Old to New: Accelerating the Velocity of Decision Advantage...

Trust Decisions in the innovation environment requires entrepreneurs, who are willing to risk their reputation and to build new cognitive bridges.

The vulnerability of solving new found problem-sets outside of your organizational safe zone, with a new set of people, is just the beginning.

As your new TEAM works side-by-side, through hours, weeks and months of tame dialogue, heated arguments and little sleep, the level of cultural trust quickly rises.

It does not matter if this occurs in a new business unit within the private sector, or out on the frontier in an austere world at the Forward Operating Base (FOB).

This place on the edge was created to be a strategic unit with tactical objectives.  Call it a "Skunkworks", an "Outpost" or some other clever xxWERX name.  It really does not matter.  Yet everyone knows that the core mission is still relatively unknown.

The reward becomes, that someone of significant rank, or a vital customer, who recognizes that the new idea, new prototype or new invention is truely a game changer.  An outlier.  A true "Decision Advantage".

Walking across that virtual bridge from the "Old" to the "New," from the normal to the abnormal or from the design of a market copy cat to a disruption market leader, is what this initiative is really all about.

So how do you do it?  In order to set the stage, you might start here:

Col. John Cogbill, chief of staff of the Joint Special Operations Command, discusses how to leverage Silicon Valley's "secret sauce" to encourage the MacGyvers in your ranks.

The methods and the process are constantly evolving.  Yet the core thinking and the integration of the various cultures that synchronize together, in a proven innovation journey is the real mission.

A few months before Col. Cogbill's podcast, the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) published the 120+ page Independent Task Force Report #77, "Innovation and National Security - Keeping Our Edge.

What happens when you put a Task Force together with a combination of Special Operations Commanders, Venture Capitalists, Private Sector Leaders and Management Consultants?

"A new U.S. innovation strategy should be based on four pillars: funding, talent, technology adoption, and technology alliances and ecosystems. Action is required over the next five years." (TFR Innovation Strategy P. 17).

You will have to read the report in it's entirety to form your own thoughts and conclusions on what needs to happen in your own local ecosystem of innovation.

Yet, suffice it to say, the people on the "Task Force" understand the real challenges.  They know first hand the National Security threats.  They realize we all have to accelerate and simultaneously collaborate.

So how might you build some bridges this month from the "Old" to the "New"?

Why will your mission create a foundation to increase the velocity of your TrustDecisions to gain Decision Advantage...

Corporate Social Responsibility: An Era for New Leadership...

Here are a few of this mornings top news stories. It seems that Operational Risks have us surrounded and yet many organizations are still in denial that anything will impact them directly:

Libyan Oil Exports Blocked Ahead of Berlin Peace Conference
By Salma El Wardany
January 18, 2020, 4:46 AM PST Updated on January 18, 2020, 7:16 AM PST

World News
China reports new virus cases, raising concern globally before key holiday
Published Sat, Jan 18 20206:34 AM EST

Why Iran plane disaster protests mark most serious test yet
By Amir Azimi BBC Persian service 18 January 2020

U.S. Government Confirms Critical Browser Zero-Day Security Warning For Windows Users
Davey Winder Senior Contributor Cybersecurity

How long will this naivete go on in your company, city, state or country?  Maybe it's time for more Corporate Social Responsibility and a renewed focus on training new leaders.

As the finger pointing continues and the documents of the day are debated, there is one strategy that has been with us for many years, and many have forgotten.  It is called Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR). CSR is gaining new emphasis around the globe:

Mary Parker Follett's (1869-1933) thoughts on democracy, society and management have inspired business leaders in fits and starts during the 20th century and they deserve to be revisited as we move forward in this century.

What is the important role that businesses play in society?  She gave serious attention to what we now call corporate social responsibility, a topic of great interest in today's boardrooms and business schools.

One thing is certain. All of the employees and citizens on the planet want leadership and courage from the ordinary person next door.

The citizen soldier who is willing and capable of leading the people around them in the face of a sudden catastrophic crisis.

In the midst of an important ethical decision. In the moment of the day, are "Leaders Born, Not Made"?  What would Mary Parker Follet and Laura Tyson have to say:

"Leaders can be taught, and should be keen on sharpening their skills as rigorously as a surgeon. In 1933, she put it plainly: managers must realise that they, as professional[s], are assuming grave responsibilities, that they are taking part in one of the large functions of society, a part which, I believe, only trained and disciplined [business people] can hope to take with success."

As the Operational Risks continue to surround our corporate enterprises, it's imperative we look at where we are spending our money and deploying our resources.

What would happen to our preparedness, readiness and recovery capabilities if we just reallocated 5% of the corporate marketing budget to the Risk Management budget?

If we did, then we might find ourselves with fewer calls to the Court house, State house and the White House.

Davos 2020: Culture in a Complex, Interdependent World...

"No institution or individual alone can address the economic, environmental, social and technological challenges of a complex, interdependent world"...

In 9 days, leaders on the planet Earth will be converging on Davos, Switzerland for the World Economic Forum Annual Meeting. What will this years pressing themes tell us, about what is on the minds of Presidents, CEOs, Managing Directors, Chief Information Security Officers, Chief Risk Officers, Generals, Secretarys and Activists?

Davos 2020 will be focused on the following four themes:

__1. How to address the urgent climate and environmental challenges that are harming our ecology and economy.

__2. How to transform industries to achieve more sustainable and inclusive business models as new political, economic and societal priorities change trade and consumption patterns.

__3. How to govern the technologies driving the Fourth Industrial Revolution so they benefit business and society while minimizing their risks to them.

__4. How to adapt to the demographic, social and technological trends reshaping education, employment and entrepreneurship.

If you only could pick one of these four very important issues facing our global societies, which would you feel you have the most ability to impact, with your own organization?

Got it?  Now, think about how your organization will change, in order to make a greater difference in that particular theme you have selected.

The culture in your organization is going to be the difference between your ability to succeed, or to be soon facing failure.  As a leader, how will you continuously adapt to your human culture, just as Davos is addressing our interdependent world?

How might you change the way you are "Visible" to your stakeholders?  Why are you the one they "Trust", to achieve organizational objectives?

You see, you are not as visible as you think you are.  You are not as trusted as you think you are.

Your organization needs you, to step out and really show them who you really are.  They need to see, hear and read about the collective mission.  Their respective purpose, for being present today.

Culture.  As a leader, it is all on you...

ORM: Pervasive Risk Across Disciplines...

What is the origin of the "Operational Risk Management" (ORM) discipline? Was it derived from the work within the financial services industry from the Basel II initiatives?

The definitions and the actual work towards creating standards of conduct and rule-based design has been evolving for the past few decades.

Operational Risk and the approach to risk that is not otherwise considered to be market or credit risk, is one mind set. The other mind set considers the hazards associated with the threat to our valuable assets.

Either point of view depends on the environment that you operate in and the risks associated with that environment.

To give a quick example, here are a few views into Operational Risk in the United States:

"It didn’t take long—the first attack on a U.S. government website hit on Saturday, a day after the killing of Qassem Suleimani in Baghdad. The fact there was an attack is not a surprise—speculation has been rife. And the style of the attack is consistent with the nature of the primary cyber threat we now face. Hackers claiming to be linked to Iran targeted a low-level domain—the website of the Federal Depository Library Program—defacing its home page, echoing Teheran’s threats of vengeance alongside imagery of President Trump, Ayatollah Khamenei and the Iranian flag" Forbes

"Boeing will still burn more than $1 billion a month even after halting 737 Max production, according to J.P. Morgan.  Boeing’s decision to stop suspend production of the troubled aircraft was made in light of months of cash-draining groundings worldwide, but the company’s internal overhead and labor expenses will remain and will increase cash burn, analyst Seth Seifman wrote to clients."  CNBC

These examples encompass a U.S. government agency and a private sector U.S.-based global aerospace company.  Both are operational risk scenarios that could contribute to losses that will also impact the reputation of the entity involved.

That aspect alone, could be the major factor in why Operational Risk Management is such a growing discipline in our 2020 global landscape.

Some of the earliest origins of the Operational Risk concerns come from the military. The U.S. Navy is one of the branches who has embraced it fully:

• Purpose. To establish policy, guidelines, procedures, and responsibilities per reference (a), standardize the operational risk management (ORM) process across the Navy, and establish the ORM training continuum.
• Scope. This instruction applies to all Navy activities, commands, personnel, and contractors under the direct supervision of government personnel.
• Discussion. Risk is inherent in all tasks, training, missions, operations, and in personal activities no matter how routine. The most common cause of task degradation or mission failure is human error, specifically the inability to consistently manage risk. ORM reduces or offsets risks by systematically identifying hazards and assessing and controlling the associated risks allowing decisions to be made that weigh risks against mission or task benefits. As professionals, Navy personnel are responsible for managing risk in all tasks while leaders at all levels are responsible for ensuring proper procedures are in place and that appropriate resources are available for their personnel to perform assigned tasks. The Navy vision is to develop an environment in which every officer, enlisted, or civilian person is trained and motivated to personally manage risk in everything they do.

If only our major business entities would would fully encompass the following steps with all employees and processes then more lives would be saved, corporate assets would be protected and the enterprise would be ever more resilient:

(1) Identify the hazards;

(2) Assess the hazards;

(3) Make risk decisions;

(4) Implement controls; and

(5) Supervise.

Yet the losses and the potential for loss continues across the organizations who are well equipped to make Operational Risk Management a part of every person and operating divisions daily mind set:

The places change, the numbers change, but the choice of weapon remains the same. In the United States, people who want to kill a lot of other people most often do it with guns.

The number of U.S. mass shootings depends on how you count

Public mass shootings account for a tiny fraction of the country’s gun deaths, but they are uniquely terrifying because they occur without warning in the most mundane places. Most of the victims are chosen not for what they have done but simply for where they happen to be.

There is no universally accepted definition of a public mass shooting, and this piece defines it narrowly. It looks at the 172 shootings in which four or more people were killed by a lone shooter (two shooters in a few cases). It does not include shootings tied to robberies that went awry, and it does not include domestic shootings that took place exclusively in private homes. A broader definition would yield much higher numbers.

Whether it is on the deck of an aircraft carrier or within any organizations business facility, operational risk is pervasive. It is up to you and your organization to begin to make a difference...