Learning Agility: Many Questions, a Few Answers, and a Path Forward

This article responds to and extends the commentaries offered in response to our focal article on learning agility. After summarizing the basic themes in the commentaries, we use this response to clarify points that were unclear in our original article and push back on certain points raised in a few of the responses. In particular, we reframe the rigor–relevance debate from an ‘‘either–or’’ to a ‘‘both–and’’ discussion, clarify the relationship between learning agility and ability to learn, explain how learning agility in organizations moves beyond cognition, and describe how exchanges such as the one we have collectively engaged in here are central to progressing the scientific study on learning agility and its effective use in practice. We sincerely appreciate the responders’ thoughtful and stimulating remarks in response to our focal article on the conceptual clarity and theoretical grounding of the learning agility construct (DeRue, Ashford, & Myers, 2012). As a collection, the commentaries highlight important gaps in our model of learning agility and surface important questions that need to be addressed as the scientific study on learning agility and its use in practice move forward. Although we might have to agree to disagree on certain issues, we are truly encouraged by the quality of discourse and thank everyone involved in the exchange. Some of the commentaries offer provocative extensions to our conceptualization of learning agility. For example, Mitchinson, Gerard, Roloff, and Burke (2012) emphasize a need to clarify ‘‘learning’’ as much as the need to clarify ‘‘agility.’’ Carette and Anseel (2012) situate epistemic motivation as an underlying psychological mechanism Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to D. Scott DeRue. E-mail: [email protected] Address: Stephen M. Ross School of Business, University of Michigan, 701 Tappan Street, Ann Arbor, MI 48109 of agile learning. Johnson and Scott (2012) introduce action identification as an additional cognitive mechanism that underlies and facilitates learning agility. Vandewalle (2012) submits implicit person theory as an additional antecedent to learning agility. Finally, Beck (2012) challenges us to consider the interand intrapersonal aspects of learning agility by looking at within and between variance in learning agility over time. All these commentaries extend our conceptualization and theory of learning agility in important ways, and future research should incorporate these insights to develop a more comprehensive theory of