- Introduction to Scenario Learning: Guest Post Series with Michael Barr
- Auftragstaktik in One Simple Diagram by Chet Richards
- "Leaders Are Teachers": Great Insights on Leadership and Developing Your People from The Mentorship Forum
- Great Review Over at the The Mentorship Forum of My Favorite Resource on Developing Adaptability "Raising The Bar"
- Rethinking the Traditional Teacher-Student Relationship in Conflicts
- Command and Control During a Disaster: Podcast
- The Evolving Warfighter Sits Down with Don Vandergriff and Talks Mission Command
- Developing and Preparing Cops for the Adaptive Challenges of The Street: Instructors Roundtable Podcast Episode
- Unreflective Speed of Action...Do You Think Its Time Policing Reflects on the Tactical Influence of Time?
- Break It Down Show Podcast: Don Vandergriff - Mission Command, Trusting Your People, To Win
- I See You...Back Up! On The Call to Win in Crisis and in the Aftermath to Win in Life
- Technological Negation of Human Sexual Dimorphism: A Guest Post by Franklin C. Annis, EdD
- Guest Post Home Security Guide from Bank Rate
- Commonwealth Police Legacy Program of Instruction: Sound Decision Making for Cops
- Outstanding In Your Face and Much Needed Book Policing and It's Leaders Can Learn From
- THE TRUTH BEHIND RACIAL DISPARITIES IN FATAL POLICE SHOOTINGS: Great Research Every Cop and Every Citizen Should Read.
- Thought on Discipline: A Great Podcast Series from All Marine Radio, Every Police Leader Should Listen To
- Gary Klein – Cognitive Psychologist, Studies Decision Making in Crisis on The Break It Down Show..Outstanding Episode
- Tactical Decision Making Facilitation Guide Maj McBreen: The Lessons Transfer to Police Instruction as Well
- 4th Generation Warfare Interview and Yes There Are Lessons for Policing
- Keys to Training Excellence: Evidence Based Research Policing Can Use
- Adopting Mission Command: Developing Leaders for a Superior Command Culture by Don Vandergriff
- Lead Yourself First: Inspiring Leadership Through Solitude: Book Review
- PODCAST: Tactical Decision Games with Bruce Gudmundsson and Don Vandergriff
- Podcast: Human Factors and Officer-Involved Shootings
- Donald Robertson - Stoicism and Thinking Like a Roman Emperor
- Dr John Sullivan and MAJ John Spencer - The Complexity of Modern Urban War
- Great Podcast: The Courageous Police Leader – Combating Cowards, Chaos, and Lies
- Recommended Reading: Range: Why Generalists Triumph in a Specialized World
- Another Approach to Tactics Guest Post by Bert DuVernay
- LYNCH & KENNEY: react to clips of LtGen Van Riper’s “On Discipline” interview on All Marine Radio
- Outstanding Interview: ON DISCIPLINE: LtGen Paul K. Van Riper, USMC (ret)
- The Learning Insurgency: It’s an Evolution, not a Revolution By Donald E. Vandergriff
- On Policing a Free Society Episode 3: Toxic Bosses
- On Policing a Free Society Episode 2: Repairing Dysfunction in Police Organizations
- On Policing a Free Society Podcast: Episode 1 Dysfunctional Organizations and Their Impact On Response
- On Policing a Free Society with Fred Leland A New Podcast Coming in 2019
- Making Police Training Stick...and Learning How to Learn
- A New Conception of War: John Boyd The U.S. Marines and Maneuver Warfare
- Utilizing The Case Method: Some articles by Bruce Gudmundsson to Help Shed Some Light on How Too
- Use of Force Policy: Dispelling the Myths by Lexipol
- How to Make a Small Unit Decision Forcing Cases by Bruce Gudmundsson
- Facilitating Learning a Hybrid Of Methods to Effective Police Officer Development
- Why The OODA Loop Is Forever By Dan Grazier
- 15 Tips to Remember when Promoting a Growth Mindset in the Classroom: A Guest Post from USA Test Prep
- New Edition of Boyd’s Discourse on Winning and Losing by Grant Hammond
- My Book Review: On Tactics by B. A. Friedman
- Of Garbage Cans and Paradox: Reflexively Reviewing Design, Mission Command, and the Gray Zone:
- On Tactics: An Interview with B.A. Friedman
- Podcast Part 2 from Professional Military Education: John Boyd, Maneuver Warfare, and Marine Corps Doctrinal Publication-1
- Podcast from Professional Military Education: John Boyd, Maneuver Warfare, and Marine Corps Doctrinal Publication-1
- Walk,Sacrafice, Work ...Always Hungry Never Satified! What it Takes to Fight Complacency
- The Ten Deadly Errors, Plus...Failure to Learn, Failure to Anticipate and Failure to Adapt
- Turning Tragedy into Victory...We Must Start APPLYING LESSONS LEARNED
- Police Responses Demands Constant and Repeated Action...Throughout the Tactical Encounter
- All Police Actions Take Place in an Atmosphere of Uncertainty
- Adapt or Die: The Call for Police Reform...Is It Reasonable or Necessary?
- Force Science Assesses Proposed “Necessary” Deadly Force Standard
- Special Tactics Online Course Intro
- LESC is Honored to be Part of Special Tactics New Online Training Academy and Full-Featured, Professional Networking Site
- Leading Discussions and Facilitating Better Training Outcomes
- Police Leaders Mentoring and Coaching Their People: the Cornerstone to Top Performance in Crises
- Research: Adaptive Skill as the Conditio Sine Qua Non of Expertise
- Developing Adaptive Expertise: A Synthesis of Literature and Implications for Training
- How the Germans Defined Auftragstaktik: What Mission Command is - AND - is Not by Don Vandergriff
- Avioding Hostilities is the Goal But Sometimes to Gain The Advantage Reasonable Force Must Be Used
- Navigating Chaos: How to Find Certainty in Uncertain Situations
- The Protector Ethic: Morality, Virtue, and Ethics in the Martial Way
- Police Ethos:The Warrior and Guardian Mindset Are They Not One In the Same?
- Neighborhood Watch is Homeland Security at the Most Local Level
- Developing Police Sergeants: Getting the Outcomes and Measures of Effectiveness Right
- Col John Boyd's Patterns of Conflict Expanded to Policing Part 3: Disrupting an Adversary Using Soft and Hard Tactics
- Col John Boyd's Patterns of Conflict Expanded to Policing Part 2: Don't Just Be a Reactor..Be a Shaper Too!
- Col John Boyd's Patterns of Conflict Expanded to Policing Part 1
- Smart Tactics Takes Thinking Police Leaders...Leading Thinking Cops
- Wrestling With Delayed and Immediate Entry, Solo and Team Tactics...Are We Really Expecting All to Go as Rehersed?
- Guardian Joe: How Less Force Helps The Warrior
- Making It Safer: A Study of Law Enforement Fatalities Between 2010-2016
- Professional Reading and Development: It Doesn’t Give All the Answers, But It Lights What Is Often a Uncertain Path Ahead
- What Are The Force Multipliers That Allow Police Organizations to Operate at Rapid OODA Loop Tempos?
- Why Frontline Employees Should Make All Decisions:Lessons Police Can Learn From The Corporate Rebels
- What was Boyd Thinking and...What Can Policing Learn From It?
- Proper Mindset, Situational Awareness, Skill Proficiency and Physical Fitness: Force Multipliers of Great Value to Police
- Recognizing The Signs and Signals That Lead To Violent Acts At Our Schools and Making Collaborative Efforts to Prevent Them
- Adaptive Leader Program: Developing Thinking Leaders Who Lead Thinking Officers
- What Are Mission-Type Orders and How Do They Influence a More Effective Crisis Response?
- Tactics Are They More High Diddle, Diddle Straight Up the Middle the Devil Be Damned or Maneuver and Boyd Cycling an Adversary?
- There Are No School Solutions, Formulas or Recipes to School Shootings, so How Can We Develop Better Courses of Action?
- Great Break It Down Show Focus on School Shootings
- Developing Critically Needed Leadership: A Podcast on Mission Command Building Trust and Cohesion
- Powerful Facilitation: Two Critical Approaches
- Powerful Facilitation: Three Critical Competencies
- STARTING AND GROWING A NEIGHBORHOOD WATCH
- Adaptive Action: Leveraging Uncertainty In Your Organization a Book Review
- The Case Method In Developing Police: "Cold Calling" Will Have to Be Unambiguous
- The Biggest Obstacle to Tactical Progress… and How to Beat It
- Pete’s Combat Wish List Pt 2: Mental Models, Mistakes, Reflection and Learning on the Fly
- Pete’s Wish List for Combat Warriors. Perhaps Some Lessons for Poliicng as Well?
- What Affect Does the Human Dimension and Human Bias Have on Policing?
- What virtues are the most essential for a warrior to live by in order to prepare for, protect against and prevent violence?
- Exploring Criminal Justice Careers Check Out the Community for Accredited Online Schools
- A Great Break It Down Show Podcast on Interview and Interrogation: A Candid Straight Up Discussion
- Experiential Learning a Big Part of The New Recruit Officer Course In Massachusetts: Looks Promising!
- Run Out and Buy: Anatomy of a Warrior: The 7 Virtues All Warriors Must Live by to Successfully Protect and Serve
- Devising Solutions to Complex Police Problems: How Can We Get Better?
- Podcast with the Break It Down Show A Candid Discussion on Policing a Free Society, Mission Command and More
- Understanding Problems Range in Complexity and Designing Police Operations
- When it comes to Police Training, When is Good Enough, Not Good Enough?
- On The Job Training and Deliberately Framing Experience
- Police Officer Discretion…and Focusing Our Efforts on Better Outcomes
- Strength of Character: The Foundation of Working Together and Getting Things Done
- A free chapter from our new book now available on Amazon
- A Major Problem We Must Confront as Police Trainers and Students: How To Improve Performance?
- MISSION COMMAND THE WHO, WHAT, WHERE, WHEN AND WHY An Anthology
- Conflict and Crisis are Full of Friction: The Force That Makes the Apparently Easy so Difficult
- PODCAST: Don Vandergriff on Military Personnel Reform: The Ideas Discussed Can (SHOULD) be Adapted to Policing As Well!
- Fire Nobody! by Dave Smith
- Teaching United States Marine Instructors New Tricks: Developing Adaptability Through Experiential Learning
- The Why was born out of pain
- Inspiring People to Lifelong Learning & Impacting Their Ability to Make Sound Decisions
- We Can't Just Use the Same Mental Recipes Over and Over Again: In Police Training We Must Challenge The Prevailing Mindset
- Reflection Leads to Deeper Learning...Put Each Day Up For Review
- We Must Train and Educate Within an Uncertain Environment to Prepare to Adapt
- Defining Policing 's Training & Education Challenge...Some Ideas On Achieving High Levels of Professionalism
- Defensive Tactics for Today's Law Enforcement
- Uploading John Boyd: The Legend Delivering His Opus is Online...and is as Relevant as Ever
- Make Many Mistakes and Learn
- Is Your Purpose in Life Based on Self Awareness and Strength of Character or Are You Just Following the Crowd?
- An Officer’s Principal Weapon is His Mind: Professional Development In Policing
- Outstanding Manual: Law Enforcement Close Quarter Battle: Urban Tactics for Individuals, Teams and Tactical Units
- The Art of Police Training is the Ability to Move Officers Through the Fog and Complexity of Human Interaction
- Brian Willis Interviews Yours Truly on Teaching Adaptive Leadership
- The Police Leader's True Work: Train Them, Trust Them, Let Them Do Their Job
- Sir William Slim on His Leadership Motto: No Details, No Paper, And No Regrets
- The Grid: Is There Better Ways to Approach Police Interactions?
- Teaching Officers How to Think verses Telling Them What To Think
- Develop a Philosophy and Understanding of Crime Fighting and Problem Solving That Considers Complexities of Policing
- Unwarranted: Policing Without Permission Book Review
- Thinking Leaders, Leading Thinking People is the Adaptive Leaders Focus
- Take Policing From a Training Culture to a Learning Culture
- Are You Serving Those You Lead?
- Vehicle Stops Strategies and Tactics: Being Safe and Effective Is About Options, Not Best Practices
- Teaching Adaptability and Making Marines More Effective Trainers
- Break It Down Show Podcast: Better Understanding Policing and Why it Matters
- The Last 100 Yards Series: High Diddle, Diddle Straight Up the Middle or Maneuver: How Are Your Tactics, Officer?
- Police officers I beg you to please run out and buy this book! What a great tactical resource!
- Second Episode in This Podcast Series with Complete Emergency Managment: Leadership in Public Safety
- Podcast: I sit down with George Whitney of Complete EM and discuss: Active Shooters and After Actions
- Sir Robert Peels, Nine Key Principles of Policing: Fair and Impartial Policing Defined Back In 1829!
- Herman Goldstein, Fundamental Objectives of Policing: Are They Relevant Today? I Say Yes!
- Shaping and Adapting: Using the Environment (The Last Hundred Yards) To Unlock the Power of Colonel John Boyd’s OODA Loop
- Informative Fair and Impartial Podcast: Do the legal rules for using deadly force, still make sense?
- Crisis Intervention Teams & Police Interactions with People with Mental Illness: Evolving Tactics That Make a Difference
- How Does The Last Hundred Yards, Enhance Tactical Responses to Crises?
- Complacency and False Sense of Urgency: Why We Fail to Take Advantage of The Last Hundred Yards?
- The Last Hundred Yards: Operate On Blind Luck or Win Consistently?
- My Good Friend Coach Kevin Kearns talks with 5th & 6th graders about Vision
- Keeping The Peace in a Free Society Let Us Not Forget Why We Do What We Do
- How Do We Better Assess and Grade Decision Making and Adaptability in Those We Train?
- Types of Cases
- Report: Deadly Calls And Fatal Encounters
- Developing Individuals with the Ability to Work Together Solving Real World Problems
- Five-Year Study of Police Officer Deaths: RoboCops or Guardians?
- The role of humility in the Socratic method by Bruce Ivar Gudmundsson
- Keeping the Peace
- Experiential Learning Defined
- How We Learn Versus How We Think We Learn
- Reducing Violence is About Not Grabbing a Gun
- Boston PD & Boston Red Sox: Full Scale Complex Operating Environment Training Exercise
- Scouts in Contact Tactical Vignettes for Cavalry Leaders A Book of Tactical Decison Exercises for Cavalry Leaders
- What is the Mission and Intent of Policing a Free Society?
- Sound of Silence A Tribute to Policing and All Those Who Serve The Homeland
- Problem-Oriented Policing: Where Social Work Meets Law Enforcement
- Thoughts on Policing a Free Society: Altering Public Expectations
- Thoughts on Policing a Free Society: Rethinking Widely Held Assumptions Regarding Police Fuction
- Thoughts on Policing a Free Society: Our Failure to Concern Ourselves...
- Thoughts on Policing a Free Society
- Simon Sinek: Why Leaders Eat Last
- 8 Tips to Keep Your Home Wireless Network Secure From Hackers: a guest post from Wichly Cazeau
- John Boyd's Patterns of Conflict Part 3
- Engaging The Community and Making Meaningful and Lasting Change
- The Pre-Class Preparation Pyramid By Bruce Ivar Gudmundsson
- We All Lose When it's Us Verses Them!
- Facilatating The Adaptive Leader Program at The Army ROTC Leadership Conference at Harvard University
- A Break It Down Show Pod Cast: Paying Criminal Not to Commit Crimes or is There Something More to The Story?
- Harvard ROTC Leadership Conference
- A Discourse on Policing a Free Society
- We Made the Mandatory Reading for the US Army MPs
- Patterns of Conflict Pt 2
- Hand in Hand Project, a new initiative promoting dialogue and interaction between local police officers and young people
- How May We…Rebuild the Bridge Between The People and The Police?
- Why Adaptability Trumps Hierarchy?
- Military Reform Through Education: From The Straus Military Reform Project, Something We In Policing Can Learn From
- In Building Trust, Actions…Speak Louder Than Words!
- Somewhere Along the Way
- Taking It Personally
- The Facts of the Case By Bruce Ivar Gudmundsson
- J.J. DID TIE BUCKLE Traits I live By
- On Fitness: Learn from my weakness, my mistakes, and my bad habits
- Don’t Do It Alone: Developing a Shared Sense of Destiny Requires We’re all on the Same Sheet of Music
- Recommended Reading List From The California Association of Tactical Officers
- Values For A New Millennium: A Book That Will Help Bridge the Gap Between People and The Police
- Teaching Adaptability…and Firearms Training
- Simon Sinek: Why Reciprocity Improves Mentor Mentee Relationships
- Felix Nader Discusses The Value of Workplace Violence Prevention
- Breaking Down Police Work and How To Win at Low Cost: Part 2 Podcast Break It Down Show
- Boyd: Adapting Isn't Good Enough
- Simon Sinek on the responsibility that leaders have to create environments where people are more productive,and inspired
- The Hunting Story - the meaning of human equality
- Ethical Warriors with Jack Hoban
- Emotional Intelligence: Re-Thinking Police Community Relations by Mark Bond
- Approaching LE with the 'What's important now?' perspective
- Staying in control when a suspect is aggressive
- 10 Overlooked Truths About Taking Action
- Warriors vs. Praetorian Guard – Which Mindset Fits You Best? By Mike Ox
- ITOA News: Articles By John Farnam, Patrick Van Horne, Jeff Chudwin, Don Vandergriff, Yours Truly and More
- The importance of mindset in policing with Chip Huth
- A Discussion on Police Work and How to Win At Low Cost, Connecting The People and Police Gap
- Be Passionate, Back Up and Empower Your People, and You Will Get The Culture Right
- Why Are Shared Visions So Important?
- Technical Skill as a Component of Creativity by Bruce I. Gudmundsson
- I Am Spartacus…No I Am Spartacus: Is Your Police Organization United?
- The Demand For Autodidacts – The Self-Taught in an Age of Shrinking Budgets by Patrick Van Horne
- It’s How You Say What You Saw by Patrick Van Horne
- The Path of Don Vandergriff: A Discussion On Leadership, Learning organizations and Adaptability
- The Newhall Incident: Failure, Adaptation and Success…Or Lost Opportunity? Published in the latest ITOA News
- NYPD’s New Strategy for Dealing with Stressful Interactions, Absurd or Realistic?
- The Mind Can Be Convinced But The Heart Must Be Won
- Imagine a Police Culture Where People Wake Up Every Day Inspired to Go to Work
- Open Letter to President's Task Force on Policing by Louis Hayes
- The Blame Game: Who @#$%ed This Up?
- Breaking Down the Stranglehold of Formality
- Boyd and Beyond: From Marine Corps University to FBI National Academy Boyd' Ideas are Expanding
- From The Art of Manliness: John Boyd’s Roll Call: Do You Want to Be Someone or Do Something?
- Pamela Meyer: How to spot a liar
- The Case Method Increasing the Efficiency and Effectiveness of Marine Education by Captain Paul Tremblay Jr USMC
- Simon Sinek: If You Don't Understand People, You Don't Understand...
- Using Official Histories as Quarries for Case Materials By Bruce I. Gudmundsson
- Left of Bang By Patrick Van Horne and Jason Riley
- The Most Dangerous Weapon in Law Enforcement by Brian Willis
- Sizing Up Situations Is A Skill, We Need To Develop
- Change the Culture If I could Only Change One Thing by Don Vandergriff
- The Five Learning Disciplines
- Using Complete Stories in Decision Forcing Cases by Dr. Bruce I. Gudmundsson
- Newhall Shooting: A Tactical Analysis
- Tactical Decision Games, Obscure Information and Generating New Ways to Thrive in the Climate of Chaos and Uncertainty
- Calling on Cops in Class: An Anecdote for Developing Character, Confidence and Sound Tactical Decision Makers
- Solving Tactical Dilemmas with Indirect Experience (Education & Training) and White Castle Cases
- Ugly Police Force: Misunderstandings of Law & Human Factors by Lou Hayes
- Design and Facilitate, Decision Making Exercises Using The Sandwich Metaphor
- Strategic Rifleman: Key to More Moral Warfare by H. John Poole
- Developing Teamwork, Leadership Skills and Decision Makers with Case Study's "Washington's Crossing"
- FBI Report: A Study of Active Shooter Incidents in the United States
- The Art of Manliness Discusses...The Tao of Boyd: How to Master the OODA Loop
- Courage: The Backbone of Leadership by Gus Lee
- A Police Officers thoughts on the “Militarization” of our police forces.
- Cops With War Toys: Militarizing police is the worst way to fight crime.
- “Just the facts Ma’am”
- Re-Imagine the Way We Lead!
- A Milestone in Boydian Theory at the Tactical Level
- CASE STUDY: Ferguson Missouri shooting incident and aftermath by Louis Hayes
- What is Leadership?
- Use of Force Investigations: a Manual for Law Enforcement
- Do You Know How to Get Fullfillment?
- How Great Leaders Inspire Action
- Leaders Eat Last: Why Some Teams Pull Together and Others Don't
- Adaptive Leadership Handbook, Reviewed [by Mark Safranski, a.k.a. "zen"]
- Have We Not Learned Anything From History? Don Vandergriff's Book Review on American Spartan
- How Do We Inspire Action?
- Book Review: Rubicon: The Poetry of War
- Book Review: American Spartan
- Command Culture: Officer Education in the U.S. Army and the German Armed Forces, 1901-1940, and the Consequences for WWII
- What are the Basics? Developing for Mission Command by Donald E. Vandergriff
- IN COMMAND AND OUT OF CONTROL
- Adaptive Leadership By Charles “Sid” Heal and John R. Engbeck
- Why good leaders make you feel safe
- Guardians vs. Warriors: What it Takes to Win at Low Cost
- After Action Review on The Christopher Dorner Incident
- Adaptive Leader Program
- Crisis Meta-Leadership Lessons From the Boston Marathon Bombings Response: The Ingenuity of Swarm Intelligence
- Outstanding piece! The Myth of Mission Command by Don Vandergriff
- Cops or Soldiers?
- Situational Assessments: Being Mindful of What’s Important Now!
- Convinced or Committed?
- Discipline: The Lost Art of Leadership
- How Do We Develop Adaptability?
- Improve the Work…Develop the People
- Incident Strategy and Tactics: The Baby Diaper Analogy
- Adaptive Leaders …Develop Strength of Character
- How About Some Empathy, Please?
- Get Into the Sandbox, Think and Play and Let’s Inspire… Adaptability
- Stoning The Gatekeepers: Is It Not Time Society Attempts To Better Understand Police Use of Force?
- First-Line Supervisors Do The Most Important Training
- Why Tactical Decision Games? Because They Challenge The Status Quo & Emphasize Tactical Options In Developing Courses of Action.
- Why Does Understanding The OODA Loop Matter to Cops?
- How Do You Develop Strength of Character and Adaptive Leaders?
- Adaptive Leadership Handbook: Innovative Ways to Teach and Develop Your People
- Don’t Fear Failure; Instead Make Failure Your Classroom
- In Forging Adaptability…Distinguish Technical Problems from Adaptive Challenges
- The Doctor in SWAT School (and What His Performance Says About Police Culture)
- Designing Law Enforcement: Adaptive Strategies for the Complex Environment by John A. Bertetto
- Guest Post: Toward a Police Ethos: Defining Our Values as a Call to Action by John Bertetto
- Adaptability is Key in Handling Crisis Situations…Be In Command and Out Of Control
- For Meaningful Lasting Results, Get Into the Weeds…and Identify Root Causes
- Want to get better and be safer? Debrief!
- How to Forge Adaptability in Police Leaders and Culture
- Adaptive Leadership is Purposeful Learning in Real Time
- Book Review: The Practice of Adaptive Leadership: Tools and Tactics for Changing Your Organization and The World
- Growing Leaders Who Practice Mission Command and Win the Peace, Lt. Col. Douglas A. Pryer, U.S. Army
- Achieving Greatness by Giving Control and Creating Leaders
- Choosing Adaptability by Gary Gagliardi and The Science of Strategy Institute
- The Review of Boyd & Beyond 2013…..
- Have You Thought About Why You Choose To Lead?
- Incident Command: the big picture by Louis Hayes
- Understanding the OODA Loop by Derek Stephens
- The Cops Amaze Me by Bob Lonsberry
- I Am An Optimist. It Does Not Seem Too Much Use Being Anything Else!
- Mike Rayburn Asks...What Makes A Good Street Cop?
- Fighting the good fight with moral clarity by Lt. Dan Marcou
- Are Gated Communities Really Secure?
- Top 25 Criminal Justice Blogs We made the list at # 3
- Incident Command: the team cohesion aspect of the SitRep
- Book Review: Always Picked Last: Conquering the Bullies: A Guide To Finding Your Way in Life…
- To Continuously Improve We Must Set Boundaries and Expectations
- Elite Performance...Takes WORK? Say it ain't so!
- Create Your Fantasy Island Organizational Culture by Tracey Richardson
- Have You Stopped a Car Today? Improving Patrols Tactical Effectiveness with Vehicle Stops
- Incident Command: Communicating the Situation and Location By Louis Hayes
- Incident Command: a problem-solving approach By Louis Hayes
- SWAT Cop Says American Neighborhoods Are 'Battlefields,' Claims Cops Face Same Dangers As Soldiers In Afghanistan
- Overmilitarization: Why Law Enforcement Needs to Scale Down Its Use of Military Hardware and Tactics By Evan Bernick
- John Boyd’s Art of War Why our greatest military theorist only made colonel. By William S. Lind
- Police militarization and rise of the warrior journalist by Lance Eldridge
- Strategic Studies Institute: Cartel Car Bombings in Mexico Authored by Dr. Robert J. Bunker, Mr. John P. Sullivan
- To Strengthen And Preserve Cohesion Your Values...Equal Their Values
- Another Must Read Book From Don Vandergriff: "The Path To Victory" Revised Kindle Version with a new foreword
- Safe Streets, Overruled By Heather McDonald of the City Journal
- Must Read Book On Leader Development, Updated Kindle Addition: Don Vandergriff's, Raising The Bar:
- Brian Willis Offers Great Info on Defeating...The Enemy Of Innovation
- Police militarization and the Ethical Warrior By Jack E. Hoban & Bruce J. Gourlie
- “A Way” To Develop a Toxic Leader: How We as Leaders Create Our Own Monsters
- The Guy Behind the Guy, Behind the Guy: A Case for Taking our Roles More Seriously
- Flatenning the Decision Cycle in Tactical Units
- Tactical Supervision: Coaches and Chessplayers: Guest Post By Louis Hayes
- To effectively function in the initial, chaotic stages of a crisis, develop adaptive leaders
- FEAR VS COURAGE: IT'S YOUR CHOICE By Danny Cox
- Skid Row Terrorist
- Col John Boyd: Question and Answer Video
- Great Piece on Adaptability by Brian Willis: The Dinosaur versus The Cockroach Training Model
- The Psychotic Militarization of Law Enforcement
- The Missing Piece of NIMS: Teaching Incident Commanders How to Function in the Edge of Chaos by Police Chief, Cynthia Renaud
- The Human Problem? by Frank Borelli an Officer.com article
- From Police One 3 techniques for controlling your brain with Chief Joel F. Shults, Ed.D.
- Great Article From Police One with Val Van Brocklin: How to create 'fierce followers' in law enforcement
- Deadly Force: Have We Lost Our Senses? Guest Post by Louis Hayes
- Tactical Philosophy 101 A Guest Post by Louis Hayes
- Leadership in Unconventional Crises
- Unconventional Crises, Unconventional Responses: Reforming Leadership in the Age of Catastrophic Crises and “Hyper complexity”
- JOHN BOYD WAS A PATRIOT, A MORAL LEADER, AND A BONAFIDE VISIONARY. AND YES, HE WAS A MAVERICK.
- Force Science Research Study: The Influence of Officer Positioning on Movement During a Threatening Traffic Stop Scenario
- Guest Post: Adaptive Decision-Making by Sid Heal
- “More Better,” Ideals, and To Be or To Do: Guest Post by Scott Shipman
- Learning Like an Expert: A Guest Post by Marshall Wallace
- What Represents a High Level of Professionalism?
- This Memorial Day Remember: The Path of The Warrior
- School Security: Sharing and Enhancing Best Practices
- Guest Post by Michael G. Moore: Boyd's Snowmobile ...or what made Alexander “The Great”
- Coffee Pots and Baseball Bats: Household Items Offer Protection
- Learning to Adapt With A Professional Reading Program
- Boyd and Beyond 2013
- Guest Post by Tyana Daley: Developing Law Enforcement Leaders and Nurturing Smart Thinkers
- Somewhere Between Born and Made: Where Good Leaders Come From
- Is Today Your Day?
- Guest Post by John Demand: “You look for the bomb…we look for the bomber”
- What Do OODA Loop’s Mean to the Street Cop, Wanting To Become “World Class” Tacticians?
- The Psychology of a Boston Marathon Terrorist: 10 Questions for a Retired Marine
- Watching Boston “Work Together” Made Me Proud to Be a Police Officer
- What Makes a "World Class" Tactically Proficient Peacekeeper?
- Tactical Decision Games to Increase Speed and Maturity of Problem Solving: The Lessons Learned
- The Path to Better Execution in Seeing, Understanding and Solving Complex Problems is a Learning Organization
- A Systemic Concept for Operational Design: a Robust Tool Law Enforcement Should Use in Preparing for Chaotic Crisis
- How shift debriefings can improve officer safety Published at P1
- Boyd and Beyond Boston 2013: Balancing Pursuasion and Force in The Moral, Mental and Physical Dimensions of Conflict
- Don Vandergriff, Discusses: Misinterpretation and Confusion: What is Mission Command?
- Huddling-Up To Acheive Successful Law Enforcement Outcomes
- Building Cohesive Law Enforcement Agencies That Can Decide In Crisis Situations
- Mistakes ultimately ended ex-LA cop's rampage
- Red Teaming The Workplace Violence Shooter and The "MR. Uncomfortable Factor"
- Top 30 Criminal Justice Blogs of 2012 : LESC is Number 5!
- Showing Up Is Overrated. Necessary But Not Nearly Sufficient. Can Taking An "Interest" In What You Do Enhance Performance?
- Handling Dynamic Encounters...Go Get Him, Or Set Him Up To Get Him...With An Adaptable Response
- Shift Debriefings: How Can We Be More Deliberate, More Disciplined, and More Thorough in our Approach to Learning?
- AOW Card Deck Lesson 6: Provoke Your Adversary’s Reaction
- Does Mass Violence Unfold Randomly and Chaotic or is There Hidden Order We Can Leverage in Our Prevention Efforts?
- Police One Column: 13 questions to answer in 2013: What has 2012 taught you about officer safety and effectiveness?
- Take Small Steps, Towards, Lifelong Learning In 2013
- Positive Adaptive Leadership...Tools and Tips and Critical Questions To Explore in 2013 Inspired by Many Of Those I Follow
- AOW Card Deck Lesson 5: Sheath Your Sword
- AOW Card Deck Lesson 4: Score A Small Victory Along The Way
- In Mastering Tactics Shouldn’t We Be Blending Policy and Procedures with People and Ideas?
- Ready, Aim, Ready?
- IMPLEMENTATION (OODA LOOP OR BOYD’S CYCLE) by Sid Heal
- AOW Card Deck Lesson 3: Engage Your Adversary From Many Directions
- AOW Card Deck Lesson 2: Lure The Tiger Out Of The Mountain
- AOW Card Deck Lesson 1: Catch Your Adversary Sleeping
- The Art of War: Sun Tzu Strategy Card Deck…Simple, Yet, Great Tool for Developing Strategic and Tactical Mindset
- "Certain men…come to be accepted guardians and transmitters, instructors, of established doctrines...
- On Vision
- Book Review: The Rite of Return: Coming Back From Duty Induced PTSD
- Restoring the Wounded Spirit
- Deciding Under Pressure…and Fast: You Need to Understand the Concept of “Coup d’oeil”
- How Do Adaptive Leaders Think?
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Designing Law Enforcement: Adaptive Strategies for the Complex Environment by John A. Bertetto
Submitted by Fred on Thu, 12/12/2013 - 9:06pm.
Crime Control Strategies
As law enforcement professionals, we often hold two things as fact. First, we acknowledge that the world in which we operate is ever changing and different than the one we were familiar with in the past. Second, when designing strategies to combat crime and criminal activity, we look into the past for strategies that have proven successful and re-implement them. That the contradictory nature of these two things is rarely recognized and even more rarely reconciled continues to be a source of mystery. However, by placing these two statements side by side, it should be clear that they stand in direct conflict with one another. If today’s operational environment is different than that of the past, how can any previously implemented strategy have any real hope of being successful? Crime and criminal organizations may be similar to those that came before them, but the players and their relationships with each other are different. This dramatically affects our existing framework for understanding these problems. Understanding this change in the operational environment is the first step toward designing new strategies that have the opportunity to be proven successful, but it is still not enough for operational success. The designing of successful law enforcement strategies must be an evolutionary process that occurs in real time in response to and, in the best of circumstances, before the evolutionary and adaptive environ-mental changes occurring at the same time. To design such strategies, law enforcement agencies must change the way they think, evaluate, understand, and implement enforcement strategies. They must use design thinking to create adaptive strategies that evolve in real time with the operational environment.
Proof, Logic, and the Environment
Before any adaptive strategies can be implemented, the nature and relationship between proof, logic, and the environment must be clearly understood. For law enforcement, proof is typically described through statistical data: percent increase or decrease in crime or enforcement activity. These statistics are the yard mark from which we measure operational success. It is important to understand that this form of proof comes at the conclusion of a process; it is its end state. Even proof of a purely philosophical nature must come at the conclusion of a logical process. The point to understand is that one cannot prove something beforehand.
Logic involves the cognitive process that allows for reliable inference. One thinks logically when a judgment that is made is based upon what has been known to happen in the past, is likely to happen again, and can be inferred to occur in the future. Reliability requires that conditions be constant, or fairly constant, so that outcomes of like processes remain the same.
The environment that we in law enforcement operate in is, of course, the real world. Our operational environment is that portion of the real world in which we seek to implement any strategy. The environment is an open and complex system. Complex systems, unlike merely complicated systems, are dependent in nature and based upon relationships. Complicated systems are composed of multiple, interacting components that can be broken apart into their respective pieces and examined independently. Aircraft and wristwatches are complicated systems. Complex systems rely on relationships, and the whole of the system turns upon changes in those relationships. When any relationship is affected, the whole of the system is affected. Complex systems all share the trait of emergence, which means they can change without any outside influence. Consider as an example the criminal street gang. The gang itself is a complex system, relying on relationships to function and exist. It shows the quality of emergence as internal gang conflicts result in the shifting of allegiances within the gang, and power struggles result in internal gang violence. It is also an open system in that it is affected by outside influence. Conflicts with other gangs and enforcement activities from law enforcement affect it as a system.
The relationship between proof, logic, and the environment has critical implications for the design of effective crime strategies. Given that the environment is a complex system and in a constant state of evolution and that prior strategies, no matter how successful, are based upon an understanding of relationships that likely no longer exist, it is not logical to think that a strategy proven successful in the past will prove successful today. Rather, those early strategies serve, at best, as a starting point for designing new strategies for today’s environment.
Design Thinking and Adaptive Campaigning
Design thinking and the concept of adaptive campaigning are not new. Roger Martin, the dean of the Rotman School of Management at the University of Toronto, has written extensively on design thinking. In his book The Design of Business , Martin (2009) describes the idea of design thinking as that of using what we know to look to what might be, rather than what has been done before. Design thinking, then, is itself the practiced application of logic to strategy. Adaptive campaigning is a similar concept that has been used by the Australian military for some time (Australian Army, 2006, 2009b).In Adaptive Campaigning – Future Land Operating Concept, the Australian Army (2009a) indicated the key themes of adaptive campaigning as:
the influencing and shaping of perceptions, allegiances, and actions of populations through a persistent, pervasive, and proportionate response; the orchestration of a whole-of-government effort across five interdependent and mutually reinforcing conceptual lines of operation; warfare as a continuous meeting engagement and competitive learning environment requiring a flexible, agile, resilient, responsive and robust Land Force; [and] a command climate that challenges understanding and assumptions founded in the philosophy of “Mission Command.” (p. 1)
The goal of adaptive campaigning is to under-stand the complex environment and to design strategies specific and adaptive to diverse and diffuse threats. This is a theme that can be traced back still further to an article written by Marine Corps General Charles C. Krulak(1999). In “The Strategic Corporal: Leadership in the Three Block War,” General Krulak describes future battles as being complex in nature, in which operators “may be confronted by the entire spectrum of tactical challenges in the span of a few hours and within the space of three contiguous city blocks” (p. 4).
Design thinking and adaptive campaigning have also recently been included in the U.S.Army’s operational planning. In a very thorough and well-presented article, Brigadier General Wass de Czege (2009) describes both the need and the practice of design thinking in strategic planning. Referring to the kind of thinking needed to address complex missions as “operational art,” Wass de Czege states,“ Fundamentally, operational art requires balancing design and planning while remaining open to learning and adapting quickly to change. Design is not a new idea” (p. 2).Owing to the efforts of military thinkers, such as Wass de Czege, the latest version of the U.S.Army’s (2010) Field Manual 5-0: The Operations Process contains a chapter devoted to design thinking as part of the creation process of military strategies.
It should be clear from these documents that design thinking and adaptive strategies have real and demonstrable value in addressing the challenges encountered in today’s complex and evolving environment. Though the language is decidedly military, the operational applicability of design and adaptive campaigning to law enforcement is inherent.
Designing Adaptive Strategies
Understanding the complex system that is the operational environment is a daunting task. It requires a full set of data, involving all the criminal offenders and criminal organizations in a given operational environment and the relationships they have within that environment, with each other, and within their organizations. Law enforcement has been very good at “doing things right,” but at times it has struggled with “doing the right things.” The procedural nature of law enforcement operations—tactical applications such as street stops, warrant sweeps, search warrant execution, and enforcement actions—has refined the practice of “doing things right.”However, “doing the right things” involves receiving and recognizing relevant information and acting upon it. When designing adaptive strategies, “doing the right things” must delve still further. Law enforcement must also understand the causal relationships between the various operators in the environment and design strategies that exert direct influence upon these relationships in a manner intended to cause a specific or desired response.
The understanding and exertion of influence is the very heart of designing adaptive strategies. All strategies are designed to create a desired end state, but the adaptive strategy is designed to repeatedly exert influence on the causal and dependent relationships. Adaptive strategies have at their core a cycle of understanding the environment as it currently exists, designing strategies to affect relationships in the environment, influencing those relationships to change the environment in an intended manner, and evaluating the environ-mental response. As the environment changes with each cycle, the designers recognize the changes in real time and adapt the strategy in response. In this cyclic manner, the strategy itself is evolutionary, and the designers guide the environment to the desired end state.
Understanding, Predicting, and Preventing Adaptation
The first step in the design process is the assembling of a team of competent and creative individuals. Members should be chosen for their ability to think critically, recognize salient data and relationships, understand the complex nature of the studied system or systems, and to be creative. Once this team has been established, it is necessary to develop a complete understanding of the targeted system. This involves direct contact with the environment itself and the frontline officers who have day-to-day contact with the operators. Complex systems change often, and the design team must have a real-time understanding of the operational environment in order to develop an accurate framework. Design strategies will only be successful if they affect relevant relationships. Historical data serves a purpose in understanding context and may give an indication of possible future actions but should not be relied upon extensively.
The goal of an adaptive strategy is to affect causal relationships so as to disrupt, destabilize, and eventually dismantle a criminal organization. Unfortunately, most law enforcement strategies are reactive in nature: law enforcement agents recognize a trend, act to combat that trend, and change both strategy and tactics as new trends emerge. With design and adaptive strategies, there exists the opportunity to become proactive, combating a given criminal organization before it has a chance to establish any trend. Human beings are creatures of habituation. Patterns of behavior are often repeated, and this same habituation is prevalent in systems that are governed by humans. As the understanding of the operational environment and the criminal organizations within it grows, this type of habituation may be recognized and often predicted. To understand this most simply, consider the relationship between spouses. Years of cohabitation and interaction have created an understanding that allows one spouse to adequately predict the other’s reaction to an action or behavior. With this prediction, one spouse can determine the other’s likely response to any given course of action. This can, in some instances, be applied to select criminal organizations. Once a thorough understanding is achieved, law enforcement strategies can be created that not only affect targeted relationships but also have a predictable expectation of the criminal organization’s response. By anticipating the response, the designers can have the next evolution in their adaptive strategy prepared in advance. This type of logical inference accomplishes two things: first, it allows the agency to get “in front” of the criminal activity rather than always reacting to it, and second, it prevents the organization from ever fully adapting to the changes in the environment.
For these criminal organizations, which operate in a manner where habituation allows for prediction, the ability for the law enforcement agency to prevent adaptation will in short order dismantle that organization. The criminal organization will not be able to settle into any routine behavior but will always be in a reactive mode itself; the ground upon which it attempts to operate will be unstable. Without this stability, control of the organization and its ability to efficiently conduct its “business” will be lost.
Adaptive strategies have another critical benefit when used against criminal organizations like street gangs. In law enforcement operations where the senior leader or leaders of the street gang are removed, a power vacuum within the gang is created. Middle-tier gang members often increase acts of violence as they struggle both with each other for control over the criminal organization and with rival gangs who see a weakened organization. However, by focusing on relationships, individuals targeted using adaptive strategies are most often these middle-tier operators. Their removal from the operational environment via incarceration prevents the kind of power vacuum that is created when the senior leader or leaders of the gang are removed. Their removal from the organization also creates a “management” gap between senior gang leaders and street-level operators, resulting in further internal instability that can be exploited to collapse the gang.
The designed instability and collapse of a criminal organization can be difficult. Many street gangs can often be impossible to predict due to their fragmented and young leadership, which can lead to a form of constant instability. For these organizations, the designing of adaptive strategies may be most effective. The unpredictability of an institutionalized instability aids in the dismantling of the organization; chaos leads to inefficiency, both in criminal activity and the ability to conceal that criminal activity. By understanding the operational environment and the criminal organizations within it, and then designing adaptive strategies that target relationships, a constant pressure is created that will serve to disrupt, destabilize, and ultimately dismantle those organizations.
Command and Leadership
Most law enforcement agencies, being hierarchical in design, lend themselves easily to the implementation of adaptive strategies. The question is, at what level in the organization should command of the design team be inserted? Command must be high enough within the organization to allow for the holistic overview of all interagency assets and the authority to use them and to coordinate all agency efforts with whatever external law enforcement agencies, intergovernmental supporting agencies, and nongovernmental agencies are required. At the same time, command must have the ability to work directly with those agents engaged in the day-to-day interaction and enforcement efforts. For larger agencies, where regions inside their jurisdictions have operational environments and criminal organizations distinct from those in other regions, command should be separated into different efforts. For smaller agencies, command may be consolidated.
Command should also welcome a difference in opinion from members of their design team. Dissent is not negative so long as it serves to either increase the understanding of the operational environment or advance the understanding of the problem. If the environment is not thoroughly understood or the problem is not properly framed, the developed strategy will be limited in its success. Command should not see these types of questions as a threat to their authority but as the necessary part of the design process.
Conclusion
By using design thinking as the primary process for creating adaptive crime control strategies, law enforcement agencies will find themselves increasingly effective in disrupting criminal activity and reducing crime. Command staff members in charge of such strategic planning should assemble a group of critical and creative thinkers who can take the necessary time to understand the complex network of relationships in their operational environment and who can use this knowledge to design adaptive strategies that target those relationships. The endeavor requires a substantial time and resource commitment, but in doing so, agencies may eventually find themselves with a thorough enough understanding of the various criminal organizations within their operational environment that they can predict likely responses to enforcement actions and plan the next wave of enforcement actions in advance. By understanding the environment as it exists in real time and continuing the cycle of understanding, designing, influencing, and evaluating, designers can guide their target through a series of intended responses. When used against criminal organizations, such as street gangs, adaptive strategies target and exploit the relationships among middle-tier operators resulting in their incarceration and removal from the operational environment. Without these middle-tier operators, the ability for the criminal organization to effectively conduct its criminal affairs is lost, resulting in the disruption, destabilization, and dismantling of the organization in a way that prevents a power vacuum and the violence typically associated with it.
References
- Australian Army. (2006). Adaptive campaigning. Canberra, Australia: Department of Defence.
- Australian Army. (2009a). Adaptive campaigning – Future land operating concept. Vanguard, No. 4, 1. Canberra, Australia: Department of Defence.
- Australian Army. (2009b). Army’s future land operating concept. Canberra, Australia: Department of Defence.
- Krulak, C. C. (1999). The strategic corporal: Leadership in the three block war. Fort Meade, MD: Marine Corps Production Directorate.
- Martin, R. (2009).The design of business: Why design thinking is the next competitive advantage. Boston, MA: Harvard Business Publishing.
- U.S. Army. (2010) Field Manual 5-0: The operations process. Ft. Leavenworth, KS: U.S. Army.
- Wass de Czege, H. (2009). Systemic operational design: Learning and adapting to complex missions. Military Review, 89(1), 2-12.
John A. Bertetto is a sworn member of the Chicago Police Department. He is the author of “Counter-Gang Strategy: Adapted COIN in Policing Criminal Street Gangs,” “Coun¬tering Criminal Street Gangs: Lessons from the Counterinsurgent Battlespace,” and “Toward a Police Ethos: Defining Our Values as a Call to Action.” Officer Bertetto holds a Master of Science degree from Western Illinois University and a Master of Business Administration from St. Xavier University.
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