How Business Leaders Can Use The Military’s Commander's Intent

“Don't tell people how to do things, tell them what to do and let them surprise you with their results.” – General George S. Patton

What does success look like? When we are done with the program or project do we all know what excellent or even good enough is??Mike Tyson once said “Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the mouth.”?Business plans and project plans are no different.?We get hit with unexpected situations or competitive counter moves.?Not unlike combat, where there is plan, called an Operations Order or OPORD, in business the conditions and situations change rapidly almost immediately after the kickoff.?There will be obstacles and setbacks.?

Enter Commander’s Intent. The simplest layman’s definition is painting a picture for your team of what success looks like.

COMMANDER’S INTENT. ?In this paragraph of the written plan, or OPORD, the leader develops a personal description of what the end state looks like.?Their vision for success.?Military manuals state “The commander’s intent must be easy to remember and clearly understood two echelons down.”

It all starts with a mission.?The OPORD is the military equivalent of a business plan or project plan.?It outlines the situation, the mission, the resources and team for a particular effort.?It discusses everything from enemy forces (competition) to supply and logistics, from friendly forces (business partners and teams) to recon and surveillance (market intelligence).?The most important part is the MISSION.?My 1990 Ranger handbook defines it as a clear, concise statement that includes the Who, What, Where, When, and Why of the operation to be conducted.

But once the mission is communicated and understood, the leader MUST anticipate the chaos and uncertainty that will follow as we pursue the mission. In order to properly empower your team and staff, you must give them the right to adjust and make decisions on the fly.?Or as we say in military, ADAPT, IMPROVISE, OVERCOME.?That is one of the hallmarks of US military – delegating authority down to the leaders who are on the ground in the heat of the battle where decisive action and commitment of resources and personnel is critical for victory. ???

It must be brief – succinct. When combined with the mission statement it gives subordinate leaders the ability to understand the overall purpose and have a picture painted in their mind what success looks like. ???In simplest terms if mission = goal then intent = successful goal achievement.?Everything else become a means to the end.?They are just tactics, techniques, and actions all with the universally agreed upon target in mind.

“Plans are worthless, but planning is everything.” ? - Dwight D. Eisenhower, 5-Star General, Supreme Commander of the Allied Forces, WWII and 34th President of the United States.

Planning is critical and outlines everything including potential courses of action, concept of the operation, and the resources available.?But for me, after the mission statement the single most important part of even the longest and most complex plan is COMMANDER’S INTENT. ?Perhaps the Wikipedia description captures the importance of it best “vital element to facilitate subordinates' initiative and collaboration and cooperation amongst team members”?By using Commander’s Intent, everyone on the team knows what your vision of success looks like.?It enables them to adapt, improvise, and overcome to ensure mission success.

There is an art and science to a good commander’s intent or vision of success.?It has to be concise, but have enough detail that those working on the task, project or business will recognize it when they see it or achieve it including the conditions and characteristics of successful completion. ?Don’t be afraid to use S.M.A.R.T. Goals when describing successful completion. A picture may be worth a thousand words, but some metrics and data sprinkled in are always useful to help the team wrap their head around ultimate targets. ?

Don’t overthink it.?Operation Overlord was the plan for the Allied invasion of Normandy.?The operation was HUGE and the stakes were nothing less than the fate of all of Europe.?But, the Commander’s Intent was simple “to secure key bridges, road junctions and other locations in Normandy that would allow the ground invasion forces to advance inland.” You don’t have to be a history buff to remember how disastrous the airborne drops were and initial beach landing was. Chaos and confusion.?But all the unit commanders knew even as things went sideways what the ultimate measure of success was.?At the small unit level, they re-grouped, re-assessed, and reorganized their efforts so that no matter what the final mission was complete.

Let’s take a quick peek at two situations in the business world and see how goal is the same, but the Commander’s Intent would change actions and attitudes significantly.?

?Coffee Distributor: My intent is that we ship 100lbs of each of our top five selling coffee blends to our new customer Chef Charlie’s Café by Wednesday for his grand opening next Monday. That is VERY different than: My intent is that ensure 100lbs of each of our top five selling blends arrives at our new customer Chef Charlie’s Café by noon on Saturday for his grand opening next Monday. Technology company: My intent is that we email the software download keys to Sue Jones at Company A by Friday at 9am. ?That is VERY different than: My intent is that we ensure our code is active and working at Company A’s 14 end user locations and Sue Jones signs off. ??A new sale is the goal in both these scenarios.?But if the job isn’t complete until you ensure the coffee arrives is different than ensuring it ships and ensuring the software is working is different than emailing the passwords to download and may require onsite resources too.?

Trust your team. With a well written and communicated mission and intent – no need to micro-manage.?You can now delegate decision making down to the lowest levels including those most engaged and most responsible for the actions, tasks, and progress. In my personal leadership philosophy I tell my team “I expect a bias toward action. Three things: Think like a customer, act like an owner and behave ethically.?Anything else - including mistakes and failures we can deal with together if you adhered to those three guidelines.”

I am a fan of detailed plans, market analysis, and contingency plans.?So, the next time you kick off a project, program, or new business endeavor, have a detailed plan.?But, please take extra time to write, share, and then discuss in detail your vision for success (commander’s intent) knowing your original plan may not survive but the mission must.?This simple statement used by our military for ages will align your team, empower them while ensuring proper buy in, and maybe even eliminate some execution friction.??

Further Reading:

Manage Uncertainty with Commander’s Intent via Harvard Business Review Commander’s Intent is the description and definition of what a successful mission will look like. Military planning begins with the Mission Statement that describes the who, what, when, where, and why (the 5 W’s) of how a mission will be executed. Commander’s Intent describes how the Commander (read: CEO) envisions the battlefield at the conclusion of the mission. It shows what success looks like. Commander’s Intent fully recognizes the chaos, lack of a complete information picture, changes in enemy situation, and other relevant factors that may make a plan either completely or partially obsolete when it is executed. The role of Commander’s Intent is to empower subordinates and guide their initiative and improvisation as they adapt the plan to the changed battlefield environment. Commander’s Intent empowers initiative, improvisation, and adaptation by providing guidance of what a successful conclusion looks like. Commander’s Intent is vital in chaotic, demanding, and dynamic environments.

You Have To Intend What You Intended via Rob Campbell Leadership On the beaches of Normandy, France in World War II, individuals and units were given the intent to secure the beachhead and open passage ways for follow-on forces to penetrate deeper inland. At its most tactical this intent translated to "hold this bridge."?When developing missions, I spent most of my time crafting my intent. It was critical for my people to know what I intended. They would find their own solutions to achieve my intent but my job was to get the words right. I still use intent and coach it today.

Use Commander’s Intent to Empower Your Team for Execution via AchieveIt blog Borrowed from the military, Commander’s Intent has been relied upon for decades as the go-to framework for military operations. The concept, however, is equally applicable in the business world…The focus on the goal ensures teams have guidance in their work but autonomy to be experts in their field enough to make real-time decisions along the way.

Intent (Military) via Wikipedia ?(Sample definitions U.S., NATO, Joint Forces) For military strategy, Intent is the desired outcome of a military operation. It is a key concept in 21st century military operations and is a vital element to facilitate subordinates' initiative and collaboration and cooperation amongst team members in joint operations.

US Field Manual 5.0 (U.S. Army 2010, para. 2-90) "The commander’s intent is a clear, concise statement of what the force must do and the conditions the force must establish with respect to the enemy, terrain, and civil considerations that represent the desired end state

(FM 3–0). The commander's intent succinctly describes what constitutes success for the operation. It includes the operation’s purpose and the conditions that define the end state. It links the mission, concept of operations, and tasks to subordinate units."

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