The 2018 world agility recognitions have been announced by the World Agility Forum. Next to regional recognitions for companies in Europe, Africa, and America, there are also recognitions for creativity agility, agile in defense, team agility, personal agility, and lifetime agility.
The purpose of the World Agility Forum (WAF) is to recognize organizations and individuals for their effort, commitment and dedication to achieving agility.
The world agility recognitions were announced during the gala dinner of the World Agility Forum on October 1, 2018, held in Lisbon, Portugal. The following companies and individuals have received a world agility 2018 award:
| Category | Company or Individual |
| Personal Agility | Paulo Rosado from OutSystems, Tiago Paiva from Talkdesk, and Steve Denning, Forbes Columnist |
| Creativity Agility | Gapingvoid Culture Design Group |
| European Agility | EDP, NXP Semiconductors, WeDo Technologies |
| American Agility | Toyota Connected North America, Scrum Alliance, and Amazon Web Services |
| African Agility | Sterling Bank Plc |
| Team Agility | AGLX Consulting |
| Agile in Defense | US Navy EODMU2 |
| Lifetime Agility | Chet Hendrickson and Ron Jeffries |
Nominees submitted to the forum have been evaluated by a council of agile experts on key themes in the agile world such as: collaboration between teams, permanent retrospectives, continuous learning and impediment removal, a flow of knowledge and information, strong relation with identity and the constant search for delivery.
InfoQ spoke with Hugo Lourenço, founder of the World Agility Forum.
InfoQ: What made you decide to establish the World Agility Forum?
Hugo Lourenço: Agility in organizations and in individuals is a key factor in a VUCA world. The greater the agility, the easier it is to find solutions in times of crisis and uncertainty. I started WAF as a remarkable way to help strengthen this mindset, especially for those working hard and struggling to become agile every day.
InfoQ: Why do we need a recognition for excellence in agility? What purpose does it serve?
Lourenço: Diversity and agility are differentiating features that organizations all around the world are looking for in order to stay in business. An international recognition of this effort is a great way to urge organizations and people to promote and spread the different mindset of Agile.
InfoQ: How did you come up with the different categories?
Lourenço: Geographic awards are a recognition that each geographic context are differentiators and we can’t use "the same weight" for all, although the goals are the same. Creativity and team awards are natural extensions to agile, generating diversity, innovation, and uniqueness. People in teams need to practice agility on a daily basis, thus a personal agility award is a fundamental leading figure for achieving results. Agility in defense award is a recognition we want to make to the military because they were pioneers in this field. Lifetime award is also a tribute to those who were involved in the agile manifesto without which, our work would be meaningless.
InfoQ: What does the world agility recognition stand for?
Lourenço: It is a responsibility that both organizations and individuals will carry "on their shoulders" in the following days and months, and it works as a lighthouse for stakeholders, managers, leaders, teams, and individuals. Agility is not a pit stop on a normal busy day, but a challenge everyone will face. This is "Second Wave of Agile" like Michael Sahota considered it in 2017.
InfoQ: After having announced the recognitions, what is next?
Lourenço: For nominees, we hope they continue their agility journey with an additional "boost", to look for inspiration and "transpiration" to offer us new great stories to tell. For the WAF organization, the challenge will be even greater; we expect that more and more companies and individuals will share their stories as nominees. Creating a broader awareness of the WAF is a purpose and will be our great challenge. We are in advanced conversations with several agencies and organizations about where this will lead us, and in 2019 we might go to New York City!
The gala dinner where the winners were announced was held in conjunction with the eXperience Agile 2018 event (formerly Scrumday Portugal). InfoQ is covering the first eXperience Agile conference & DevOps Forum with Q&As, summaries, and publishes articles provided by the speakers and organizers.