4 Decision Games That Changed Me |
Despite their name, Tactical Decision Games (TDGs), as they’re called, aren’t just a form of recreation. They can exert a powerful and lasting effect — changing a person’s mental model. This post describes my own experiences and transformation.
It was a simple scenario set at twilight. A squad is moving west to east on a path through hilly terrain when suddenly it is ambushed by the enemy. The first two fire teams are pinned down. You are the leader of the third fire team, and your unit is not pinned down. You can see that the fire is coming from a hill to the north of the path, just ahead. What do you do?
I posed this TDG to a class of U.S. Marine Corps NCOs (noncommissioned officers), and one of them, a tall, burly sergeant, immediately volunteered his answer: “I’d tell my men to follow me, and we would go charging up the hill to attack the force that was attacking us.”
I have never been in the military, and have minimal expertise, but even so, this tactic seemed very risky. I nodded supportively at him and called on someone else who, fortunately, had a much better idea, to lead his men up the neighboring hill just west of the enemy and use that position to drive the enemy off. And that got me off the hook and ended the game that night.
But years later, in a conversation about what to do when you have walked into an ambush, I mentioned the doctrine I had heard that you are supposed to immediately assault the force attacking you. My colleagues, experienced and sophisticated Marines, laughed. Yes, they said, this had been the doctrine maybe 150 years ago when people were using muzzle-loaded rifles. It........