Foresight = Battlefield Transparency

Business leaders grapple with planning for the future even though the future is unknowable. To overcome “future shock” they use foresight to detect early signals and develop capabilities to respond swiftly to them. Yet, surveys suggest that only 25 percent of all Fortune 500 companies have foresight expertise at the executive level. Military leaders on the other hand, understand early the fundamentals of foresight - we call it achieving Battlefield Transparency. While Peter Drucker, the late management guru, said “look out of the window and see what’s visible but not yet seen”, much earlier, The Duke of Wellington had said “all the business of war, indeed of life, is to guess what is on the other side of the hill.” So how do military leaders achieve battlefield transparency or foresight?

Firstly, we crowd source our risk information. From the strategic to the tactical, a matrix of surveillance is designed by synergizing devices and their capabilities. They pick up early and late indicators of battle. One third of our resources are deployed in a manner to provide information of emergent threats and to exploit opportunities. Business leaders need to allot a similar level of importance and asset prioritization so that they can see through the “Fog of War” and with these concomitant inputs be able to visualize future scenarios.

Secondly, we create hubs where all the information is synthesized into intelligence. These nerve centres filter information, prioritise them and provide a concise intelligence gist, for commanders to take informed decisions. This synthesis is based on doctrinal templates or lessons from the past and situational templates or lessons from contemporary events. The intelligence provided by these hubs is critical for leaders to articulate the future.

Thirdly, based on the intelligence picture provided, we reframe the future and articulate it as the enemy’s likely Pattern of Operations. We thus create scenarios and wargame the likely courses multiple scenarios can evolve into. We appreciate threats and opportunities in each of these likelihoods. The tangible output of this process is our plan – the Design of Battle.??With this design in mind, we build capabilities to execute this plan.?

Active foresight or battlefield transparency is a key competency to create a future-ready force which can mitigate risks and exploit opportunities. This is the foundation on which agile teams can perceive, prepare and propel themselves through an uncertain and ambiguous future.??