This article is a little old, but really interesting. I first caught on to the whole OODA(Observe, Orient, Decide, Act) concept after reading Paul Howe’s book called ‘Leadership and Training for the Fight’. Since then, I find myself applying those principals of OODA to my every day work, when overseas or home.
In a simplified version, of how I use it, this all relates to winning the fight. You either can beat the enemy with speed or beat the enemy with surprise, or a little bit of both. And in this industry, beating the enemy means, keeping your client alive. That ‘randomness’ and ‘unpredictability’ is a tool, that can totally help you accomplish this task. Also, the more you can isolate the enemy and keep them in the dark, the better your chances of survival and protecting your client.
And the various tricks of ‘observing’ and ‘orienting’ to compress the OODA loop, as described by Paul, was fascinating and really made sense to me. I highly suggest studying OODA, and we can thank Col. John Boyd for developing such a concept. We can also thank men like Ken Good and Paul Howe for their incredible interpretations of such concepts.
On a side note, after reading the book, I had a brand new view point on binoculars and rifle optics. I subsequently bought a Trijicon ACOG afterwards, and it has been one of the best purchases I have ever made for field work. Here is a link for Paul’s book, a wiki entry on OODA Loop, and Ken Good’s article below. I hope you enjoy. -Head Jundi
————————————————————————————-
From Wikipedia
The OODA Loop
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OODA_loop
————————————————————————————–
Got a Second?
Boyd’s Cycle – OODA Cycle
Written by Ken J. Good , Director, Surefire Institute
Introduction
Today?s environment of accelerating scientific discoveries and technological change bring ever-improving hardware to the end user. In this climate is it easy to overlook and even abandon the core foundation of any weapon system, the interplay and perceptions of the human mind in a combative situation.
A man who understood this better than most was Col. John Boyd, USAF (Ret.) Col. Boyd was tasked with determining why American pilots in apparently inferior aircraft were consistently outmatching their Korean counterparts. Air to air combat takes place in a 360-degree sphere and represents the pinnacle of the man and machine relationship coupled with the man on man dynamic warriors dream about. (more…)