Improvising agility: organizations as structured-extemporaneous hybrids

This chapter discusses agility as an improvised accomplishment conducted by improvisational leaders, i.e., leaders that approach and define rules that guide behavior in normal conditions and that stimulate impromptu adaptations in unpredicted conditions, when the existing rule set failed. We do that by showing how the triad of the leadership process (leaders, followers, and context) enacts the four principles of agile management. The contribution defends these principles are highly aligned with an improvisational understanding of leadership. The authors adopt a deliberately relational and distributed leadership perspective by exploring improvisation as a mutually constructed process of supportive leaders, compelled followers, and a conducive context. The chapter also discuss several obstacles that might limit the ability to enact agile improvisational leadership.