Original article here

I have spent decades immersed in the world of geopolitical intelligence and remain a practitioner of the craft today. With this post I reflect on some of the key lessons I have learned in seeking to optimize geopolitical intelligence analysis and reporting.

One of the goals I have in sharing these lessons is to help you optimize your use of the reporting you see in the OODA daily pulse and the long form research and reporting done for our OODA network members. However, these lessons can also be applied to any organization seeking to improve the application of insights to operational decision-making. You will also find these lessons useful to personal decision-making.

I review lessons learned in geopolitical intelligence in the following categories:

• Focusing on Insights for Decision-Making
• Information Gathering and Validation
• Analytical Techniques and Strategies
• Contextual Understanding
• Influence of External Factors
• Professional Networking and Continuous Collaboration

Insights and Decision-Making

• Seek Insights that Can Inform Decisions: From day one of training to be a Naval Intelligence officer they beat this into our heads: We were not there to be historians and just report on what had happened. Anyone can do that. We were there to assess dynamic situations, put issues into context, and shed light on what may come next. When considering an unfolding situation we seek to bring insight to two key questions: ‘So what?’ and ‘What’s next?’
• Assess the Impact of Decisions: The discipline of intelligence I focused on is known as operational intelligence, or OPINTEL. This is all about informing decisions based on real world data and assessments of dynamic situations. The decision-makers who consumed this type of intelligence would take actions that would change the situation. This occurs in far more than military situations. Any competitive environment where decisions are being made will change because of those decisions. Like the OODA Loop we named our site after implies, actions are not the end of a process; analysis must be continual.
• Question Everything: An early lesson from my time running all source intelligence operations is the observation that any source of information has its own strengths and weaknesses, and any can, at times, be flat wrong. This means skepticism is essential in intelligence analysis. Question assumptions, challenge narratives, and verify the validity of all information. Every source of information has flaws.
• Balance Short-Term and Long-Term Perspectives: In the geopolitical domain, immediate crises are important to understand, but long-term trends and developments often have more significant impacts. This critical point is why the urgent never-ending hair on fire stories on most news channels can lead us astray. Ensure you are thinking through what the long-term impacts of any situation are and what they can have on your organization. An example is the topic of global demographic shifts. This is not a topic you will see on the evening news. But it is driving changes that should inform decisions by nations, corporations and even individuals.
• Stay Informed and Continuously Learn: Geopolitical analysis requires constant updating of knowledge and skills and constant insight into the changing situation on every continent. Stay abreast of current events, emerging trends, and new methodologies. We trust you will keep OODA as one of your information feeds here, but staying informed means having a very robust information diet with multiple sources (more on that below).

Information Gathering and Validation

• The First Report is Always Wrong: This adage has served me well for years. On any urgent report remember you have time to take a deep breath and think and seek to put things in context. This is critical since initial information is often incomplete or inaccurate. You may have to make assumptions based on experience and if you do, be sure that is reflected and caveated as such. And seek corroboration when you can.
• All-Source Intelligence is the Goal: Integrating multiple sources is critical to forming a comprehensive picture. I mentioned above the fact that any source of information can have flaws. Relying on a single source can lead to biased or skewed conclusions, so ensure you have good coverage from multiple sources. Triangulate data from diverse origins.
• Be Aware of Your Sources: Being proactive means seeking out the right sources before a crisis.

Analytical Techniques and Strategies

• Know Your Models In Advance: The study of mental models can improve your ability to make decisions. There are many to master. For a review of those most critical to success in competitive environments see: Mental Models For Leadership in the Modern Age.
• Avoid Pilot Fixation: Pilot fixation is the term used to describe when a pilot is so focused on something they lose awareness of other critically important aspects of the situation. Do not get tunnel vision on one issue or region. Maintain situational awareness and consider the broader geopolitical landscape.
• Prepare for Surprise: Expect the unexpected. Geopolitical dynamics are fluid and can change rapidly, often without warning.
• Monitor the Margins: Often, significant changes start at the periphery. Pay attention to seemingly minor events that may indicate larger trends.
• Be Wary of Confirmation Bias: Avoid letting personal beliefs or preferences color your analysis. Strive for objectivity and impartiality (if you can figure out how to do this let me know, I have tried a lifetime to beat this one and it is hard, but we all have to try). There are many other bias and cognitive traps to watch out for, see: The Executive’s Guide to Cognitive Bias.

Contextual Understanding

• Understand the Historical Context: Current events are often rooted in historical precedents. Understanding history provides critical insights into present situations. This understanding will help improve your ability to assess situations. It can also help you communicate with decision-makers, many of which will also understand the historical context.
• Evaluate the Motives of All Actors: Every player has their own interests and motivations. Assess these to better predict their actions and reactions.
• Cultural Awareness is Key: Deep understanding of cultural norms, values, and behaviors can provide crucial insights into a region’s actions and reactions. It is amazing how this lesson repeats itself through history. It is reflected in the writings of Thucydides and Sun Tzu and is part of the lessons learned in just about every major geopolitical issue I know, but still too many fail to treat this as a lesson worth embodying in improving analysis.
• Consider the Environmental Factors: Climate change, natural disasters, water wars and resource scarcity have profound geopolitical impacts.
• Assess Internal Dynamics: Domestic politics, social movements, and internal conflicts within a country can significantly influence its foreign policy.

Influence of External Factors

• Economic Indicators are Crucial: Economic stability or instability can drive geopolitical events. Keep a close watch on economic data and trends. This includes exports and imports of raw materials and national debt to GDP ratios. Long term, the previously mentioned demographic shifts are pointing to significant economic changes for most every nation.
• Technological Changes Impact Geopolitics: Advances in technology can shift power balances. Stay informed about technological developments and their potential implications. We make technology assessment a big part of our analysis at OODAloop.com and find it very helpful in bringing context to geopolitical analysis.

Professional Networking and Continuous Collaboration

• Engage in Network Building: This is about something far more important than sources. This is about networking with others who can help you think through complex dynamic situations. For example, the members of the OODA network who come from a variety of backgrounds including technologists, analysts, investors and global business leaders. It is critical to have a good network before you need one.
• Ethical Considerations Matter: Everyone in your organization should understand that you consider integrity and ethical interactions as critical to running a good analysis operation. So should everyone you support with intelligence assessments. Having a reputation for sticking to assessments without allowing undue influence is also a key ethical consideration.

The lessons I learned from decades of work in geopolitical analysis will help you make the most of our reporting and research at OODA, and can also help organizations seeking to improve internal intelligence processes. Join us in the Member Only Slack Workspace to discuss further and share your views.

For more on related topics see:

A Practitioner’s View of Corporate Intelligence: Organizations in competitive environments should continually look for ways to gain advantage over their competitors. The ability of a business to learn and translate that learning into action, at speeds faster than others, is one of the most important competitive advantages you can have. This fact of business life is why the model of success in Air to Air combat articulated by former Air Force fighter pilot John Boyd, the Observe – Orient – Decide – Act (OODA) decision loop, is so relevant in business decision-making today. In this business model, decisions are based on observations of dynamic situations tempered with business context to drive decisions and actions. These actions should change the situation meaning new observations and new decisions and actions will follow. This all underscores the need for a good corporate intelligence program.

Optimizing Corporate Intelligence: This post dives into actionable recommendation on ways to optimize a corporate intelligence effort. It is based on a career serving large scale analytical efforts in the US Intelligence Community and in applying principles of intelligence in corporate America.

Mental Models For Leadership In The Modern Age: The study of mental models can improve your ability to make decisions and improve business outcomes. This post reviews the mental models we recommend all business and government decision makers master, especially those who must succeed in competitive environments.

An Executive’s Guide To Cognitive Bias in Decision Making: Cognitive Bias and the errors in judgement they produce are seen in every aspect of human decision-making, including in the business world. Companies that have a better understanding of these cognitive biases can optimize decision making at all levels of the organization, leading to better performance in the market. Companies that ignore the impact these biases have on corporate decision-making put themselves at unnecessary risk. This post by OODA Co-Founder Bob Gourley provides personal insights into key biases as well as mitigation strategies you can put in place right now.

OODA On Corporate Intelligence In The New Age: We strongly encourage every company, large or small, to set aside dedicated time to focus on ways to improve your ability to understand the nature of the significantly changed risk environment we are all operating in today, and then assess how your organizational thinking should change. As an aid to assessing your corporate sensemaking abilities, this post summarizes OODA’s research and analysis into optimizing corporate intelligence for the modern age.

Useful Standards For Corporate Intelligence: This post discusses standards in intelligence, a topic that can improve the quality of all corporate intelligence efforts and do so while reducing ambiguity in the information used to drive decisions and enhancing the ability of corporations to defend their most critical information.

John Boyd on Patterns of Conflict and the OODA Loop: John Boyd studied. He studied fighter pilot tactics, studied aeronautical engineering, studied bureaucrats and how to avoid their traps, studied evolution and biology, and studied history. And Boyd synthesized in a way that only a real practitioner of war could to produce a briefing called Patterns of Conflict that is still having a big impact on the world today. A full copy of the briefing is linked here. This post summarizes some key points worth reflecting on as the world views and reacts to the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

The OODA Loop Explained: The real story about the ultimate model for decision-making in competitive environments: In this article Matt Devost and Bob Gourley provide practitioner’s context on a concept near and dear to our heart, the OODA Loop. In doing so we capture why this concept is so relevant to any competitive situation, including business and cybersecurity. The OODA Loop is an approach to decision-making developed by retired Air Force Colonel John Boyd based on his decades of experience as a pilot and extensive study of the greatest battles in history.

In Business, Like In War, Data Is A Weapon: Broadly speaking, a weapon is anything that provides an advantage over an adversary. In this context, data is, and always has been, a weapon. This post, part of our Intelligent Enterprise series, focuses on how to take more proactive action in use of data as a weapon.

Fine Tuning Your Falsehood Detector: Time to update the models you use to screen for deception, dishonesty, corruption, fraud and falsity: The best business leaders are good at spotting falsehoods. Some joke and say the have a “bullshit detector”, but that humorous description does not do service to the way great leaders detect falsehoods. Bullshit is easy to detect. You see it and smell it and if you step in it it is your own fault. In the modern world falsehoods are far more nuanced. Now more than ever, business and government leaders need to ensure their mental models for detecting falsehood are operating in peak condition.

Scenario Planning for Strategic Decision-making: Scenario planning is an often overlooked aspect of corporate decision-making. But it is needed now more than ever. Scenario planning is a methodology for helping leaders think through alternative futures in a way that enables identification of issues. It raises potential outcomes and impacts and helps conceptualize potential risks and opportunities so organizations can be better prepared.