2537 The Effect of IT on Organizational Agility Kamran Yeganegi Industrial Engineering Department Islamic Azad University, Zanjan Branch Zanjan, Iran Mohammad Saber Zahiri Azar Department of Industrial Engineering Payame Noor University, Zanjan Branch Zanjan, Iran Abstract In the unpredictable and competitive world of today the organizations must have different competitive features to compete, otherwise they will move towards annihilation. One of these features that organizations need in turbulent environments is agility. Agility provides the organization with the possibility of quick response and compatibility with environment and allows the organization to improve its efficiency. The organization is affected by a variety of features. One of which is the information technology (IT) that has effects not only on the organization, but also on its features. This essay attempts to study the effect of IT on agility and its different aspects. Keywords Agility, organizational agility, information technology, the effect of information technology on organizational agility 1. Introduction In recent years organizations have been after features to compete with one another. Since the environment around organizations is changing constantly, the agility feature which is one of the most efficient features of environments of this kind has become the centre of attention in a way that has resulted in the division of organizations to the two types of agile and traditional. Agility is the result of the combination of several features and in fact an organization that owns the features of flexibility, speed and compatibility is known as an agile organization. Information technology is one of the most effective factors affecting the organizations and the environments. We can firmly state that IT has effects on all components and features of an organization. In the following part we study the effect of IT on organizational agility. 2. Study of Literature 1.2 History of organizational agility The history of agility dates back to the U.S. industry downturn. With regard to the U.S. industry downturn and the disappearance of compatibility in the 1980s that was well documented, in the 1990 the U.S. Congress decided to take necessary measures in this regard. In conclusion, the congress ordered the Department of Defense to establish an agent and to investigate the U.S. manufacturing industries with the aim of making them more competitive. In fact by observing that the rate of changes in business environment is higher than the rate of compatibility with environment, a group of experts and scientists on the behalf of the Department of Defense in the University of Lehigh in the United of Pennsylvania gathered together to investigate the U.S. manufacturing industries with the aim that which systems and strategies will be successful in the industry. The result of their efforts was a two-volume report under the title of “the strategy of manufacturing firms of the 21 st century”, which was published in the fall of 1991 by the Yakuka Institute in Lehigh University. The “agility” name was also assigned to it at the same time. Later in the 1995, the results of these researches were published in Steven Goldman and Nigel’s book and the press under the title of the “Nimble competitors and virtual organizations” [15]. Proceedings of the 2012 International Conference on Industrial Engineering and Operations Management Istanbul, Turkey, July 3 – 6, 2012