Building Flexible Organizations for Fast-moving Markets

By considering flexibility as a valuable strategic option in turbulent environments, this article distinguishes four types of effective response to strategic change. From this typology different trajectories of revitalization are derived. On the basis of this typology, the article describes a method for diagnosing organizational flexibility and guiding the transition process, the Flexibility Audit & Redesign (FAR) method. This method was applied successfully within the Dutch Postbank NV, Philips Semiconductors and the Dutch National Gas Corporation. The findings suggest that a viable corporation has to oscillate between ‘planned’ and ‘flexible’ forms. In this process of change, the corporation has to prevent itself from overshooting and becoming extremely rigid or chaotic.