Enterprise Systems and Organizational Agility: A Review of the Literature and Conceptual Framework <s> Environmental Dynamism <s> Seeks to present a better understanding of dynamic capabilities and the resource-based view of the firm. Dynamic capabilities are considered to be the "organizational and strategic routines by which firms achieve new resource configurations." Dynamic capabilities are identifiable and specific routines that can serve different purposes, including integrating resources, reconfiguring resources within firms, and guiding the gain and release of resources. Various examples such as the product development process and alliancing, are discussed. Commonalities related to effective dynamic capabilities can be seen across firms though this does not mean that these capabilities are exactly alike. The dynamism of the market can impact the sustainability of the dynamic capabilities and the causal ambiguity of these capabilities. Moderately dynamic markets see robust, grooved routine, while high velocity markets experience simple rules and real-knowledge creation. The evolution of these dynamic capabilities within a firm are unique but the firm's individual path is shaped by well-known learning mechanisms. Competitive advantage does not lie in the dynamic capabilities themselves but rather in the resource configurations that managers build using these dynamic capabilities. (SRD) <s> BIB001 </s> Enterprise Systems and Organizational Agility: A Review of the Literature and Conceptual Framework <s> Environmental Dynamism <s> Agility is vital to the innovation and competitive performance of firms in contemporary business environments. Firms are increasingly relying on information technologies, including process, knowledge, and communication technologies, to enhance their agility. The purpose of this paper is to broaden understanding about the strategic role of IT by examining the nomological network of influences through which IT impacts firm performance. By drawing upon recent thinking in the strategy, entrepreneurship, and IT management literatures, this paper uses a multitheoretic lens to argue that information technology investments and capabilities influence firm performance through three significant organizational capabilities (agility, digital options, and entrepreneurial alertness) and strategic processes (capability-building, entrepreneurial action, and coevolutionary adaptation). We also propose that these dynamic capabilities and strategic processes impact the ability of firms to launch many and varied competitive actions and that, in turn, these competitive actions are a significant antecedent of firm performance. Through our theorizing, we draw attention to a significant and reframed role of IT as a digital options generator in contemporary firms. <s> BIB002 </s> Enterprise Systems and Organizational Agility: A Review of the Literature and Conceptual Framework <s> Environmental Dynamism <s> This 4-year study examines the effect of strategic decision speed upon subsequent firm performance and identifies environmental and organizational characteristics that relate to decision speed. We draw upon strategic decision-making theory and organization theory to propose that strategic decision speed mediates the relation between environmental and organizational characteristics and performance. Measures of business environment, organization structure, strategic decision speed, and firm performance (growth and profitability) were collected from 318 CEOs from 1996 to 2000. Structural equation modeling confirmed that fast strategic decision-making predicts subsequent firm growth and profit and mediates the relation of dynamism, munificence, centralization, and formalization with firm performance. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. <s> BIB003 </s> Enterprise Systems and Organizational Agility: A Review of the Literature and Conceptual Framework <s> Environmental Dynamism <s> Recent innovations in utility computing, web services, and service-oriented architectures, combined with a growing array of IT skills, have improved firms' ability to be more agile in responding to change. Using the resource-based view of the firm, prior research suggests that IT resources, in isolation, are unlikely to yield superior performance and so as firms try to boost their agility, the question becomes how to configure IT resources to prepare for, or react to, change. In this paper, we posit that managerial IT capabilities based on IT-business partnerships, strategic planning, and ex-post IT project analysis lead to the development of technical IT capabilities associated with a flexible IT infrastructure which in turn drives agility or a firm's ability to react to change in its products and markets. Using data from matched surveys of IT and business executives in 241 firms, we find that managerial and technical capabilities affect agility. In further testing, we reveal that in a stable setting, technical IT capabilities are more important to agility than managerial IT capabilities, while in a dynamic setting, the opposite is true. Thus, for firms operating in volatile markets, effective models of managerial IT governance are essential for delivering superior agility or adaptiveness. <s> BIB004
The proposed framework has one boundary condition, that is, the impact of environmental dynamism factors such as competitiveness and complexity of the environment BIB002 ]. The dynamism factors can influence the level of agility required in an organization (i.e., organization operating in stable industry with predictable changes will require different levels of agility to those who operate in a fast changing environment) BIB004 . The impact of market-sensing activities on organizational performance vary with the degree of market turbulence BIB001 , while environmental dynamism also significantly requires faster strategic decisionmaking speed, thus higher responsive capabilities BIB003 . Organizations operating in turbulent environments face higher uncertainty, thus need to process information more rapidly than organizations that operate in more stable business surroundings. Enterprise systems centrally manage information flows within an organization and across the organization and its business partners. Therefore, we propose that the extent of environmental dynamism serves as a control variable on how ES can be used to achieve agility: 