Navigating chaos with Ben Ford
We talk with Ben Ford, founder of Commando Development, about the his course Communicate to Operate.
In this podcast we discuss:
- How tech companies can adopt military strategies to deal with chaotic situations
- Ben's online course
- Mission Command
- and much more
Full Episode
Guest Links
Show Notes
00:27 Ben's Commando Background
02:43 3 Principles of Communicate to Operate
04:02 OODA loop is a hierarchy, not a loop
04:22 Full OODA loop diagram
05:59 How can companies stay in touch with reality?
06:35 Getting inside the ooda loop is more than just going faster
08:45 Why a course?
10:14 3 fundamental concepts
10:37 Challenges when building this course?
12:21 More participation in online courses
13:31 Company inflection points
15:39 OODA Loop as a meta-process
15:50 Shifts in military and industry thinking
17:04 Team of Teams
20:49 In a complex world you need to use emergent behavior
20:59 Applying these principles as a 'low level' developer
21:18 There's always a locus of control
22:51 Agile vs Shape Up
23:06 Context and Boundaries
24:20 Ben's newest thinking on dev/biz separation
27:07 Can you skip the siloing stage?
29:55 Avoid siloing with a clear roadmap
31:13 Mission Command
31:34 Three building blocks of blitzkrieg
31:41 Don Vandergriff
33:59 3 aspects of Mission Command
34:58 The Doctrine of Empowerment
35:28 Group flow as a security team
37:16 Can't get to emergence by only thinking about individuals
39:16 Psychological safety
41:21 Where to find Ben
41:44 Twitter serendipity
Member discussion