mikelally.net

Just finished reading Roughneck Nine-One: The Extraordinary Story of a Special Forces A-Team at War by Sgt. 1st Class Frank Antenori, US Army (Retired).

Loved it. If you like a solid, action-packed ride – this is a book for you. I read a lot of military history and analysis. I am a geek this way.

Sgt. Antenori, during the After Action Review (AAR) section of the book, lays out the four fundamental ideas of the Special Forces system. First, I love that he calls it a system. It is a WAY of doing things. Love it. Second, I love the AAR. Every operation gets pulled apart for a lessons learned.

The fundamentals are something that every successful team can use. I have adapted them here:

• People are more important than stuff. (Soldiers are more important than hardware).
• The quality of these people – “maturity, courage, technical skills, cultural sensitivity, and language proficiency, and their ability to lead AND follow [my emphasis on the "AND"] – that is the foundation of our effectiveness.”
• The PROCESS [again, my emphasis] of producing good people is a “long, slow, and expensive one”. Lower standards and quicker training simply does not work.
• The process of “minting competent”…”people can’t be accelerated.”

So easy yet so hard. The first thing the suits want to cut is training. I have seen this time and time again. Not hiring the right people, not giving them adequate training, giving up too quickly once they are out of initial training.

In my last position at a learning solutions company no client ever wanted the best results. They wanted a rubber stamp. They wanted fast and cheap. They never wanted to produce the best results.