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The OODA loop: How fighter pilots make fast and accurate decisions

submitted this link to Icon for group Mental Models
Mental Models
on March 15, 2021
  1. 1

    Great article! I also really enjoyed the book about John Boyd - "The Fighter Pilot who Change the Art of War" from Robert Coram

    Another good article on this from Brett McKay where he talks about how to quickly redirect or reorient:

    "You constantly have to break apart your old paradigms and put the resulting pieces back together to create a new perspective that better matches your current reality.
    Boyd calls this process destructive deduction."

    https://www.artofmanliness.com/articles/ooda-loop/

  2. 1

    As a software developer, I've seen OODA Loop used as a framework for how the org should develop.

    In my experience, the general idea is a good one, but there are some common holes people fall into:

    • It's important to remember that as cool as it might sound to think so, a business is not a dogfight. It's not a sports match. No business war can be won in 40 seconds, so one should consider the time scales they are operating in for what being faster their your competition means.

    • Confusing speed and nimbleness with just doing something. Deploying faster than your competition doesn't mean you're orienting better than your competition. I haven't met a company that succeeded because they could deploy 100 times a day (the opposite can be a problem, though).

    • And finally, this is common of any framework that gets popular: just saying you're doing OODA Loop is not the same as doing OODA Loop. It's not a talking point at a meeting, it's a company culture.

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