I'm sitting here, palms all sweaty and a swallow caught in the throat. I'm just about to be told that I'm not good enough. Not good enough at planning that is. A while back when I first started teaching I was doing a lot and spun the wheel of doing furiously, but without proper planning I remained stuck in one place like the class hamster, Buddy.
The elections for a post-Mousebumples President are barely a day old and we have fourteen questions about how the candidates will achieve their goals. Europeians are itching for plans and strategy, demonstrations of competency and vision.
This, I believe, is not the right question to ask at this stage. The time for how comes later; first and foremost the question is 'why?'.
Commander's intent
Military planners use Commander's Intent to ensure a plan that is effective even in the most unpredictable and chaotic of scenes. Commander's Intent is the vision of the end, the purpose and the key tasks. Summed up it's:
1) “A concise expression of the purpose of the operation.”
2) “Must be understood two echelons below the issuing commander.”
3) “Focus subordinates on what has to be accomplished even when the plan and concept of operations no longer apply.”
Source
“No plan survives contact with the enemy.” a German strategist once said, and the way you ease that inveitablity is for a strong Commander's Intent.
The Way of the Why
Let's ground this IRNS (in-real-nation-states, the game as she is played), if you're going to ask writers to write more, why? If you're going to start an audio endeavour, you have to ask why? If you're going to start an interregional paper, the first thing is why? We spend far too little time on the why. As Notolecta remarked in his vivisection that:
Notolecta burns the EON in Notty Talk 004 (45 Seconds, Youtube)
Subtitles available. Select "English".
A coherent, powerful why is not readily apparent with the EON. Looking back in the archives I tried to find the why for the EON, and here it is:Europeian Overseas Network said:
That's a why, but does it resonate with you? Are the steps leading to increased domestic activity clear? And, is it, the more times you look at it, really what will get you out of bed?
If your Directors and Assistant Ministers, those two echelons, don't understand the why clearly then you'll need up with your own EON mess. The EON, and the many different pages.
Conversely, if you understand the why the more effective you are. I recently had a conversation with the Minister above me (Minister of Communications Notolecta) and he said that the,“Images in sig advertisements,” had to go. I knew they had to go. My plan, in all of its detail, was shot at first sunlight on signatures. My battleplan did not survive contact with the reality of the situation: graphics take time to make, they require the broadcaster so on the ball that he'd put in a request early and some people are running out of signature space. I was annoyed and frustrated. But then I remembered why I wanted them. The reason was that no matter where you were, you saw signatures. It is pervasive and effective advertising. Nothing in the why implied I had to use an image, so I used text instead. Understanding on a deep conceptual level, the why means that your Directors and Assistant Ministers can react faster and without your micromanagement.
You can't, as a President, as a Minister or a Director, do all the work yourself. You can't centralise it all. You must then empower through the Commander's Intent. But Commander's Intent is more than this.
The Context of Why
After Napeloen stormed across Europe, the Germans came up with the concept of Aftragstaktik- a philosophy rooted in the uncertainty of battle. We'd do well to acknowledge, as a region, the uncertainity of executive action. The philosophy was less of an 'I am in control of my soldiers' and more of an 'I trust my soliders to make decisions'. In the face of uncertainity, in the face of the caphocany of NationStates you need to trust your soliders --- your Ministers, Directors and Assistants (MDAs). The President utterly confident that the MDAs will act to the why.
The why isn't just the written intent. It's a philosophy and way of doing.
That is the way, nay, the why of the why.
By hyanygo
Edited by Writinglegend and Cassy Styles Anumia
