Burning the Saplings of Innovation

As DoD embarks on new processes, whether directed by Congress or self-initiated, there’s a corrosive culture to want to analyze the new thing in detail from the start.

This often includes a report to Congress, multiple GAO and/or DOD IG audits, and many updates to senior leadership.

What many don’t realize is the oppressive oversight of a new sapling of an idea is often like a mischievous boy burning things with a magnifying glass on a sunny day.

Less time is spent on shaping and implementing the new thing as more time is spent on feeding the oversight beast.

Critics of the new thing, fully understand this effect, and do so to sabotage it before the roots take hold. They look for early signs of failures to prove the new thing is bad and we must return to the status quo.

One common approach is to establish a pilot program whereby a handful of programs are empowered to pilot the exciting new approach. Experienced managers will often avoid being a pilot program knowing the burdens and risks that come with it. Oversight organizations and GAO will regularly seek quantifiable metrics that the new approach achieved measurable impacts. Given the endless array of variables on a program or organization, it is extremely difficult to isolate the impact of the new thing.

Pilot programs implementing the new thing must regularly battle functional organizations who question the new approach - “That’s not how it’s been done for the last 20 years.” - and often impose legacy artifacts and thinking. Managers are hit with regular data calls, status updates, and reviews to see how’s it going.

Another approach is to establish a Commission or Board to study the problem. As the commission (and pilots) will often take 2-3 years to provide insights and recommendations, the DoD will continue with broken processes and structures.

Conversely, when embarking on a new thing, when DoD leadership and Congress ask how’s it going, the response can’t be a collective shrug.

We need to find the right environment where the new things have fertile soil, water, and sunshine to grow along with room to breathe. This includes providing sufficient support, resources, and top-cover to implement the new thing. It cannot just be an additional duty for overworked programs or HQ staff.

Those involved in growing the new saplings should take measurements along the way and - when ready - share the findings with key stakeholders. We need to bake in some scientific rigor as we adopt new methods.

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When discussing enterprise reforms, leaders will often seek examples of the current challenges or successful efforts. Having a set of vignettes can be powerful to convey a story to stakeholders on the need to change or scale early success.

Critics of change however will cross their arms and ask for 5-10 detailed examples with supporting data on why the current model is bad before they even begin to explore changing. They know the significant time and energy it will take to assemble that case and can point to other factors why those example programs failed or succeeded to undermine the reforms.

Flipping the script can look like this:

If we were to design the system today based on what we know,
would it look anything like the current system we have?

In many cases the answer is heck no! Only a sadist would design the system like the outmoded system designed 30-60 years ago. Yet people get defensive when you call their baby ugly.

Changing an entrenched system in a large bureaucracy is extremely difficult. We need to explore avenues to build better models and scale adoption going forward. We need to shrink the change into small elements to it doesn’t spook the critics and early adopters. After understanding others’ perspectives, seek to encourage change using their language, and rally others to join you.

Many of these insights came from Dan and Chip Heath’s book Switch.