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

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

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