The OODA-Loop Revisited (3-minute memo)

Ooh-La-La OODA-Loop!

• I’ve talked about the OODA-Loop before (search on OODA), but it’s always worth a revisit.
• I find myself living by it more and more.
• Background: fighter pilots live and die by making split-second decisions under stress.
• Four Steps:
  • Observe: take in the data streaming in
  • Orient: assess where the threats and opportunities are
  • Decide: choose a course of action
  • Act: execute your plan
• Repeat
  • ReObserve
  • ReOrient
  • ReDecide
  • ReAct

How Life Works

• Looking back from 69 years, I see that I used to be too top-down in my approach to decision-making.
• I wanted a full schema in place before I took Step One.
• I started slow but finished hard.
• It worked well enough, but not so well as it could have done.
• Now, I’m exploring everything all at once.
• I make an initial assessment — enough to know where the cliffs are — and then pick a path and go!
• Any assessed path works, so long as it’s not over a cliff that turns the next step into a flying leap!
• As data pours in, I adjust.
• I’ve modified the war cry of Silicon Valley, “Move Fast and Break Things” — that’s the point of sighting out the cliffs before you take a flying leap.
• My version: Move Fast and Drop Things.
• If you’re moving fast, you’re juggling many balls: much data, many assessments, decisions and plans, all of them shifting as your actions ricochet into the resistance of brute objects or the actions and reactions of other players facing the same time and resource chokepoints.
• So, you’re going to drop things. Just make sure to keep the crucial balls in the air.
• Getting the big things right carries the day, and if, by focusing on the key things, you miss a few small things, you can tidy things up when the show’s over.
• The stars carry the show, even if the supporting cast just passes muster.
• Problem-solving on the fly turns out to be as gratifying as devising the perfect scheme — but it works faster, applies more broadly and accelerates the accumulation of valuable experience, even at age 69!
• I am living through a personal renaissance. That’s why you haven’t heard much from me lately: I’m up to my armpits in life!
• But I’m expanding my capabilities on many fronts — and this is one of them.
• Like the man said (OK, like the cyborg said): “I’ll be back”.