As I sat down to write this blog post on Shane Parrish’s New York Times Bestseller, Clear Thinking [1], I suddenly became quite fuzzy due to heavy ingestion of serious painkillers. I knew that many things were competing for my clarity of thought. I suddenly felt the urge to turn this ordinary moment into an extraordinary result.<\/p>\n
I have always considered myself a clear thinker. It is only as I have aged that I have realized that to think of oneself as a clear thinker may be a prodrome to the reality that my thinking may not be as clear as I am giving myself credit for. It is with this confession that I initiate the writing of this blog.<\/p>\n
Decision-making has been a big part of my adult life. I was first introduced formally to decision-making models in 1981 when I was commissioned into the United States Cavalry. I was adept at using the Military Decision-Making Process, which is one of the reasons that I was so interested in Shane Parrish’s book on decision-making. It dawned on me, “If it is not broken, don’t try to fix it.” This certainly pertains to the historical use of decision-making processes and, more specifically, to Shane Parrish.<\/p>\n
The first documented use of what is now known as the Military Decision-Making Process (MDMP) was in 1779 during the Revolutionary War, specifically Friedrich Wilhelm Ludolf Gerhard Augustin Louis Freiherr von Steuben’s “Estimate of the Situation” for General Washington prior to the attack on Stony Point, NY.[2]<\/p>\n
Below, I will list the 7 steps of Baron Von Steuben from the Military Decision-making Process as he designed it. Below, I will list Shane Parrish’s 7-step decision-making process. I will then compare them, demonstrating that there is little difference between the two.<\/p>\n
The 7 steps of the Military Decision Making Process (MDMP) are as follows:[3]<\/p>\n
Parrish’s Major steps to Decision-making. [4]<\/p>\n
MDMP \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0Parrish’s 7 Steps. \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 Similarities<\/p>\n
Receipt of Mission. \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 Define the Problem. \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 Both begin with understanding the problem<\/p>\n
Mission Analysis. \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0Clarify Objectives. \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0Digging into purpose, constraints, and goals<\/p>\n
COA Development. \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 Listing All Options. \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0Generating potential solutions or actions<\/p>\n
COA Analysis \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 Evaluate Consequences \u00a0 \u00a0 Assessing pros\/cons and risks of options<\/p>\n
COA Comparison. \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 Make Tradeoffs. \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0Comparing options based on effectiveness, cost, risk, etc.<\/p>\n
COA Approval. \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 Make a Decision. \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 Choosing the best course<\/p>\n
Orders Production. \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0Communicate and Act. \u00a0 \u00a0 Formalizing and executing the decision.<\/p>\n
As you can see, there are across-the-board relatively strong similarities between Von Steuben’s MDMP and Parrish’s 7 Steps. My point is not to disparage Parrish in any way, but to demonstrate that both the MDMP and the 7-Step process are such powerful decision models that little has changed over the past few hundred years in this practice from the battlefield to your personal life.<\/p>\n
One of my takeaways from Parrish’s book is that it reinforces Daniel Kahneman’s concept of Fast versus Slow Thinking. Parrish describes what is often considered thinking as more like reacting without reasoning. He then goes on to describe the notion that intentional reasoning is a longer process and leads to clearer-minded results. Parrish ties the matter of clear thinking in connection with our life’s purposes and personal goals. “All the successful executions in the world are worthless if it is not in service of the right outcome.” [5]<\/p>\n
Parrish brings everything together well at the end. \u00a0He tells the reader, “Good decision-making comes down to two things: 1. Knowing how to get what you want and 2. Knowing what is worth wanting.”[6] He goes on to conclude by saying that the first point is about making effective decisions. The second is about making good ones. The difference between the two is significant.<\/p>\n
References:<\/p>\n
[1] \u00a0Shane Parrish, Clear Thinking: Turning Ordinary Moments into Extraordinary Results<\/em>(New York, NY: Portfolio\/Penguin, 2023).<\/p>\n [2]. FM 101-5 Staff Organization and Operations (DA, 1997)<\/p>\n [3]. Combat Studies Institute, 7 steps of the Military Decision Making Process (MDMP), https:\/\/www.armyupress.army.mil\/Portals\/7\/combat-studies-institute\/csi-books\/FromOneLeadertoAnother.pdf<\/p>\n [4]. Shane Parrish, Clear Thinking: Turning Ordinary Moments into Extraordinary Results<\/em>(New York, NY: Portfolio\/Penguin, 2023).<\/p>\n [5] ibid, page 8<\/p>\n [6] ibid, page xi<\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" As I sat down to write this blog post on Shane Parrish’s New York Times Bestseller, Clear Thinking [1], I suddenly became quite fuzzy due to heavy ingestion of serious painkillers. I knew that many things were competing for my clarity of thought. I suddenly felt the urge to turn this ordinary moment into an […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":215,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[3465],"class_list":["post-41703","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-parrish-dlgp04","cohort-dlgp04"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41703","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/215"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=41703"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41703\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":41730,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41703\/revisions\/41730"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=41703"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=41703"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=41703"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}