, agile manufacturing
is concerned with objectives, structures, processes and resources
and not with individual point solutions, particular technologies,
methods, etc. considered in isolation.
- The emphasis is on designing
the enterprise as a whole so that certain characteristics are
achieved and not on the piecemeal adoption of quick fixes, prescriptions
and panaceas.
- Agile manufacturing may require
some current best practices, lean production concepts, technologies
and taken-for-granted assumptions to be re-evaluated, modified
or even abandoned.
- In the same way that mass-production
marginalised many craft-based firms, agile manufacturing is likely
to marginalise many mass production firms, even those with lean
production enhancements.
- One of the biggest problems
to overcome is the misunderstandings that lean and agile are
synonymous. They are not, although most of what is portrayed
as agile is in fact lean.
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