Written by Dr. Tom Clark:
Recent discussions about links between Battle Command and Design seem to understate the relative importance and difficulty of the Battle Command “Visualize” component. The Understand component requires effort. To Describe requires communication skills. Not to diminish the importance of either, Understand and Describe are skills-based, learned behaviors.
To “Visualize” is a mental process that brings clarity to the most complex topic on earth – human behavior in a competitive environment.
2-53. Visualizing military operations effectively depends on understanding the human factors involved in operations and the dynamics of operations themselves. Commanders consider both of these when performing their commander’s visualization (FM 6-0, 2003).
The “language” native to Visualization is a difficult translation into the native language of Understand and Describe. The Understand and Describe Battle Command components share a common language based in well-defined concepts based in words, figures, and symbols. Visualization relies on images, pictures, relationships, and “feelings.”
2-52. Visualize means to create and think in mental images. Human beings do not normally think in terms of data, or even knowledge; they generally think in terms of ideas or images—mental pictures of a given situation (FM 6-0, 2003).
As a rule of thumb, most humans focus on one topic at a time. The Uncertainty Principle suggests that the more we focus on one factor, the less we know about another. To Visualize requires thinking on multiple levels, simultaneously.
2-64. To visualize the battlespace, commanders consider the human dimension; the physical dimensions of width, depth, height, and time; and the information environment (FM 6-0, 2003).
2-61. Commander’s visualization is the mental process of achieving a clear understanding of the force’s current state with relation to the enemy and environment (situational understanding), and developing a desired end state that represents mission accomplishment and the key tasks that move the force from its current state to the end state (commander’s intent) (FM 6-0, 2003).
2-66. Key Tasks. Finally, commanders visualize the dynamics between the opposing forces during the sequence of actions leading from the current situation to the end state. This includes evaluating possible enemy reactions and friendly counters to those moves. This part of the commander’s visualization produces the key tasks: those tasks that the force as a whole must perform or conditions the force must meet to achieve the end state and stated purpose of the operation (FM 6-0, 2003).
5-59. The decisive operation is the operation that directly accomplishes the mission. It determines the outcome of a major operation, battle, or engagement. The decisive operation is the focal point around which commanders design the entire operation. Multiple units may be engaged in the same decisive operation. For example, one task force may follow another on an axis of advance, prepared to assume the attack. Units operating in noncontiguous areas of operations may execute the tasks composing the higher headquarters’ decisive operation simultaneously in different locations. Commanders visualize the decisive operation and then design shaping and sustaining operations around it (FM 3-0, 2008).
In glibly stating that commanders “describe their visualization” we grossly understate the effort first, to create mental images and second, to translate those images to others. Commanders visualize in terms of images, pictures, feelings, and relationships. Some of the world’s greatest thinkers have described the great difficulty of communicating their mental concepts into a form that is understandable to others.
In contrast to popular perceptions, to “Visualize” cannot be framed as an independent Battle Command component that falls between “Understand” and “Describe.” Visualization supports insight into how independent forces relate in time and space – how events unfold at the decisive operation. Visualization provides focus for planners to develop worthwhile courses of action. Visualization is the essence of mission command – it is a constantly changing, ready image of what’s going on and what needs to be done. The commander’s Visualization provides a foundation for an organization to mold behavior around “what the commander deems most important.”
Visualization is not important – more than essential, it’s critical. The capacity to Visualize is the power that enables decision-making aimed at both setting and achieving a desired end state. Visualization is the center of gravity for Battle Command and, by extension, the compass that marks “true north” for Mission Command.
One Comment on "Understand Visualize to Practice Design"
On 5/27/2009 @ 10:58:27 AM, Don MacCuish said:
Dr Clark,
You brought up some good points in regards to visualization.
I would, however, argue the visualization is also skills-based much like understand and describe. One of the major topics that the Army is not addressing in discussions on visualization is the concept of mental models. Visualization is about having “contextual intelligence”, or the ability to sense the contexts one is operating in and adopting a mental model in response for their organization. In the military, the context could be DIME or PMESII-PT, etc. Regardless, it is the ability to not become prisoner of your own assumptions and experinces; to not be constrained with the traditional solution to problems.
Developing visualization requires growth in independant thinking, open-mindedness, systems thinking, and personal mastery. It requires looking through a wide-angle lens rather than a telephoto lens.
You are right, it is not independent from the other components of Battle Command. By looking at it independently, you lose the ability to see the synergy of the “whole of Battle Command”. Each component reinforces the whole system and each component has an effect on the other components.