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Ben Ford Profile picture
Ben Ford
@commandodev
Organisational Engineering as a service for scaling tech companies | OODA | Former Royal Marine Commando | ADAPT. RESPOND. WIN!
Jan 11, 2023 • 28 tweets • 5 min read
Boyd's OODA loop is probably the most valuable mental model I know of for reasoning about the increasing pace of change in the world. But - it's was formulated at a time before much of current complexity science. What's missing? I want to share some of what I've been looking at to start answering that question, what a view to taking a fresh look at OODA in the context of a couple more decades of progress.
May 11, 2021 • 10 tweets • 3 min read
Organisations are evolutionary processes operating in a fitness landscape.

Military tactics and doctrine has been shaped by the same forces.

This thread is a series of atomic essays exploring the principles, overlaps, and leadership in uncertainty

#ship30for30 Tech leadership needs an UPGRADE. The paradigm of tinkering with a factory to make it more efficient is no longer of service to fast growing tech companies.

Oct 16, 2020 • 14 tweets • 6 min read
Today's newsletter from @TaylorPearsonMe is excellent. It's about The Farthest Down the Chain Principle.

I haven't heard it called this before, but I do know about the principles under other names: Mission Command or empowered execution.

Important ideas - time for a thread! Let's start with OODA.

There are 2 or 3 really good intros to OODA out there that don't oversimplify, and Taylor's is one of them. It's also another OODA loop video with insanely low views for its value! (I'll share some more later on).

Oct 15, 2020 • 7 tweets • 2 min read
Potentially unpopular opinion on the tech industry.

We're already good enough at doing.

#devops, #nocode, #agile are all mainly focused on building things better and faster.

That's not the bottleneck anymore. We should switch our focus to what comes before and after

\1 What comes before?

Context and Situation - WHY are we doing this?

and after?

Learning and Improvement - how are we going to get better over time?

\2
Oct 15, 2020 • 10 tweets • 2 min read
I've been researching, reading and practising on building better teams in tech start ups for ages.

One thing that's come up time and again (with increasing frequency recently) is navigating dichotomy and paradox.

So I'm going to dig into some of these phenomena. \1 I don't have any simple answers, but I do have an unusual perspective from which I hope to throw a different light.

I've been in tech for ~15 years and I've discovered some incredibly relevant ideas and doctrine from the military through research. \2 Image
Sep 24, 2020 • 8 tweets • 4 min read
I got a @onepeloton 3 weeks ago. Since then I've used it almost every day, and seen some pretty startling results.

I've lost nearly 5kg (not been drinking this month too) and my avg power output today over 45 mins was almost equal to a 20 min max effort in wk 1 🤯

Takeaways: Image I am just a complex systems like any other. I want to pull out a few observation that I think apply to intervening in any system.
Sep 24, 2020 • 5 tweets • 2 min read
Leadership is at least as much about systems as it is about skills.

Thread. So much of the conversation is about teaching leaders the right "skills". Even worse, we talk about skills, when we really mean knowledge.

As if there's some set of techniques that will make anyone a "Great Leader" ™️
Aug 28, 2020 • 6 tweets • 2 min read
Just sent out my first ever email offering a thing I'm making to my (tiny) email list. Pretty cool feeling!

gum.co/communicate-to…

Table of contents: \1 FUNDAMENTALS - the building blocks of operational excellence Image
Aug 28, 2020 • 5 tweets • 1 min read
Pst... Wanna grow your height by 2 cm?

YOGA.

\1 My military ID card had my height as 178cm (5ft 10).

Pardon?

Never mind how long ago!

\2
Aug 7, 2020 • 5 tweets • 2 min read
That is a GREAT question! One of the biggest problems with military stuff is trying to apply without taking account of that massive difference!

See here for some recent discussion on that:
\1 This is why I only really came back to the military stuff through the lens of research and experience in tech. I actually thought for a long time that my service was just a cool diversion and a fun few years in my early 20s.

I couldn't have been more wrong!
\2
Jul 22, 2020 • 7 tweets • 2 min read
I'm about halfway through listening to this incredible episode of the @JimRuttShow episode jimruttshow.com/tyson-yunkapor…

It's about indigenous wisdom and what we can learn from different points of view. Full notes to follow, but so far: Civilisation at the moment is synonymous infinite and exponential growth. I'm also reading Scale by Geoffrey West at the moment which has some very similar conclusions. Fascinating to look at that observation through both lenses.
Jul 9, 2020 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
Systems biology. . . is about putting together rather than taking apart,
integration rather than reduction. It requires that we develop ways of
thinking about integration that are as rigorous as our reductionist programmes, but different - Dennis Noble And yet we still tend to reach for the reductionist toolkit first. Another book to add to the list: amazon.co.uk/Music-Life-Bio…
Jun 28, 2020 • 5 tweets • 2 min read
Ok. Prep done. Thread: Balsamic, thyme and honey carrots and parsnips ImageImage
Jun 25, 2020 • 14 tweets • 4 min read
Just read this mind blowing piece of work on "Neural Annealing" opentheory.net/2019/11/neural…

There are some profound, incredible implications for individuals in here, but it also draws some threads of belief I have about teams and organisations together... \1 We can simplistically view the brain as a hierarchical organisation of overlapping systems. These subsystems exchange information and energy at varying frequencies and act as whole to adapt to its environment by minimising free energy (equivalent to surprise) \2
Jun 22, 2020 • 6 tweets • 2 min read
Some really interesting perspectives on the impact of coronavirus and what it means for the future of startups (I also really like the new youtube chapter feature).

Some highlights: @mundy_philip Start ups are an "imperfect response to an unmet need". I love this framing. It makes it much easier to accept that coronavirus is a massive dislocation in unmet needs, and that an imperfect, but rapid response to them is what's needed.
Jan 12, 2020 • 10 tweets • 7 min read
1/ Heads up!

I'm preparing a guide to fixing organisational problems in scaling software development teams.

I'd love to talk to you if you're a founder or leader dealing with this! Things I'll cover (feedback welcomed): 2/ A decade plus programming/team building and leadership experience across start ups, global mega banks and sizes inbetween.
Nov 7, 2019 • 15 tweets • 13 min read
1/ @DavidCHoll asked the other day about translating strategy to execution, and why that's such a challenge.

Here's what I think. @DavidCHoll 2/ There is a necessary and natural boundary between the long term strategic goals of an organisation and the short term projects and tasks that are performed in pursiut of those goals.
Nov 1, 2019 • 24 tweets • 7 min read
1/ Boyd's OODA loop is probably the most valuable mental model I know of for reasoning about the increasing pace of change in the world. But - it's was formulated at a time before much of current complexity science. What's missing? 2/ I want to share some of what I've been looking at to start answering that question, what a view to taking a fresh look at OODA in the context of a couple more decades of progress.