Critical Constraints: Operational Agility, When Speed Matters
Why great marketing ideas keep dying in execution, and how to build an organization that can actually move.
[This post is helpful reading on its own, so feel free to read on, however it's intended for anyone who completed the Disruption-Fluency Self-Assessment. I encourage you to start there.]
If your Disruption Fluency Assessment identified Operational Agility as your lowest-scoring dimension, your organization faces a fundamental execution problem: you may know what needs to change, but you can't change fast enough to capitalize on it.
Organizations weak in Operational Agility exhibit a frustrating pattern: good ideas die in implementation. Opportunities spotted early are captured by faster competitors. By the time campaigns launch, the moment has passed. Teams work hard but output feels disconnected from impact.
This isn't about working harder. It's about how work flows through your organization, and right now, something is systematically blocking that flow.
What Operational Agility Actually Means
In the Disruption-Fluent Marketing framework, Operational Agility is defined as "the organization's ability to move from insight to action quickly, reallocate resources fluidly, and work iteratively and flexibly." It comprises four components:
