Profile and enablers of agile companies: An empirical investigation

Agile attributes and agile enablers, i.e., the capabilities which allow promptly responding to changes in business environment and the available leverages to achieve the agile capabilities, respectively, have been widely debated in literature. Few studies, however, provide empirical evidence about the main characteristics of agile enterprises and tools practically exploited by companies to achieve agility. This paper attempts to improve the existing knowledge on agility, by presenting the results of an empirical research, whose aim is to investigate both the profile of agile companies and the enablers practically adopted by companies to achieve agility. The empirical investigation was performed on a sample of about 190 companies, about 65% of which were small and medium enterprises (SMEs). Results of the analysis provide a detailed investigation of the agile paradigm; moreover, outcomes suggest new taxonomies for agile attributes and enablers, and in particular provide evidence of attributes and enablers that appear as most relevant in embracing an agile strategy. (C) 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.