The author uses the military as an example of top down and that is true in many cases.
However, after reading the book Corps Business [0] about the United States Marine Corps, you realize that they are VERY big into having a top level mission but almost all of the decision making is pushed down to the lowest levels. In fact, if they do move decision making up the chain, it's usually for non-combat reason e.g. organizing the mess halls is moved up, how should we take that hill is moved "down" and closer to the front line troops.
Several of the other threads have mentioned "but how do we become those orgs??" and my best answer is just to read the book.
NOTE: the book was written in the late 1990s so there are some parts that are dated but the overall concepts are still sound.
The US military does a lot of things right. But not every concept matches over to the world of business.
A tremendous amount of time / money is spent on developing talent. There are way too many officers just for supervision; they are there so that leadership can be practiced, and just as important, so the next levels leaders can be selected. 'up or out' is what makes this work. You can't do this in a business.
(in peacetime) there is no cost of failure. The military can afford to learn. You can't do that in a business.
The book has value. I have read it. But there are several mis alignments across the problem domains.
The military can afford to learn. You can't do that in a business.
are you literally saying that businesses cannot afford to learn?
Businesses must afford to learn. Under capitalism, that's the job description. Those that fail to learn... just fail.
The entire reason for the existence of a market is to provide information. Buyers and consumers exchange information, coming to an agreed market price, if you're out of the loop, sorry. This was capitalism in 1790. This is still capitalism in 2026. Not much has changed in that regard.
The military can piss away millions of dollars, and hundreds of thousands of hours, and it is not an existential situation. Oh, we bought an airplane that is broken 1/2 of the time vs. the 10% of the time we budgeted for. No big deal. A business where an investment failed like that would be in trouble. In the military, they just take that as a lesson and move on (we shouldn't buy that again, or we should not use that process the next time).
Likewise with people. Hire someone, train them for 6 months, find out they cannot do the work. The military will retrain that person. Most businesses can deal with situations like that without going broke. If you ever have a spare hour, research how the Navy selects commanding officers for aircraft carriers. The select 5 for each future opening. All highly qualified pilots with demonstrated leadership potential. Then they send them to Nuclear school. 1 Year. Then another school for a year. One or two might get a carrier XO slot, one of those will get a command. The others, they just retire them. Crazy investment. No business would do that.
The military can piss away millions of dollars, and hundreds of thousands of hours, and it is not an existential situation.
Meta and it's pursuit of VR would like to have a word.
Crazy investment. No business would do that.
My dad was in a management training program in the 1980s that sound very much like you are describing. e.g. 100s of people start the program for maybe 20-30 slots. Everyone went through the same process for fairness and to identify who should move on.
Comments
The author uses the military as an example of top down and that is true in many cases.
However, after reading the book Corps Business [0] about the United States Marine Corps, you realize that they are VERY big into having a top level mission but almost all of the decision making is pushed down to the lowest levels. In fact, if they do move decision making up the chain, it's usually for non-combat reason e.g. organizing the mess halls is moved up, how should we take that hill is moved "down" and closer to the front line troops.
Several of the other threads have mentioned "but how do we become those orgs??" and my best answer is just to read the book.
NOTE: the book was written in the late 1990s so there are some parts that are dated but the overall concepts are still sound.
0 - https://www.amazon.com/dp/B000W94FFU?lv=shuf&channelId=500&r...
The US military does a lot of things right. But not every concept matches over to the world of business.
A tremendous amount of time / money is spent on developing talent. There are way too many officers just for supervision; they are there so that leadership can be practiced, and just as important, so the next levels leaders can be selected. 'up or out' is what makes this work. You can't do this in a business.
(in peacetime) there is no cost of failure. The military can afford to learn. You can't do that in a business.
The book has value. I have read it. But there are several mis alignments across the problem domains.
are you literally saying that businesses cannot afford to learn?
Businesses must afford to learn. Under capitalism, that's the job description. Those that fail to learn... just fail.
The entire reason for the existence of a market is to provide information. Buyers and consumers exchange information, coming to an agreed market price, if you're out of the loop, sorry. This was capitalism in 1790. This is still capitalism in 2026. Not much has changed in that regard.
I was rather loose with my terms.
The military can piss away millions of dollars, and hundreds of thousands of hours, and it is not an existential situation. Oh, we bought an airplane that is broken 1/2 of the time vs. the 10% of the time we budgeted for. No big deal. A business where an investment failed like that would be in trouble. In the military, they just take that as a lesson and move on (we shouldn't buy that again, or we should not use that process the next time).
Likewise with people. Hire someone, train them for 6 months, find out they cannot do the work. The military will retrain that person. Most businesses can deal with situations like that without going broke. If you ever have a spare hour, research how the Navy selects commanding officers for aircraft carriers. The select 5 for each future opening. All highly qualified pilots with demonstrated leadership potential. Then they send them to Nuclear school. 1 Year. Then another school for a year. One or two might get a carrier XO slot, one of those will get a command. The others, they just retire them. Crazy investment. No business would do that.
Meta and it's pursuit of VR would like to have a word.
My dad was in a management training program in the 1980s that sound very much like you are describing. e.g. 100s of people start the program for maybe 20-30 slots. Everyone went through the same process for fairness and to identify who should move on.
Yes, decentralized execution of commander’s intent is the bread and butter of military operations, at least in the Air Force.
This is also a core tenant in Ender's game.