- Agility: Agility or nimbleness is an ability to change the body’s position efficiently, and requires the integration of isolated movement skills using a combination of balance, coordination, speed, reflexes, strength and endurance.
Organisational Agility: The ability of an organisation to renew itself, adapt, change quickly, and succeed in a rapidly changing, ambiguous, turbulent environment.
There is no doubt that the world is in a state of flux. Environmental changes, the growth of digital technologies and capacities, new industries and the breaking down of barriers and borders (except when COVID hits).
What does an agile organisation look like?
It offers:
- Strong shared vision and purpose
- A willingness to seize opportunities to improve performance
- Shared and servant leadership ethos
- Strong governance
- Active partnerships in its community
- An engaging physical environment
- A performance orientation
- Staff who model continuous learning
- Action-oriented decision-making
- A cohesive community
- Ability to adapt to new technologies.
“Agile organisations view change as an opportunity, not a threat.”
St Columba aims to be an agile organisation.
Schools, like all other organisations, need to develop the agility to deal with rapid changes if they are to be able to serve their communities and prepare students for a successful future.
We need to be able to adapt and deal with:
- Constant and sudden changes in the education, business and physical environment;
- New “disruptive” digital technologies and their uses;
- The rapid and often dangerous spread of information and disinformation on digital platforms;
- The fact that our graduates need to be able to compete internationally for university places and employment positions.
While this might sound scary and make people feel that there is no certainty in a world of constant change, it does not have to be so.
Truly agile organisations, like St Columba, know that to be able to weather the storms of change and stay strong, they must have solid foundations.
With our clear vision and values, adherence to the value of foundational literacy and numeracy and capacity to provide a safe and welcoming environment for our students, we believe we have the foundations that will allow our school to not only deal with the changes the world throws at us but to emerge stronger after each challenge.
“Success today requires the agility and drive to constantly rethink, reinvigorate, react, and reinvent.”
That’s us!
