“Agile” has become the mantra for the digital age. If you don’t move fast, so the thinking goes, you can never be any good, because your competitors will get there first and you’ll be left in the dust. In many circles, this notion has become so well established that no one even thinks to question it anymore.
While agility is a good thing for any organization, innovation is never a single event. For example, while Alexander Fleming discovered penicillin in 1928, it didn’t arrive on the market until 1945 — nearly 20 years later — and that span was shortened because of massive help from the US government.
