One Half a Revolution in Orientation

The military is locked in a technology-driven orientation that designed great command and control systems for the cold war, but this same mentality is inadequate to address decision making challenges of the future. Consequently, the military must rebuild its intellectual framework to link decision makers to forces in an incredibly dynamic environment. The appropriate rebuilding is through a decision-centered approach to command and control systems. To adequately comprehend this approach, policy makers must understand how humans decide and how decision makers fit into complex systems. This study investigates current research on decision making and links naturalistic decision making theory with complexity theory to provide a basis for analyzing decision support systems. Using Boyd's "OODA" loop as a frame of reference, this paper describes how the post cold war orientation has changed decision requirements. Next, the study proceeds with a discussion on decision theory with thoughts on how recent progress in naturalistic decision making theory should fundamentally redirect decision system design. Complexity theory offers an opportunity to link the decision maker to other elements of a unit and provides a basis for advocating decision-centered methods to improve decision performance. The study concludes with comments and recommendations on current efforts to move toward decision centered design.