Julian Birkinshaw on the ageing of Porter's Models

In times of an increasing rate of change and/uncertainty, organisations are being challenged to move with times - as a result the planning horizons are becoming shorter and shorter and organisations need to be more agile/flexible to adapt to the changes as they emerge. Some of the key elements to this agility are the need for a clear, specific and well-communicated vision to ensure that all employees know where the organisation is going, while ensuring that the organisation is also clear on what it is good at (call it core competence if you wish). In addition, it is incumbent on the leadership to provide clear "rules of engagement" - of how to ensure that the organisation makes it own future in the ever changing competitive landscape.

Armed with the clear view of the future and knowledge of the organisation's core competence and the "rules of engagement", a licence to be flexible/"free"/adaptive should be granted to employees to react/respond to the emerging opportunities and challenges to ensure continued competitiveness.

The speaker espouses a more rapid, flexible (but not necessarily less structured) approach to strategy development and implementation - as opposed to the more rigorous, long planning cycle approach harking from the Porter approach.

Interesting viewpoint - the challenge though does remain the "governance" of this more flexible/adaptive approach to ensure that the organisation remains on track to achieve its cast vision.