Saying “No” to Defaults
It was another clear and crisp morning at 4 a.m. when we stumbled out of our tent and peered into the West Texas skyline to view the glow on the horizon. Ken, Jerry, and I quickly shaved and began our routine ten-minute stroll to the operational control center, where we were planning the next phase of the team’s flight operations. As operations team leaders, we were required to digest the newest intelligence, explore different courses of action, and create two to three plans for our team to accomplish the mission based on objective criteria. Following our briefings, our commanders would judge the courses of action based on the requirements and risk and decide on the appropriate option to execute. We leveraged a time management principle called the “1/3 – 2/3” rule. The rule is designed to control the amount of time used by senior leaders for their planning (1/3) and allow the more junior leaders sufficient time to plan, rehearse, and role-play in preparation for executing their flight mission (2/3). For example, if there were a 12-hour window to respond to a threat, our team would plan and present within 4 hours, and the flight crews would leverage the remaining 8 hours before executing the mission.
The three of us were already working on limited rest for successive days. Because we were in the initial phases of testing out new aircraft for the U.S. Army aviation, there was immense focus and scrutiny from senior Army aviation leaders. This training was a key milestone within the Army’s plan to roll out these aircraft across the globe, and we were informed that there was over a decade of preparation leading up to this moment. Our stress level was already high, and as the 20+ work hour days progressed, we slowly lost our ability to iterate well. We found ourselves giving in to the inertia of past decisions in our overall planning, which limited our creativity in solving problems under new and fresh intelligence and criteria. We had been successful for the past week, but with each successive day, additional layers of emotional and social pressure crept in. Leading up to this final day of mission planning, our commander took us aside and provided us with supporting critique and comments to help us navigate through.
Additional Thinking
In this week’s reading, Clear Thinking, Shane Parrish shares his “practical guide to mastering clear thinking.”[1] As I read through these chapters, I was reminded of a similar goal from Your Brain at Work[2], where Dr. David Rock presents a daily instruction guide to help focus, lower stress, and effectively aid the decision-making process. Each author informs leaders to reduce the amount of noise and improve their capability to make correct decisions. They agree that clear, informed, and quality decisions come from discipline and situational awareness. I enjoyed the affirmation shared by both authors, where we can learn to train our brains to improve thinking. This would be accomplished through enhanced routines, practice consistency, and overall mental awareness. Parrish shares practices and tools to turn clear thinking into effective decisions.[3]
Defaults
To overcome our behavioral instincts, Parrish informs us of four prominent internal forces that might lead to poor or uninformed decisions. He labels these emotional defaults. Similar to the System 1 thinking, outlined by Daniel Kahneman in Thinking, Fast and Slow[4], without mastering these defaults, our reactive responses and rapid decision-making process will lead to poor results.
- Emotional Default: Responding to feelings and not facts.
- Ego Default: Reaction to the threat to self-worth.
- Social Default: Conformance to norms of social groups.
- Inertia Default: Staying on the habitual course and resisting change.[5]
Fortunately, there are ways to decouple our unconscious response to these defaults. While exhibiting a strong will appears to provide an appropriate corrective path, the people with the best defaults typically have the best environment.[6] Managing through these defaults on our own won’t break the cycle.
Clear Thinking in Action
Parrish outlines tools and considerations for making effective and timely decisions. As I read through his work, it reminded me of how maintaining our discipline prevented us from falling into the default traps during the planning and execution process while conducting our flight operations. Parrish outlines specific principles and safeguards to leverage while working through an effective decision-making process.
- Defining the correct problem: You must take responsibility for the definition. Do the necessary work to understand it correctly.[7] For our Aviation operational planning team, the definition was understanding the actual threat and the key outcomes of the mission.
- Explore Possible Solutions: The Parrish 3+ principle recommends having three possible solutions to a problem.[8] Our planning team followed the same methodology. We arrived at two relatively quickly, and most times had to stretch ourselves to devise a third plan.
- Evaluating the Options: Parrish outlines that true leadership is maintained by focusing on the key criteria in the evaluation process.[9] Within our planning, we often took the best ideas and thoughts from the different plans and integrated them into one singular plan. Sometimes, that third “stretch” plan surprisingly provided the most key insights to execution. Parrish also incorporates the HIFI Principle, which states that you seek information closest to the real source.[10] As part of our briefings, the commanders who would execute the mission sat in the tent. They would listen intently and provide us direct feedback on the “why” this was an incomplete or riskier plan. It was invaluable, and we would incorporate changes leading into our final planning briefings.
- Margin of Safety: A buffer between what you expect to happen and what could happen. It’s designed to save you when surprises are expensive.[11] Within each mission, we understood the enemy could alter tactics, or we could run into adverse environmental conditions. We also leveraged one of the fail-safes that Parrish annotates. The commander’s intent is to empower others (in this case, the pilots) to act and make decisions.[12]
- Learning from Your Decisions: Recording results and reflecting on decisions are key to improving the overall process in the present and future. After each flight mission, we participated in a detailed debrief called an After-Action Review (AAR). This allowed everyone to provide feedback and incorporate the key learnings and actions into subsequent missions.
In the end, our discussion with our commander proved fruitful. He quickly reminded us of how objective we had been leading up to these final days, and he was extremely proud of our combined discipline and energy to solve. While the intensity and pressure of the moment were incredibly high, it was gratifying. However, behind all the accolades and hoopla, it most importantly gave us a solid operational foundation to build on in our careers. Moving forward, exploring the ideas, language, and tools that Parrish provides will continue to allow me to refine my practice around clear thinking and the thoughts and actions of my immediate leadership team.
[1] Shane Parrish, Clear Thinking: Turning Ordinary Moments into Extraordinary Results, (New York, NY: Latticework Publishing, 2023), x.
[2] Dr. David Rock, Your Brain at Work: Strategies for Overcoming Distraction, Regaining Focus, and Working Smarter All Day Long, (New York, NY: Harper Collins Publishers, 2020)
[3] Parrish, xi.
[4] Daniel Kahneman, Thinking, Fast and Slow, (New York, N.Y.: Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 2011)
[5] Parrish, 11.
[6] Parrish, 37.
[7] Parrish, 128.
[8] Parrish, 146.
[9] Parrish, 161.
[10] Parrish, 165.
[11] Parrish, 194.
[12] Parrish, 208.
About the Author
Michael Hansen
8 responses to “Saying “No” to Defaults”
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Thanks for sharing this practical example of managing defaults, Mike.
How have you taken these lessons learned and applied them to life after military service, and how do you manage your defaults today?
Joff,
I appreciate the questions. My background and wide array of experiences have been invaluable… to a point. Over the years, I have needed to modify and temper many of these approaches, tactics, and models. It’s been an iterative process, and there are many roles where I have left tools sitting idle in the toolkit. Right tool, but the wrong job or moment.
When I transitioned off active duty military service into B-school and subsequently into the civilian sector, I worked at a quicker pace than I do today. However, I have determined in the process that I can bring others along better and achieve improved results.
I am more aligned with emotional and inertia defaults. My roles have been more about efficiency and not anchored to the current process or history. I would struggle more with the ego and social defaults. With my managers, I tread carefully about drawing the line between an idea and an excuse. Socially, I have never enjoyed working for larger organizations with layers of process, policy, and procedures. This can manifest in various ways, and my experience has been that these have been limiters and not accelerators. My team’s performance on paper and in actuality has been excellent, and despite those results, I would find it to be a grind, slow, and less rewarding.
Thanks for your response, Mike.
What stood out to me was a similar response David gave to Ivan in his (David’s) post this week: his decision making during active service was often very quick, and it’s much slower these days. I’ve noticed this from other colleagues who have served too, particularly in the US military. There’s a part of me that would be fascinated to go through a military leadership academy just to experience for myself how it is approached.
Joff,
It is a unique institution to learn and participate in. To the observer, it’s pretty impressive. However, it operates at a completely different operational tempo inside its four walls. I read through David’s post, and he referenced the same model I shared from my experience in the hills of West Texas. The lessons I learned from constructing, participating in, or viewing those briefs were gold and stand a test of time.
One of my best friends is a Navy chaplain stationed in South Korea. When he was in Japan, I got to visit him on base and see a little bit of military life firsthand. This week, he’s here visiting me in Hawaii, and we even got to go on a Navy ship together, such a cool experience! Reading about your high-pressure flight planning made me appreciate even more how much clear thinking, discipline, and structure matter in that kind of environment. I’m curious, how did going through something so intense shape how you live your life and handle challenges today?
Ivan,
The transition to the civilian sector was challenging. In the military, one aligns with like-minded, mission-oriented thinkers and removes much of the noise from the overall symphony one is trying to produce. I have experienced this when I worked in business development or strategic planning with larger companies. There was more focus on mission, vision, and strategic implications.
Over time, I have become a kinder, gentler, and more understanding leader. Many factors have contributed to this, and it is not that I ever ignored my team’s needs. They just show up differently. I had to come to the conclusion that my teams were not going to ever see or experience what I had encountered in the past. I was the one in the minority.
Each leadership role has looked different from a business perspective, and I had to tailor my message, approach, and expectations to fit accordingly.
Michael,
What an intense and meaningful experience! Thank you for sharing it with such clarity. You connected your high-pressure environment to Parrish’s ideas so well, especially around overcoming default behaviors and creating space for better decisions. It’s clear that your discipline and reflection under pressure built more than just operational success, it has built wisdom.
Do you think your military experience has shaped the way you mentor or lead team members now facing similar challenges?
Linda,
That experience was invaluable. I was fortunate to have two superb bosses with 20+ years of experience in the Army. One critical component was learning how to pace and self-regulate. This experience also provided me with a longer-term perspective and an experimental mind. We worked hard to iterate and find creative solutions. I have brought much of that to my teams. I try to facilitate creativity and have my team members ask hard questions as we seek answers.