Strategic agility-driven business model renewal: the case of an SME

The purpose of this paper is twofold: to connect strategic agility and business model (BM) innovation, and to explore how capabilities underlying strategic agility fit the SME context.

Qualitative in approach, the paper develops a longitudinal, in-depth, single case study focussing on how BM renewal occurs in the dynamic and increasingly important sector of temporary work agencies.

The findings suggest a partial fit of the existing strategic agility framework for SMEs. Two of the proposed meta-capabilities (leadership unity and resource fluidity) seem inherent to SMEs because they apply easily to this context, although they need to be downscaled. One meta-capability (strategic sensitivity) is less natural and therefore more critical for an SME. An additional meta-capability (resourcefulness) arises as very important for SMEs to be able to overcome some of their size-caused limitations.

The contribution is limited by using a single case study from a specific sector and should be considered as exploratory and theory-grounding research in the field of SMEs’ strategic agility and BM renewal.

The originality of this paper is that it looks at the SME context in an industry with intensive change and dynamism, which is ideal for illustrating the objective. The authors contribute a model of strategic agility for SMEs.