Enterprise agility and the enabling role of information technology

AbstractIn turbulent environments, enterprise agility, that is, the ability of firms to sense environmental change and respond readily, is an important determinant of firm success. We define and deconstruct enterprise agility, delineate enterprise agility from similar concepts in the business research literature, explore the underlying capabilities that support enterprise agility, explicate the enabling role of information technology (IT) and digital options, and propose a method for measuring enterprise agility. The concepts in this paper are offered as foundational building blocks for the overall research program on enterprise agility and the enabling role of IT.Keywords: enterprise agilitydigital optionsinformation technologymeasurement AcknowledgementsWe thank Lars Mathiassen, Richard Baskerville, Sundar Bharadwaj, three EJIS reviewers, and the participants and reviewers of the 2005 IFIP 8.6 Working Conference on Business Agility and IT Diffusion for their helpful comments on previous versions of the article.Additional informationNotes on contributorsEric OverbyAbout the authorsEric Overby is a doctoral student at the Goizueta Business School at Emory University, specializing in information systems. His research explores patterns of activity in electronic markets and other virtual environments, as well as the business value of information technology. Eric can be reached at eric_overby@bus.emory.edu.Anandhi BharadwajAnandhi Bharadwaj is an Associate Professor of Information Systems at the Goizueta Business School at Emory University and is currently a Visiting Associate Professor at Singapore Management University. Her research focuses on strategic and organizational issues related to information technologies and capabilities. Anandhi can be reached at ab@bus.emory.edu.V SambamurthyV. Sambamurthy is the Eli Broad Professor of Information Technology at the Eli Broad Graduate School of Management at Michigan State University. He is also the Executive Director of the Center for Leadership of the Digital Enterprise. He can be reached at smurthy@msu.edu.