Dave,

MDMP has been and still is one of my pet peeves. It is a form of institutionalized paint by the numbers approach that seeks to replace experience with process. In other words, MDMP is a method for making up for poorly trained, inexperienced staff officers. This study is very refreshing in that it takes the experience factor and places it ahead of process. What I really like about it is that it does the same for inexperienced leaders, offering a method to systematically capture and expand their experience levels as they mature.

This also mirrors my own world of intelligence where IPB (a process) is too often equated with analysis, and that a distorted view of analysis that fixes on process. Whether you call it intuitive based or coup d'oeil ala Clausewitz, the more experienced you are in a given area or a realm of operations, the more you use that experience to format and develop your analysis. I had several occasions where I knew what was going to happen or that something was going to happen. But because there was no MDMP/IPB analytical paper trail to fit on a briefing slide, I had to watch as events proved me correct and my process-fixated superiors wrong.

I will offer this one out to Ops Grp here for their consideration.

Best all,
Tom