When serving on staff and even while in command, process often dilutes purpose. As individuals and on teams, we routinely focus on what we’re supposed to do at the expense of appreciating the why or fully realizing the impact of our efforts.
Connecting Planning to Purpose
This happens throughout the operations process and troop leading procedures. We have standard operating procedures, scripted meetings and rehearsals, and formal means of communication. We huddle over maps and keyboards to create products and graphics and PowerPoint slides. We play our part in assigning boundaries, planning tactical actions, directing unit movements and timetables, and reallocating resources across the battlespace to accomplish assigned missions. We strive so hard to simply do the things that doctrine and our leaders say we should do.
And somewhere along the way, we forget that at the end of that map marker…are human souls.
It’s sounds like an elementary point to highlight, but units will do what you tell them to. Soldiers will eventually assault through the “Objective Bruno” circle graphic you hastily threw down on acetate at 0347 and didn’t think twice about. A convoy of logistics resupply vehicles will follow the route graphic you published, despite the undulating wadi system it traverses. And that tasking of 20 Soldiers will be standing tall at 0400 because you neglected to publish the updated time of 0900.
And to provide an example I witnessed a few months ago during training…five Soldiers in a retrans vehicle will indeed drive right past the forward line of friendly forces and four kilometers into the enemy’s area. Why? Because a primary staff member failed to synchronize the timing of their emplacement. It happened…it can easily happen again.
Planning has human consequences. And in combat, poor, incomplete, ill-considered, uncoordinated planning will have bloody consequences.
Whether from the commander’s chair or the Plans Tent keyboard, we should consider it a dire privilege to direct Soldier and unit operations. Though staff members rarely get to watch the missions they plan, it’s a worthwhile thought exercise to visualize the reality at the other end of the planning tool. Talking about this reality and working in this awareness will no doubt connect the planner to the Soldier in meaningful ways, strengthening the quality of our people and our operations.
Questions for Leaders
- Does my team have an awareness of how expansive and far reaching their work is?
- In what ways can I highlight the true impact of the work my team does?
- In what ways can I adjust my team’s processes so that we pay particular attention to the effort that will directly impact human lives?
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