Digital-enabled strategic agility: it's time we examine the sensing of weak signals

Information Systems research provides significant insight into how information technologies affect the strategic agility of firms. Most research to date has studied the responding element of agility at the expense of sensing. Further, extant research has mainly focused on how the sensing of formal and strong signals might influence agility. With the highly turbulent and fast-changing competitive landscape of the digital age, we argue for the need to expand the focus of this research to include examining how managers identify and make sense of weak signals, and how the sensing of weak signals influences digital-enabled strategic agility. Drawing on social network theory, this paper presents two streams of research and several research avenues that can stimulate and potentially guide research efforts on this topic.

Automated summary

This paper argues for expanding the focus of Information Systems research to include the study of sensing agility in addition to responding agility. It highlights the need to examine how managers identify and make sense of weak signals and how this influences digital-enabled strategic agility. Drawing on social network theory, the paper presents two research streams and several research avenues to stimulate and guide further research efforts on this topic.