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Command Decision: Ethical Leadership in the Information Environment
This 2019 study, from Strategic Studies Institute, U.S. Army War College Press, and Keir Giles, and contains charts, footnotes and endnotes.
“This monograph considers how a classical challenge that commanders face in war — namely, making critical decisions on the basis of limited and often unreliable information — has been exacerbated in the era of big data. Data overload complicates the intelligence community’s efforts to identify and exclude disinformation, misinformation, and deception, and thus hampers its ability to deliver reliable intelligence to inform decision-makers in a timely manner. The military commander remains responsible for making a final decision, yet the great wealth of data now available through the intelligence cycle amplifies the risk of decision paralysis. With this in mind, technological solutions tend to be considered the most appropriate response for managing data overload and disinformation. While these remain relevant, they alone may be insufficient to equip the military commander with the necessary insight to guide decisions through the uncertainty of the big data environment. Rather, the military commander must cultivate a range of new behaviors in order to avoid decision paralysis and fulfill the distinct leadership roles a commander must play at the various stages of the intelligence process.
“For this purpose, this monograph combines U.S. psychologist Daniel Goleman’s theory of leadership styles; author John Knights’ notion of “transpersonal leadership,” on how to identify appropriate behaviors that reflect values which are essential to ethical leadership and ultimately cause positive change in an organization; and retired U.S. Army General Stanley McChrystal’s observations from his leadership of the operations and intelligence (O&I) briefing of a task force in Iraq. Significantly, all of these models take inspiration from timeless classical virtues that prove essential for command — for example, Thomas Aquinas’s views on justice, temperance, prudence, and fortitude.”
About the Author: KEIR GILES is a Senior Consulting Fellow with the Russia and Eurasia Programme at Chatham House, and works with the Conflict Studies Research Centre (CSRC), a small group of deep subject matter experts which was formerly part of the United Kingdom (UK) Ministry of Defence. Mr. Giles is an internationally recognized expert on information warfare, including the subdomains of computational propaganda and of cyber-conflict. He co-authored (with Kim Hartmann) “Shifting the Core,” an influential article calling for an urgent reconsideration of basic assumptions on privacy, encryption, and national cybersecurity in the context of constant, ubiquitous, and unconscious use of connected devices. He is also the author of a significant number of groundbreaking studies on Russian theory, doctrine, and structures for engaging in information and cyber-confrontation, many of which predate the explosion of interest in Russian information warfare, subversion, and disinformation that followed the annexation of Crimea.
“This monograph considers how a classical challenge that commanders face in war — namely, making critical decisions on the basis of limited and often unreliable information — has been exacerbated in the era of big data. Data overload complicates the intelligence community’s efforts to identify and exclude disinformation, misinformation, and deception, and thus hampers its ability to deliver reliable intelligence to inform decision-makers in a timely manner. The military commander remains responsible for making a final decision, yet the great wealth of data now available through the intelligence cycle amplifies the risk of decision paralysis. With this in mind, technological solutions tend to be considered the most appropriate response for managing data overload and disinformation. While these remain relevant, they alone may be insufficient to equip the military commander with the necessary insight to guide decisions through the uncertainty of the big data environment. Rather, the military commander must cultivate a range of new behaviors in order to avoid decision paralysis and fulfill the distinct leadership roles a commander must play at the various stages of the intelligence process.
“For this purpose, this monograph combines U.S. psychologist Daniel Goleman’s theory of leadership styles; author John Knights’ notion of “transpersonal leadership,” on how to identify appropriate behaviors that reflect values which are essential to ethical leadership and ultimately cause positive change in an organization; and retired U.S. Army General Stanley McChrystal’s observations from his leadership of the operations and intelligence (O&I) briefing of a task force in Iraq. Significantly, all of these models take inspiration from timeless classical virtues that prove essential for command — for example, Thomas Aquinas’s views on justice, temperance, prudence, and fortitude.”
About the Author: KEIR GILES is a Senior Consulting Fellow with the Russia and Eurasia Programme at Chatham House, and works with the Conflict Studies Research Centre (CSRC), a small group of deep subject matter experts which was formerly part of the United Kingdom (UK) Ministry of Defence. Mr. Giles is an internationally recognized expert on information warfare, including the subdomains of computational propaganda and of cyber-conflict. He co-authored (with Kim Hartmann) “Shifting the Core,” an influential article calling for an urgent reconsideration of basic assumptions on privacy, encryption, and national cybersecurity in the context of constant, ubiquitous, and unconscious use of connected devices. He is also the author of a significant number of groundbreaking studies on Russian theory, doctrine, and structures for engaging in information and cyber-confrontation, many of which predate the explosion of interest in Russian information warfare, subversion, and disinformation that followed the annexation of Crimea.
64 pages, Kindle Edition
Published May 20, 2019
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