Richard Neustadt, Ernest May. Contemporary reflections

22.02.2012

How to reach the decision maker in active sales?

For brevity, in the article we will use the abbreviated version of the phrase "decision maker" , how decision maker. This narrow-profile term is used by telemarketers and sales managers, negotiators, that is, those people who are interested in competently building the process of selling goods or services. A similar abbreviation is used in systems analysis and operations research, indicating a specific subject who will say his "yes" at the very end.

The decision maker in active sales is both the board of directors of a large corporation, without whose general decision not to put the main point in resolving some issue, and an individual person endowed with power and / or authority, able to take responsibility for the solution that he approves.

decision maker, who, where and how to find

decision maker what distinguishes it from all other employees of a company or organization is the possibility of making a final decision after its preparation by a group of researchers or experts and comprehensive consideration. The complexity of finding such a person lies in the fact that in each company such a decision maker can be not only the general, commercial director or their deputies, but also the head of the sales department, the purchasing manager, and the board of directors, and co-founders - it all depends on the built-in hierarchy system in organizations.

It is important to understand that the decision maker is a specific person who can make a subjective decision from “we are not interested in this” to “we will think about it”. Both options are a refusal, however, in the second case it is veiled, indefinite, which, with a competent approach, can be translated into an agreement of cooperation.

How to find an LPR? Who can help a manager or telemarketer looking for clients or cold calling a potential base? At this stage the salesman looks like a scout, who carefully considers each step, correctly formulates any of his questions before starting to identify needs and present his product.

Step 1. Cold call to the company of a potential client. Task: determine the circle of persons capable of providing complete information about decision makers. It can be any employees of the enterprise. For example, by calling the accounting department, you can ask who makes the decision on the issue of procurement. Usually professional accountants give the phone number of the secretary or the direct number of the buyer. A clarifying question about the name and patronymic of the right person will help you boldly move on to step two.

Step 2. Warm contact with the specified person. It should be noted that this may not be a decision maker at all, but only an expert or an analyst who is preparing the issue for consideration by the decision maker. In the process of contact with such a person, it is necessary to dot the “d”, asking direct questions:

Who makes the final purchasing decision?

Who plays a key role in making such a decision?

Who else is involved in this difficult process?

Who else in the company should discuss this issue with?

Does the General Director only endorse the documents or does everything depend on him?

Step 3. Access to the decision maker. WITH unique selling proposition, which, alas, is a rarity in the markets of the post-Soviet space, such a step is justified and does not cause any particular difficulties for sales managers. However, commercial offers are often similar as twin brothers and do not represent a particular value and significant benefit for the buyer. In such cases, sellers need to work on identifying your own strengths, a clear indication of the true value for the client and multiple competitive differences. This is the only way to stand out among similar offers and interest a potential buyer. In this case, the decision maker will make contact himself, without waiting for an incoming call.

To reach the decision maker, a sales manager needs patience, diplomacy, good communication skills, ingenuity, creativity and the ability to build relationships. By asking direct questions about the authority of the decision maker, you can find out the real person on whom the outcome of the sale depends.

Case from practice. The "green" manager, having made several calls to potential clients during the day, went to the decision maker in one of the companies, arranged a meeting with him and successfully held a presentation. The buyer turned out to be sociable, talkative, quickly went forward, placing an order for a huge amount. True, in a veiled form, he hinted that he should “grease up” so that payments go through faster. The requested bribe amount was quite impressive, but the seller's company considered that such a tasty order could be an excuse for the "good appetite" of the buyer. The money was transferred, the invoice for the goods was issued, but the payment never went through. Moreover, a few days later, the unfortunate buyer suddenly quit. An internal investigation showed that initially the manager of the seller's company did not go to the decision maker, for which he later suffered moral and monetary punishment.

We bypass the secretarial barrier. Specific conversation scenarios

The task of a secretary in any company is to protect his boss from annoying salesmen and daily similar commercial offers. The task of a sales manager entering into negotiations, looking for contact with the decision maker, is to correctly bypass the secretarial barrier, to achieve his goal.

Option 2. Recruitment. If a young woman picked up the phone in the company, which is easy to understand by her voice, it is easiest to bypass the secretarial barrier by asking in a serious business tone to connect with the director. A professional secretary will certainly ask about the reason for the call, who is calling and on what subject. In order not to get into trouble, you need to prepare for the conversation, do not stray into explanations, do not stutter and do not get lost. Every word is recruitment, every sentence is specific. For example: “My name is Vasily Pupkin, I represent the company XXX, your director asked me to call as soon as we are ready to present you with an exclusive offer. We are ready! Please contact the director."

This option will not work if at the other end of the handset the incoming call is received by a real “secretary of the general”, as a rule, a woman of Balzac age. The first question is: "How to contact you?" will put everything in its place. Surely the secretary will introduce himself by name and patronymic, which will immediately show the alignment of forces. It is better to treat such professional secretaries with respect, as to the main mistress of the office: “I need your help, tell me what to do, how to contact your buyer? Who makes the purchasing decision in your company? An experienced employee will always correctly find a way out of the situation, help in resolving this issue. Everyone loves to give advice, so turning to the secretary for advice will help melt the initial ice of mistrust. Even if a refusal follows, it is necessary to make more than one attempt at "recruiting" tactics, if, of course, the game is worth the candle.

Option 3. Cunning.“I would like to send a fax for your purchasing manager, but, alas, I don’t know his middle name. How would you advise me to contact him? Such a trick is quite innocent, it occurs quite often with cold calls. It happens that in the course of such a conversation you can find out about a particular decision maker. “We are not engaged in purchases ..., but ... You can call him on such and such a phone number.” Victory!

Option 4. Multi-way. Sometimes it is absolutely impossible to bypass the secretary - it is not in vain that this employee eats her bread, her slogan is "to fight to the death." Then you need to carry out multi-way castling: first try to find out the contacts of the decision maker again, then ask the secretary to receive a fax and assign an incoming number to the document, registering it in the journal, and write it down for yourself. After two or three days, call this company again and ask about the fate of your document, clearly stating its outgoing and incoming number and date. Usually, this approach commands respect from competent secretaries and the veil of "secret" about the decision maker becomes an open secret.

Option 5. Assertive. Sometimes, in order to reach the decision maker, you have to use "power" methods. Situation: the secretary rudely replies: "We don't need anything, we have everything." The answer can be anything, but a positive result is important: “I understand correctly that in your company it is you who make the final decision on the purchase? May I know your first name, middle name and last name? I need to report to my superiors." Usually, after such a move, the secretary “returns” to his position and answers who the decision maker is in her company, it remains to find out the contacts and start selling a live meeting by phone to this person.

If the secretary again does not give out contact information, asks to reset the fax, which is tantamount to a refusal, no temporary action is needed. In a couple of days, you need to dial any phone number of this company and ask for the person whose position the secretary named as the decision maker. It is much easier to find out his contacts from other employees of the company. If the contact with the buyer was limited to sending a commercial offer by fax, it is necessary to arrange a meeting with him in a few days to bring samples, make a presentation, and so on.

Statistics on the effectiveness of entering the decision maker

According to the observations of experts, calls and meetings are considered the most effective, when out of a hundred contacts in seventy cases it is possible to reach a decision maker. Ratio 100:50(out of 100 calls, only 50 appeals to decision makers) - an average option for inexperienced managers or telemarketers. All figures below this mark indicate that the seller's company has not built a cold call, that it does not have ready-made standard scripts and scripts for beginners.

What to do? Attach an experienced tug guide to "young" employees, to conduct master classes, write telephone sales scripts regarding the peculiarities of their own business, introduce newcomers into the profession. In order to correctly implement a professional telephone sales system in a company, it is necessary to write a cold call script, train staff, bringing to automatism, implement control system(for example, regularly hold a Mystery Client promotion), build a motivation system for each sold meeting.

You can't sell anything over the phone, you just need to make an appointment. Having a contact phone number of a potential client, it is easy to reach the decision maker, get him interested in your offer and sell something.

The effectiveness of entering the decision maker in Russia and the CIS countries, first of all, depends on the level of staff training, the specifics of the product offered, the market segment, the level of competence and the personal position of the decision maker.

For example, it is practically impossible to get through to such economic giants as Gazprom, LUKOIL or Sberbank of Russia “from the street”. All these companies have stable ties with suppliers, and it is possible to get to them only through participation in electronic tenders.

In this article, we gave practical advice how to find and reach out to the decision maker. However, this is only the beginning, the first common birthday of the new partnership. Whether it will be full-fledged and long-term, or end with a quick divorce, depends on many reasons: economic, diplomatic, objective and personal. How to "marry" a major client to your company and enter into a long legal "marriage", we will tell in the following publications.

When people share the worst decisions they have made in their lives, they often refer to the fact that the choice was made in a fit of instinctive emotions: passion, fear, greed.

Our life would be completely different if Ctrl + Z were active in life, which would cancel the decisions made.

But we are not slaves of our mood. Instinctive emotions tend to become dull or completely disappear. So folk wisdom recommends that in the case when you need to make an important decision, it is better to go to bed. Good advice, by the way. It won't hurt to take note! Although for many solutions one sleep is not enough. We need a specific strategy.

One of the effective tools that we would like to offer you is strategy for success at work and in life from Susie Welch(Suzy Welch) - former editor-in-chief of the Harvard Business Review, popular author, television commentator and journalist. It is called 10/10/10 and involves making decisions through the prism of three different time frames:

• How will you feel about it 10 minutes later?
• What will you think about this decision after 10 months?
• What will be your reaction to this in 10 years?

By focusing our attention on these deadlines, we distance ourselves some distance from the problem of our making an important decision.

Now let's look at the effect of this rule on an example.

Situation: Veronica has a boyfriend Cyril. They have been dating for 9 months, but their relationship can hardly be called ideal. Veronika claims that Kirill is a wonderful person, and in many ways he is exactly who she has been looking for throughout her life. However, she is very worried that their relationship is not moving forward. She is 30, she wants a family and. She does not have an endless amount of time to develop a relationship with Kirill, who is under 40. During these 9 months, she never met Cyril's daughter from her first marriage, and in their couple the cherished “I love you” never sounded from either side.

The divorce from his wife was terrible. After that, Cyril decided to avoid a serious relationship. In addition, he keeps his daughter away from his personal life. Veronica understands that he is in pain, but she is also offended that such an important part of her beloved's life is closed to her.

Veronica knows that Cyril does not like to rush into decisions. But should she then herself take the step and say “I love you” first?

The girl was advised to use the 10/10/10 rule, and this is what came of it. Veronica was asked to imagine that right now she has to decide whether she confesses her love to Cyril on the weekend or not.

Question 1: How will you react to this decision after 10 minutes?

Answer:“I think I would be worried, but at the same time proud of myself that I took a chance and said it first.”

Question 2: What would you think of your decision if 10 months had passed?

Answer:“I don't think I'll regret it 10 months later. No, I will not. I sincerely want everything to work out. Who does not take risks, then does not drink champagne!

Question 3: How do you feel about your decision 10 years later?

Answer:“Regardless of how Cyril reacts, in 10 years the decision to declare love first is unlikely to matter. By that time, either we'll be happy together, or I'll be in a relationship with someone else."

Notice the 10/10/10 rule works! As a result, we have quite a simple solution:

Veronica has to take the lead. She will be proud of herself if she does this, and sincerely believes that she will not regret what she did, even if nothing works out with Cyril in the end. But without a conscious analysis of the situation according to the 10/10/10 rule, making an important decision seemed extremely difficult for her. Short-term emotions—fear, nervousness, and fear of rejection—were distractions and deterrents.

What happened to Veronica after, you might ask. She did say "I love you" first. In addition, she tried to do everything to change the situation, and stop feeling in limbo. Cyril did not confess his love to her. But progress was on the face: he became closer to Veronica. The girl believes that he loves her, that he just needs a little more time to overcome his own and confess the reciprocity of feelings. In her opinion, the chances that they will be together are up to 80%.

Eventually

The 10/10/10 rule helps you win on the emotional side of the game. The feelings that you are experiencing now, at this moment, seem rich and sharp, and the future, on the contrary, is vague. Therefore, the emotions experienced in the present are always in the foreground.

The 10/10/10 strategy forces you to change your angle of view: to consider a moment in the future (for example, in 10 months) from the same point of view that you are looking at in the present.

This method allows you to put your short-term emotions into perspective. It's not that you should ignore them. Often they even help you get what you want in a given situation. But you must not let your emotions get the better of you.

It is necessary to remember the contrast of emotions not only in life, but also at work. For example, if you intentionally avoid a serious conversation with your boss, you are letting your emotions get the best of you. If you imagine the possibility of having a conversation, then after 10 minutes you will be just as nervous, and after 10 months - will you be glad that you decided to have this conversation? Breathe easy? Or will you feel proud?

But what if you want to reward the work of a great employee and are going to offer him a promotion: will you doubt the correctness of your decision in 10 minutes, will you regret what you did 10 months later (suddenly other employees will feel left out), and will it Will the promotion make any difference to your business 10 years from now?

As you can see short-term emotions are not always harmful. The 10/10/10 rule suggests that looking at emotions in the long run is not the only correct one. It only proves that the short-term feelings you experience cannot be at the head of the table when you make important and responsible decisions.

Current page: 1 (the book has 29 pages in total)

THE PATH OF TRUTH - INTELLIGENCE

THEORY AND PRACTICE OF "SOFT POWER"

SKY POLICY

Andrey Devyatov

Proceedings of the Academy of Development Management

INSTITUTE OF NEBOPOLITICS

Only for Nobles and candidates for Nobles

Intelligent Special Forces

Under the banner of Vejdism. Recognize the illusion. Understand the truth!

A treatise to help those who seek the truth

The book "Nebopolitics. The Path of Truth is Intelligence” is the fourth in a series of instructions on skypolitics. Published:

1. Skypolitics. Short course. – M.: Ant, 2005.

2. Skypolitics as an art. Other edges. - M .: Military University, 2006.

3. Skypolitics. For those who make decisions. - M .: Zhigulsky Publishing House, 2008.

In 2011, the book “Nebopolitics. For those who make decisions” was published in Chinese by the Academy Publishing House social sciences China. At the same time, in China, non-politics received the status of a “teaching” (Tianyuan zheng-zhi xuyo).

In the art of management there is an integral field of activity, about which, as well as about the chastity of a woman, it is not customary to expand. This area of ​​activity is called intelligence.

The point of intelligence is to find out the truth. And the truth is always bitter. The truth hurts the eyes. Therefore, it is covered with a veil of secrecy. The opening of the secrets of being is a sophisticated and risky activity of the “cloak and dagger”; concentration of will and intense, resourceful work of the mind; long searches and discoveries and, finally, a breakthrough to understanding processes.

According to the method of knowing the truth of life, intelligence is something that embraces science, art, and mysticism. In the masterpieces of its activities, intelligence predicts the order of development of events. The transition of mankind through the post-industrial barrier at the level of the Universe accompanies the change of cosmic epochs; the axis of precession of the planet Earth from 2003 to 2014 completes the transition from the constellation of Pisces to the constellation of Aquarius. There are cardinal changes in the state of nature, society and consciousness.

The "new sky" of Aquarius promises and " new land» information society. In this treatise, to help those who seek the truth, the most probable scenario for the future of Russia is predicted by the methods of higher intelligence of consciousness and time.

Foreword

Discourses of the last head of political intelligence of the USSR about intelligence work, about a person in intelligence and the meaning of his life.

“A scout becomes known to the world only when he suffers a major setback. Perhaps the same can be said about intelligence. This organization, by its nature, must see and hear everything, while remaining invisible itself.

For me, predecessors are people who did the same thing as me, these are colleagues who help me work, and sometimes confuse them with a wrong view of this or that event, a light-hearted attitude to some fact, etc. We deprived of direct communication. It's okay, we do not communicate with many contemporaries who are engaged in the same affairs as we, although we know them in absentia. They also belong to our community, where the main thing is not temporary barriers, but involvement in a common cause. It seems that my thought is not quite clearly stated, but it is hardly worth carving at the clarity of the wording. You need to feel that you yourself, your work, life are just an insignificant part of a huge common, not divided into past, present and future. Particles of this common are the predecessors.

The main question that sooner or later every person asks himself is: “Why me? What is the meaning of my life? What is the meaning of my work? It would be extremely naive to look for an answer to the question of the meaning of life, and not because the question is not important. It is difficult to answer this question. As a starting point for further reasoning, we can take such a definition, not indisputable, but absolutely necessary for people of our profession: "The meaning of life is in serving the cause." Not worship, not praise, not oaths, not just work, not service, but service to the cause.

This stage is reached when the matter becomes an unconscious, undeclared core of existence, when each step is consistent with the interests of the case, when the matter, without crowding out the worldly, spiritual, intellectual interests of a person, inconspicuously forms them, turning into unnecessary and annoying everything that can interfere case.

In order to serve a cause, one must believe that it is right, that it is part of something larger than the life of any of its participants.

We exist, we are alive, we feel like people only because we have a Motherland. We will stand on this and evaluate the past from this point of view, judge the deeds of our predecessors and contemporaries, and look into the troubled future. Thus the essence of our work becomes clear. The good of the Fatherland, the good of the people is above ideological disputes, personal and group self-interest, today's politics, above ambitions and grievances. For decades, we have been monitoring the maneuvers of external forces, opponents and partners, revealing their secret plans, suggesting the direction of retaliatory moves, engaging in fierce battles, and suffering losses. And always, even in the most difficult circumstances, the thought was present: behind us is the Fatherland, a powerful, unshakable state, behind us great people. The struggle for the Fatherland continues on new frontiers.

Of course, a single, powerful, cohesive state in the vast European expanses will not be left alone by either the West or the East. The reason is not that it threatens someone's safety. As long as it exists in this capacity, a monopoly of power - military, political or economic - is impossible in the world - the domination of any coalition is impossible.

Our service, as a kind of public institution, rests on three pillars: mutual trust actors, dedication and exactingness... Trust does not preclude exactingness. It is exactingness that makes it possible to stimulate work, to single out capable and conscientious people, to get rid of those who do not justify trust. Demanding is one of the faces of human justice, it should be the same for everyone - from the head of intelligence to the youngest, novice worker. Demanding cannot go only from top to bottom, it must be universal and mutual. And finally, dedication. Our service cannot offer an employee material benefits, a quick career, or public recognition. The intelligence officer must be modest and inconspicuous, his main motive is devotion to the cause and his comradeship, in serving the Fatherland.

The leader must have his own conscience. And away from people. who need power. Further away from power and its companion - lies ... Yes, I am a soldier of a defeated, retreating army, but I will not allow a louse to eat me!

The work that my colleagues and I have been doing for many years is the most interesting, most exciting, in my opinion, that life could offer.

That's how it seemed to me and still seems to be. Life is part of work, and it was always thought that they would end at the same time. Did not work out. Service is over, life goes on. That work continues, of which my work was an insignificant part. This work began centuries before my birth, it will not end as long as Russia lives. More and more new people will come, they will be smarter, more educated than us, they will live in a different world, not like ours. But they will continue the eternal cause, of which we and our obscure predecessors were a part, they will serve to ensure the security of Russia. God help them!

Time goes fast. What seemed unshakable crumbles to dust. Russia remains ... The sacred task is to help the Fatherland to the best of our ability to shorten the time of difficult trials, to regain its place in the world community as a great power with a thousand-year history, great culture, great traditions, with a modern economy and science. I believe it will!”

Leonid Vladimirovich Shebarshin

Part I. INTELLIGENCE AS THE ART OF THE UNIQUE

1.1. Story

1.1.1. What is intelligence

In the art of managing the state, economy and society, there is an integral field of activity, about which, like the chastity of a woman, it is not customary to expand. This area of ​​activity is called intelligence.

Intelligence is a sophisticated operational information and sabotage activity aimed at combat support capture the future in a covert fight against competitors. To argue otherwise is to forget the ABC of military art.

Intelligence is conducted by both states and non-state structures (companies, banks, parties, clans, gangs). As well as supranational formations (spiritual orders, secret societies, Masonic lodges).

Intelligence as such is an attribute of management associated with forecasting, foresight and anticipation of the development of events. The forecast is achieved by calculation. Foresight is built by analogy with the past. And anticipation requires penetration to the source of the event. In Russian: the knowledge of the beginning or the knowledge of Raz is Intelligence.

V different languages The word "intelligence" has different meanings. So, if in Russian it means an active search for truth and insight into the root cause of an event, then in English language intelligence is a pure game of the mind, subtle calculation, a puzzle and intricacies of thought. And in Chinese, there are two characters with reading qing bao- this is not the mind and not the calculation, but the heart. This is a notice of interest, a report on aspirations and aspirations, a response to experiences, registration of motives, sincere service and retribution.

Intelligence is a high style of solving the problems of controlling an offensive without the use of overt violence. It is characterized by aggressiveness, audacity, resourcefulness, technicality and inventiveness in operational combinations. Acts as a hidden source of danger.

An enemy intelligence agent (spy) is a particularly dangerous criminal for any country, non-state structure or secret organization, which must be neutralized immediately and at any cost. For the scout is always on the offensive. And since only two types of military operations lead to victory - an offensive and a meeting battle, the scout is always the Victorious in potential. During the pre-industrial period and industrial society espionage was punishable by death. On the transition of mankind through the post-industrial barrier to the global Information society intelligence remains a source of danger of the first degree, the blocking of which is occupied by the relevant security agencies and services.

Intelligence has always been a dangerous and cruel business. And only people deprived of excessive sensitivity, tenderness and pity could engage in it.

In intelligence, the goal is often achieved, regardless of the means. Here theft, hypocrisy, temptation, deceit, set-up, blackmail, trap- The usual thing. Soft-hearted, conscientious and tearful people in intelligence could not cope with the tasks and died. The path of a scout is the best test of a person not only for loyalty to an ideal, resistance to temptation, but also for a tendency to slyness.

Intelligence is a difficult and thankless job that someone has to do anyway. Scouting is one of the oldest professions. More biblical prophet Moses sent people from himself “to look out for the land of Canaan ... what is it like, and the people living in it, is it strong or weak, is it few or many? And what is the land on which he lives, is it good or bad? and what are the cities in which he dwells, whether he dwells in tents or in fortifications?” (Numbers 13:18–20).

Intelligence is a service that, over the years, turns into a lifestyle. There are no former scouts in the sense that if the right order follows, the scout will always answer "Yes".

1.1.2. Essence of Intelligence

Intelligence is a way of identifying things in the darkness of the mysteries of being. In addition to intelligence, science, religion and art are engaged in the secrets of being.

Mystery is darkness, and light is truth. Light does not fight darkness. It's just that where light enters, darkness recedes. Therefore, we can say that intelligence is the “sword” of the Spirit of Truth, cutting a path for the truth of being. And the greatest scouts of the Way, Truth and Life are the prophets.

Since intelligence deals with the disclosure of secrets, it is an instrument of truth. For “he who does what is right comes to the light, that his works may be manifest, because they are done in God” (John 3:21).

Ideally, the image of a scout is an emissary (messenger) of Truth, carrying and defending the ideals of truth and justice in the land of happiness and joy.

The Scriptures of the Christians speak of the mystery of iniquity and the mystery of godliness. Therefore, the highest field of intelligence activity is the sphere of consciousness and time: feelings, memory, thinking, will - in the past, present and future. Where these higher mysteries of "the way, the truth and the life" are hidden. For only intelligence does not face the question of the naturalness of the organic combination of the beginnings of the mystical (not of this world) and purely practical.

The next level of conducting the truth of life is the exploration of the secrets of nature: geological and mineralogical (subsoil), geodetic (land), hydrographic (water), meteorological (air), astrophysical (space). The essence is groping (probing) and identifying things in the environment.

Then comes the classical exploration of the secrets of society: political, military, economic, industrial, financial, scientific and technical, and so on.

Intelligence is one way or another active actions. This is the discovery (extraction), collection, accounting, accumulation and systematization of data, as a rule, closed from the direct views of unauthorized persons.

In addition to finding out and logically analyzing the texture (what is), intelligence is called upon to notice and evaluate what is not, and answer the question: “Why not?”

To notice what is not, the gift of judgment is useless. This is where the gift of discernment comes into play. And in order to successfully distinguish (and it is necessary to distinguish not signs of form, but signs of the essence of things), reconnaissance must be carried out continuously so that there is something to compare and notice signs of difference - signs. In Scripture, "seeing the signs of the times" is commanded.

Information intelligence work is the overcoming of the mystery of being by the ability to work with meanings. It is a breakthrough to knowledge and understanding predominantly by the effort of the mind and heart. This is a sphere of high socio-humanitarian technologies capable of breaking the masks of incognito. Or, on the contrary, to hide the cognitive models of managing people's behavior with veils of disinformation.

Intelligence is scientific in method, but not science. For science analyzes the facts and establishes patterns, while intelligence is called upon to evaluate the signs and find, first of all, the root cause of the coming event.

Intelligence recognizes the irrational basis of events, but this is not religion. For, easily connecting the beginning of the mystical and practical, intelligence is directly connected not with the "heaven", but with practice (nature).

Intelligence in the results of insight creates masterpieces, but is not art in its purest form. For, focused not on the abstraction of the artistic image, but on the truth as it is, intelligence is always concrete in the unique conditions of the current situation. That is why there is an art of the unique.

Intelligence is a superposition over the triangles of science, religion and art, completing the plane of cognition of the secrets of being to completeness, integrity and adequacy of understanding the picture of the world in volume.

1.1.3. Intelligence as a system

Intelligence as a system of penetration into the mysteries of being is characterized by such words as information, management, future.

The greatest mystery of existence is what will be. Capturing the future requires event management. And management needs information.

Information the same is nothing but what is enclosed inside (in) the form (form). And inside the form is the content. That is, to strangers, in the case of their interest in a thing, in the first approximation, only the form is available. What is given in the senses. Otherwise, data. And by no means what is hidden inside the form. Otherwise - in formation. Since when mentally capturing the future, we are talking about non-material things of being, then information (content hidden by form) is only that which carries meaning. Meaning is what answers the questions: why and why? No meaning, no information.

And to get to the meaning, you first need to extract (collect) data. Then, by the effort of thought, organize disparate data. Reduce them to one or another accounting system, that is, turn data (maintenance) into information. And finally, in the information to identify the meaning. Look at the content of the forms. reach out to in formations. The essence is to remove the clothes of forms and expose meanings. And one can understand the meaning (understand) only by distinguishing one from the other in the group.

The meanings of being in people of different genotypes (blood) and different archetypes (culture), different races and languages ​​are different. The memory of generations, for example, between the British and the Chinese is completely different. Therefore, it is impossible to avoid competition – the “war of meanings” – between the projects of the future.

The meanings of capturing the future include goals, intentions and opportunities, real and potential. They are the goals, intentions and opportunities, their own and competitors - and there is valuable information necessary for the implementation of event management.

What is an event? Being a portion of the flow took place - that's the event.

Being in volume is nature, society and consciousness. Time is past, present and future. And as a process, it is the exchange of substances, energy and information. Substance is any nature. Energy is what can do work. And information is what makes sense.

Since the process of being as an exchange of matter and energy is impossible without the third - information, then the possession of information provides control and management of the entire process. This is where the role and place of intelligence appears.

In the public life of people, the possession of information allows you to control and manage the exchange of natural values ​​in the form of land, buildings, structures, machines, equipment, raw materials, fuel, gold, drugs, etc. And most importantly, manage energy. Including the energy of human life: money (body), conscience (soul), honor (spirit). Where money, conscience and honor are the motives of people's behavior, their desire to get up and do the work.

People management is nothing more than mastering them attention and then forcing behavior patterns influence on instincts (body), reflexes (soul) or passions (spirit). You can act with signals (commands), or without signals, changing the environment in which the person is located. Behavior is determined by the imputed goals of actions or inaction, intentions (plans) and opportunities to achieve the goal.

Goals, intentions and opportunities constitute a secret, since their open demonstration exposes the control system to the blow of competitors to capture the future. The control system is built from elements and structure. Elements in the behavior management system are meanings, that which answers the question: “Why?” The structure will be the interconnections of meanings with each other. Outside of relationships, meanings can either be misinterpreted or present clever misinformation. The essence of disinformation is to divert attention to false goals and then correct behavior.

The role and place of intelligence in managing people, but through people and events is to open the competitor's control system. Assess its condition (strengths and weaknesses) and the prospect of development or stagnation, identify vulnerabilities and, if necessary, carry out a subversive undermining.

In signal management, secrecy is achieved by secrecy of the signal. This is what cryptography does. Intelligence efforts here focus not on the elements, but on the infrastructure of control: operating systems, communication protocols, codes, ciphers, the decryption of which reveals the secret. Protection against strikes against the signal control structure is achieved by high information technologies plus redundancy of signal delivery channels. And disinformation with duplication of false data - to create the effect of their confirmation - in different sources.

When managing without signals - through a change in the environment (external conditions of the situation) - a person can fall into an induced whirlwind of passion (egregor of the collective unconscious), when the mind (logic) turns off and only the "heart" (feelings) remains. No signals - no clear reflexes. Reflexes are blunted. Instincts are inhibited. For without signals there is no ratio of one to the other, there is no gear ratio, there is no ratio ("ratio"). That is, there is no actual information. Management is non-rational and non-informational. A whirlwind (psychic epidemic) can either be resonantly accelerated by a traveling wave (panic), or blocked by standing waves (stupor). In such an environment, intelligence should work primarily on the elements of the control system - meanings based on high cognitive technologies for modeling the processes of people's consciousness.

Future there is a matter of time, on the understanding of which the concept of the “war of meanings” and the image of victory over a competitor depend. In the pre-industrial period, time was threefold. The ancient Greeks had separate names for the three aspects of common time: chronos, cyclos, kairos.

Chronos This is the modern chronology. This is a measured step forward and up from the origin. This is the linear Gregorian calendar of 1582 that is now generally accepted in the world. This is the Newtonian (since the 17th century) duration in science. This is credit and loan interest in the economy. This is the arrow-shaped progress and modernity of the industrial society.

Cyclos are sunrises and sunsets, high and low tides. This is the development of coils of change. This is the indiction of Roman calends, it is also the Russian system for recording the circles of the Sun and the Moon - “vrutselet”. These are Chinese cyclic signs, devoid of the idea of ​​the magnitude of the number ( chia. and, bean, dean...) and the Chinese cyclic calendar ( sat down). This is the sequence of events one after another, regardless of the duration of each of them. In finance, this is profit through margin from the exchange of three currencies. This is what is called a transaction (work done successfully and to the end) - a concept that appeared during the transition of mankind through the post-industrial barrier.

Kairos- this is the moment when a quantum (another portion) of the flow of radiant energy, which has a cosmic basis, arrives on Earth. This is a phase, a moment of the start of a new state in the development of life circumstances. This is a sharp deviation of the curve of a periodic process in relation to the axis of equilibrium (progress). This is a successful capitalization of expectations from everything that is called goodwill in finance. This is a lucky break in the Big Game with many unknowns.

The trinity of time is held by music. The trinity is irrational, so there is no philosophy of music.

Time in all three aspects allows us to see history not as a linear progress from the creation of the world to the end of the world, but as a sum of waves of different periods. Where the progress of "this world" is a special case of an ascending wave of a very large period, on which the waves of other periods are superimposed.

Therefore, the role and place of intelligence in capturing the future is as follows:

■ ahead of competitors in chronos- come to the boundaries of intentions and operational plans faster than others;

■ ride the cyclos- to ensure that one's own efforts are in phase with the wave of change. Achieve synergy between different processes. Reduce the number of transactions on the way to the intended result. Outperform competitors not in the speed (duration) of reactions to signals (calls), but in the order of following - the choice of the route and the number of transfers - to the destination of the path;

■ catch kairos- relying on prophets, seers and masters of scientific forecasting, to identify waves of historical development and timely set a trap of antiphase to periodic processes. Strengthen your own capabilities with a flow of energy "not of this world."

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It is easy to make a choice when one of the options is obviously better / more profitable / more promising. And it is excruciatingly difficult when equivalent alternatives are presented on the scales.

site will try to restore your healthy sleep and peace of mind. We bring to your attention 7 ways to get out of a stupor and make the right decision.

From the outside, this may look like a mild form of a split personality, but try to imagine another person (friend, colleague) in your place. Pretend that the problem of choice is his, not yours. Abstract, step aside, observe, and then give advice.

This technique helps to discard the emotions that clouded your mind in the throes of choice, and to take a more sober look at the essence of the issue.

2. Turn off information noise

It seems to us that the more information we have, the more objectively we are able to assess the situation. However, the endless information flow only increases the tension and confuses our brain. We begin to overemphasize the insignificant facts and lose sight of the essential.

Temporarily turn off the information noise, relax and let your mind find the right answer on its own, because many scientists made their great discoveries in a dream for a reason.

3. Deny the obvious

By a certain age, each of us acquires our own style of behavior in general and decision-making in particular. Break the mold and argue with yourself by questioning the obvious facts about each scenario.

Take a pen, a piece of paper and write them out, then turn the sheet over and figure out what you will do in such circumstances. Very often the answer is beyond the boundaries of habitual thoughts.

4. Interview yourself

Before finally deciding on a decision, ask yourself 3 questions and answer each one for 10 minutes. So, if you follow the chosen path, then:

• How will you feel in 10 days?
• How will you feel in 10 months?
• How will you feel in 10 years?

Listen to your feelings. Feeling the prospects is no less important than considering them. The pleasure or discomfort of visualizing your choice often speaks louder than reason.

5. Play epithets

Choose a few adjectives for each solution, and then apply them to yourself. Let's say you choose between 2 job offers: one is dynamic, requiring communication and constant movement, the other is stable, implying a thoughtful approach and attention to detail.

Now try using these descriptions for yourself. Which suits you best? This is extremely important: making any choice, you always determine to one degree or another his future.

6. Draw a Descartes Square

Modern Methods is a book about how to use historical experience, fresh and old, to make political decisions and pave the way from today to tomorrow. In stories of successes and failures, the authors propose a technique that, having become routine, at least can protect against the most common mistakes. The book is based on an analysis of US political practice, but in my opinion, the methods proposed by the authors will be useful in management as well. In addition, although the authors say that this is not a history book, some of the examples given are interesting in their own right. I found a link to the book from Morgan Jones. .

Richard Neustadt, Ernest May. Contemporary reflections. About the benefits of history for those who make decisions. - M.: Publishing house A.d Marginem, 1999. - 384 p.

Download summary in format or (summary is about 4% of the volume of the book)

At the time of publication of the note, the book is available only in second-hand bookshops.

Washington is dominated by people who do not want to know about any history and are not at all hurt by their ignorance; people who believe that the world, with all its problems, was born again for them (starting with Hiroshima, Vietnam, Watergate, or even the last election) and that political decisions require only rational reasoning or emotional impulse, depending on personal preference.

Chapter first. History of success

For President Kennedy, the missile crisis entered its decisive phase on Tuesday, October 16, 1962. In the morning, National Security Adviser McGeorge Bundy reported to the President that a U-2 reconnaissance aircraft had taken pictures showing Russian medium-range nuclear missiles being deployed in Cuba. Kennedy immediately called a group of people with whom he wanted to discuss the situation. It would later be called the executive committee of the National Security Council.

When they got to work, Kennedy and the executive committee used (or did not use) historical knowledge in a very typical way. At least nine times out of ten, debates about a serious problem begin with the question: what should we do? The history of the topic and the context are usually left out. They turn to the past (if they do it at all) only for analogies, comparing the current situation with some of the previous ones. Sometimes this is done in order to squeeze an unfamiliar phenomenon into the usual framework. Sometimes - to reinforce one's position, since a reference to a similar situation usually justifies the proposed solution. In all other cases, attention is focused exclusively on the present or future.

After committee members speak, President John F. Kennedy sets the framework for all subsequent debates on the first day, outlining three options: eliminate only missiles; destroy all aircraft as well; organize an invasion.

The president's brother Robert Kennedy was wary of the idea of ​​an airstrike from the start. He spoke rather strongly against the simultaneous bombing of missile positions and airfields. “If you choose the second option, you will have to bomb all of Cuba ... A lot of people will die, and someone will have to answer for it.” Expressing similar doubts, George Ball turned to analogies: "Remember, Pearl Harbor only scared us in its time." Building such parallels is a fairly typical thing; but unfortunately they are very imperfect.

On October 22, the president informed the whole world about the intrigues of the Russians, and introduced a maritime quarantine against Cuba. McNamara remarked, "This alternative doesn't seem very attractive, but only until you get to know others." The US Navy was charged with preventing the delivery of new missiles to Cuba. By doing so, Kennedy bought time to try to persuade the Russians to remove the missiles already stationed there. A week later, however, having not succeeded in this matter, the president again returned to his original positions. The question again was whether it was necessary to bomb only rocket launchers or to subject airfields to airstrikes as well. But on the second Sunday of the crisis, Khrushchev announced the withdrawal of missiles. The story thus became a success story.

The steps taken by the executive committee testify to the scale of drawing on and testing analogies that is unusual for us. The second aspect in which the Board allowed deviation from traditional patterns was the close attention to the history of the problem - to its origins and context. Big role Kennedy himself played this by forming the executive committee. He gathered around him people who had a rich practice of communication with the Soviet Union since the Second World War. The third innovation was that Kennedy and his Board carefully revised the key assumptions of their reasoning.

No one has calculated the effectiveness of past air operations, but some of the committee members have seen enough of them. Lovett, once a naval aviator, was responsible for the ground part of the US Air Force during the Second World War. This fact played a role when he spoke out in favor of a naval blockade to the detriment of air raids. Robert Kennedy later liked to recall Lovett's phrase: “The right decision usually comes from experience. And experience is often the result of bad decisions.” During the thirteen days of the missile crisis, many other stereotypes were also challenged.

Kennedy and his executive committee surprise us with the persistence with which the question has been asked over and over again: how reliable are the premises on which we are going to act? Kennedy and the Executive Committee showed an extraordinary interest in how their opponents relate to history. According to Robert Kennedy, the president constantly tried to put himself in Khrushchev's place.

Kennedy and the executive committee paid considerable attention historical evolution organizations and institutions. Kennedy himself set a similar mood. Apparently, he felt the habit of large organizations today to behave in exactly the same way as they did yesterday. The Sovietologists helped Kennedy and his group assess the likelihood that on the Soviet side the course of events could be determined not so much by purposeful intent as by organizational routine.

After the crisis, Kennedy said that, in his opinion, the chances of starting a war were very high: "somewhere one in three, or even higher." At the same time, according to Robert Kennedy, the president viewed Khrushchev as "a rational, reasonable person who, having enough time and knowing our intentions, is able to change his position."

But we still see the most important feature of the work of the Executive Committee not in this. In a manner very uncharacteristic of today, its members saw in the problem that occupied them only one of the links in a time stream that originated long before the crisis and went into the distant future. Moving away from the simplest question - what actions should be taken now - they went to a more complex one: how will our decisions today affect the future, how will they be perceived ten years from now or a century from now? The president's desire to view the situation in a broad temporal context is well illustrated by remarks addressed to his brother regarding the First World War. He had then just read a book by Barbara Tuckman. Kennedy said: "I'm not going to follow a course that would allow someone to write the same book about our time - something like "October Rockets". Scientists of the future should understand that we have done everything possible to achieve peace, and every step we take was a step towards the enemy.”

• indomitable desire to act;
• dependence on random analogies used either for apologetic or analytical purposes, or even both at once;
• inattention to the history of the issue;
• inability to critically look at the premises on the basis of which a decision is made;
• stereotypes about the individuals or organizations involved;
• the inability to fit the decision being made into the overall sequence of historical events.

Chapter three. Fallacies born of analogies

From thinking about the Korean epic - the story of the lost victory - we draw the following moral: the first step in making any decision should be the analysis and identification of those moments in the situation that call for action. We propose a mini-method, the constant application of which, in our opinion, will reduce the number of cases when a particular step is overlooked or deliberately ignored.

It is only necessary to decompose "now" - the current situation, into components, separating Known from obscure, and then both - from alleged(assumed by those who deal with the problem and make decisions). We need to understand why in this situation generally some solution is required.

The essential components of our rubrics - Known, Obscure and Supposed - are those details and particulars that make the current situation different from the previous one that did not require attention. This focus instantly protects us from the natural desire to replace the question "What is our problem?" the question "What the hell are we supposed to do?"

Trying to figure out why action is needed at all in a given situation helps to outline expected outcomes. If the situation used to be quite tolerable, then one of the possible goals may be to return it to its previous course. In ordinary practice, as far as we know, things often turn out differently. By discussing what to do without finding out why it is necessary at all, politicians set erroneous goals that are not directly related to the problem.

Chapter five. Avoiding boring analogies

Working with analogies fits into three words: Stop! Look around! Listen! A simple appeal to them can sometimes replace serious reflection. The first line of defense is to sort Known, Obscure, and Inferred. This procedure focuses thought on the present situation. The second line is the identification of suitable analogies, the more the better, and the analysis similarities and Differences. Thus, it is possible to get rid of unnecessary illusions.

Chapter six. Studying the history of the issue

The previous chapters have looked at ways in which the use of analogies can be prevented, stifled, or expanded, the most typical recourse to historical material. Separating the Known from the Obscure and Inferred, as well as recognizing the Similarities and Differences of the corresponding analogies, allows you to more clearly describe the current situation and understand what its highlight is. In doing so, we will never confuse the 1976 swine flu with the 1918 Spanish flu. This and the following chapters will deal with a historical approach to the problems themselves, the individuals involved, and the institutions involved.

There are a number of issues that need to be addressed before a final decision is made. What is our goal? What do we intend to achieve? What exactly do we want to replace the existing state of affairs? Understanding how the problem arose and how the situation changed can be extremely helpful. By itself, this knowledge will not answer the above questions. The future is never exactly like the past. It simply cannot be. But in the specifics of the past one can often find the keys to the possibilities of the future.

Goldberg's rule a scholar and gentleman who runs Stop and Shop, a chain of discount grocers and supermarkets in New England. He said: “When a manager comes to me, I don’t ask him:“ What is the problem? I say: "Tell me everything from the very beginning." In this way I find out what the real difficulty is.”

Studying the history of the issue, it is worth writing down on a piece of paper the dates associated with the event of interest to us. Insofar as business people often too lazy to delve too deeply into the past, we emphasize that it is important to start from the earliest dates relevant to the problem.

The same type of application of our questionnaire in all possible situations may be counterproductive. Some selection is required. These are the selection rules. First, start by identifying trends - "first the forest, then the trees." Secondly, try to focus on those "trees" - the nodal points of history, where politics (no matter what - legislative, bureaucratic, pre-election or international) had a decisive impact on the final result.

Chapter seven. Finding what you need in history

People who face major decisions need to take a break to reflect on the problem before them. They need to beware of any misleading analogies. Then, as far as possible, they should try to look at the problem in a historical context, looking for those key trends and features in the past that help to make a decision today. And here we propose, firstly, Goldberg's rule - the principle according to which it is recommended to think more often: "What is the history of the issue?"; secondly, the “time scale”, that is, the principle related to the previous one and saying that any history must be studied right down to its origins (this dramatically reduces the chances of using historical data for self-justification); finally, thirdly, "journalistic" questions addressed to the past - where, who, how and why, as well as when and what exactly. With this arsenal of tools, both current conditions and future prospects can be clarified. All three steps are interdependent, they presuppose each other.

Chapter eight. Checking the prerequisites

How can politicians identify and test the premises that inspire them (or those close to them) while eliminating the most shaky and unreliable ones? The Bay of Pigs adventure of 1961 is a classic example of what neglect of premise leads to. The participants in those events relied on different premises, but at the same time they did not explore either the differences between them, or the discrepancy between their expectations and what really happened.

In retrospect, this whole story is striking in how uncritically Kennedy reacted to the proposals of the developers of the operation, the opinion of the chiefs of staff, and the positions of other persons involved in the matter. For the president and his advisers, certain prerequisites stimulated very specific expectations and preferences to the exclusion of all others; no one has even tried to find out whether they are verifiable, let alone openly revealing the entire logic of cause and effect that follows from them.

The Chiefs of Staff seemed to assume that imminent civil unrest was a key component of Bissell's plans. The latter, on the contrary, believed that the riots would begin in a week or two after the anti-Castro government established itself on the island. In the State Department, as in many branches of the CIA, the rebellion was considered a chimera. If Kennedy or any of his aides had tried to investigate the Joint Chiefs of Staff premise and then insisted on polling all the intelligence units, the differences would have become obvious.

If someone is talking about a "good chance" in the Bay of Pigs, or a "strong possibility" of a swine flu epidemic, or claims that "the Guatemalans won't let you use our training camps," you should ask, "Betting what bet are you Would you personally make that assertion? As a second test, we propose Alexander's question. He first asked it in March 1976 at a meeting of the advisory committee that preceded the decision on mass vaccinations against swine flu. Dr. Russell Alexander, a professor of public health at the University of Washington, wanted to know what the new findings are that are forcing his colleagues to rethink their earlier decision that the country could only be ready for mass immunizations by next summer.

Alexander's question brings causal associations out of the shadows, which are supposed to be confirmed by prior experience. To understand the inner mechanics of the process, imagine someone in 1960, just after the election, saying something like this to Kennedy: “Make a list of the things that worry you about Bissell’s plan, and then make a list of the things that, if they actually happened, increase anxiety. Then watch to see if any of the above actually happens. If so, reconsider the problem."

You should also check the “premises-axioms”. First of all, they need to be identified as such, if only because they affect the language in which the options are formulated. Having completed the "identification", it is necessary to determine their sources, foundations, degree of reliability.

• one should start with sorting the facts - with the selection of the Known, the Obscure and the Assumed;
• we need to get rid of useless analogies that obscure the vision of the situation that interests us and the problems it generates; while doing this, it is worth noting the Similarities and Differences of the analogies that come to mind with the current moment;
• it is necessary to refer to the history of the issue; identifying the source of our worries will help determine how to deal with them and, perhaps, prompt one or another decision;
• you need to do what they usually try to start with: outline possible solutions, fixing the arguments in each case per and against;
• it is necessary to pause in order to answer the question: what are the premises that stand behind each argument used in this case per or against? What bets are different people making on a particular scenario? What answers can you get to Alexander's question?
• it is necessary to at least briefly examine the common stereotypes about the people involved in the case;
• organizations must also go through the same procedure.

Chapter nine. Dealing with actors

Different people often perceive the same difficulty in different ways. Sometimes such differences are explained by institutional reasons. Rufus Miles rule is known: "Beliefs are determined by position." But sometimes differences of opinion are more personal.

When certain actions are planned, it is very important to be aware of and take into account the different angles from which the actors look at the world around them and their place in it. In our opinion, the "tracking" of individuals and the study of their personal histories, applied with some care and within well-defined boundaries, can significantly improve both the decision-making process and their implementation.

With regard to the main characters, it is equally productive to ask yourself a few simple questions: when was our hero born? where? what happened to him then? As soon as you accept that someone older or younger than you may perceive history in a completely different way, the operation begins, called us arrangement of actors. This neutral term refers to the use of historical data to revise initial stereotypes about other people's views. In the course of such a procedure, established stereotypes are "complicated" - in the sense that they are enriched with additional fragments, perspectives, even hints, thereby displacing unfounded hypotheses and bare guesses.

The American power pyramid - with its inherent pluralism of interests and institutions, indefinite tenure in top positions, the enormous influence of private business - is overflowing with "outsiders". Often they perceive each other quite stereotypically (and when such expectations are not met, they are indignant and indignant). In order to effectively convince each other or oppose each other - and this they have to do all the time - they must be able to "enrich" their own stereotypes. The arrangement of actors allows at least partly to solve this problem.

Chapter ten. "Arrangement" in the presence of barriers

The "enrichment" of stereotypes with the help of historical materials and events of private life is extremely complicated by racial and class differences, especially if they overlap. At the same time, conclusions are often perceived in a distorted form. However, they cannot be interpreted absolutely correctly, since they are silent about psychological characteristics both the object of study and the observer. Our position is simple: something is better than nothing. "Enriched" stereotypes are preferable to primitive ones.

Chapter Eleven. Beware of Patterns

Among Americans, at least those who consider themselves to be "arbiters of fate", making hidden beliefs public is not practiced. It is not customary for us to explain differences in opinions by a difference in value attitudes. Our pragmatic, law-abiding society believes that if people think differently, then they either rely on various facts or are guided by dissimilar interests. In the first case, it is necessary to reveal the truth; in the second - to find a compromise. Most Americans find it difficult to accept the alternative possibility that diverging views may be due to divergent conceptions of causation at a level where proof or compromise is simply not possible.

While advocating the importance of "arranging", we caution: remember, the only purpose of this procedure is to improve the quality of working hypotheses; its outcome is still an assumption that may well turn out to be erroneous.

Chapter twelve. Studying organizations

Organizations, like people, can be "squared", and this is wonderful, because the history of an organization, like the history of a problem, can be useful in making a political decision. We have a thoroughly documented example. This is history in the Bay of Pigs. The organization of interest to us will be the CIA. If the main trends in the development of this institution were identified (even if only superficially) and if the stereotypical perception of this service by John F. Kennedy could be slightly "enriched" organizational issues the president would no doubt come up with fundamental questions: where did Robert Emory go? where is Richard Helms?

We often offer our listeners a historical outline of this scam up to February 1961 (when Kennedy had a series of erratic meetings with all sorts of people), supporting it with a twenty-page overview of CIA activities in 1960, drawn from two sources - a published report of the Senate Intelligence Committee and biography of Helms by Thomas Powers. We then ask the students: If you knew so much and worked as an adviser to Kennedy, what questions would you recommend asking Allen Dulles? As a rule, at the head of the list is a proposal to hear the two above-mentioned scouts. For even in open history, ignorant of secrets, three features of the structural growth of the CIA are invariably emphasized.

First, management was born out of several independent organizations, each of which had its own employees. Secondly, after the unification, this alienation persisted and even acquired institutional features. Thirdly, the very activities of the CIA contributed to such isolation, since it strongly encouraged isolation, the desire to know only what was prescribed, and at all levels, including deputy directors.

Why turn to history? Why worry about "big" events and "small" details on the "timeline" when you can just ask how this or that structure is managed at a given moment? There are at least three reasons for this. The first one is prejudice. Kennedy would hardly have gotten the right idea about the work of the CIA if he had inquired about it from Dulles or Bissell. And if he asked the same question to Emory or Helms, he probably would not believe what he heard.

Even in more open organizations, the picture presented by one of the employees usually embellishes the part of the work that he personally does. A survey of several figures requires a significant amount of time. And here we come to the second reason: it is time saving. For the beginner the most fast way building an objective portrait of an organization is to compare its current management system, resources and human resources with similar indicators in the past.

Finally, the third reason: a person who wants to get his bearings needs not only to know what the organization does, but also to imagine what it is capable of or what should not be expected from it. With organizations, as with problems, turning to the past can help you deal with the future.

Chapter thirteen. What and how to do: summing up

The Athenian exile Thucydides believed that the history of the Peloponnesian wars he described would allow future politicians to more effectively prove themselves in similar situations. He said that he writes for those "who wish to understand the events of the past, which sooner or later - for human nature is unchanged - in the same features and in the same way will be repeated in the future."

But as soon as aides tell President Lyndon Johnson about the Athenians of the fifth century BC, we are immediately seized with doubts. Johnson's aides simply didn't know what to say if the president suddenly asked, as was his wont, "So what?" The idea of ​​progress and the achievement of modern technology, not to mention a sense of American exceptionalism, obscured them (as well as the president) from the lessons of the classical past.

Could the history of these ancient peoples armed with spears, sailing on oars, commanding slaves, devoid of electronics and not having aviation, be useful to people who succeeded in modern wars? In our opinion, a certain answer can still be offered. The feeling of superiority, the complacency or excessive timidity of the generals, miscalculations of intelligence, the inconstancy of the public, the unreliability (or the presence of their own interests) of the allies, the uncertainty of the outcome - these are the features that, even without coinciding in particular, unite the two adventures, Athenian and American, and determine parallels between them. And yet the Greeks would not have warned Lyndon Johnson against mistakes - references to unknown events only obscure the essence of the matter. Acquaintance with ancient history could not have kept him from reckless, without any idea of ​​the prospects, slipping into the war.

In a situation that encourages action, good instrumental work begins with an analysis of the situation: what, in fact, is happening? Then you need to understand the subject of your own concern, as well as the main concern of the authorities: if you need to solve some problem (or live with it), then what is it? And who does it concern first of all?

Some participants will almost certainly try to start with favorite and proven schemes. They will tend to ignore everything that is not consistent with their approaches, and define the problem in such a way that the recipe already at hand is suitable for solving it.

We want standard hardware work to begin by listing in three different columns the key elements of the situation at hand - Known, Unclear, and Inferred. This simple technique allows you to focus on the situation itself, and not on the question "what to do?" (which will have to be pushed into the background for a while). A quick sketch of Similarities and Differences on paper can block out potentially misleading analogies.

After the situation itself and the problems associated with it are more or less defined, the next logical step of the apparatus should be to identify the goal - that is, the description of the state with which we would like to replace the current one. And here comes to the aid of an appeal to the history of the issue. In this regard, we recommend the daily use of three tools. The first of these is the "Goldberg rule". Armed with some intelligible definitions of the problem, it is worth asking: “What is the history of the issue? How exactly did these troubles ripen?

The second device is the “time scale”. Start the story of the problem from the very beginning, tracking key trends along the way and noticing major events, especially major changes. The third technique involves the formulation of so-called "journalistic questions". Although the "timeline" shows when and what feel free to find out also where, who, how and why.

The history of the issue sheds light on the next logical step - the selection of options to achieve the goals. What worked yesterday may well work tomorrow. Past failures can also be repeated. However, don't neglect the Similarity and Difference test.

As the simplest tests, we recommend the bet and Alexander's question. The first involves nothing more than betting on the expected outcome (or, appropriately, conducting a small poll about how much money our interlocutor is willing to risk, predicting this or that outcome. In this way, a politician can discover disagreements among experts, often hidden under terms like “good chances” or “high probability.” The second, referring to Dr. Alexander's tactics in the swine flu story, is to ask what are the new circumstances that prompt a revision of the old premises.

If nothing new is presented to you, it’s good, but if something does appear, try again to sort out the possible options. Finally, both before making a final decision and in the course of its implementation, it is necessary to use the procedure we call “arrangement”. Here it is supposed to study the premises concerning the people and organizations involved, on whose active assistance success depends. The goal is to "enrich" the basic stereotypes that often distort the perception of individuals or structures. At the same time, it is necessary to keep in mind the time factor that cements prejudices.

For this purpose, we propose a “time scale” on which events and details of the life of individuals and organizations are recorded (significant social dates are “events”, and milestones in the personal fate or internal history of organizations are “details”). And don't be fooled by the first stereotype you see, whether it's "woman", "actor", "bureaucracy" or "interest group". Label big events that the person or organization was involved in. Add, where necessary, special events that affect only certain groups or social strata.

And finally, formulate conclusions - working hypotheses that, in your opinion, are more "enriched" than the original stereotypes. Based on the assumptions received, one should get rid of past prejudices.

The proposed mini-methods encourage historical erudition and awareness. This remark concerns registry and context. By a register, we mean a certain reservoir of historical data stored in reserve in the memory of one or another person; with its help, analogies are built, the time scale is filled, or the filling of it by others is checked. The meaning of the word context here is also quite simple: the larger the array of historical knowledge mastered by a politician, the better he understands the alternatives that open up in the course of historical development.

Chapter fourteen. Treating time as a stream

Explaining the ideological attitudes of George Marshall, let us turn to an episode that took place in 1948. After retiring, Marshall served as secretary of state in the Truman cabinet. One of his main concerns was China. The communists were about to win in going there civil war. Like other "Washingtonians", Marshall wished them defeat. He asked General Albert Wedemeyer (formerly his chief staff officer and, at the end of the war, commander of American forces in China) to see what could be done in the situation. After visiting the region, Wedemeyer recommended sending several thousand American military advisers to China. By joining the Nationalist army, the general predicted, the advisers would shift the balance of power and perhaps even allow Chiang Kai-shek to gain the upper hand.

Respecting the professionalism of his colleague, Marshall nevertheless decided that the United States should limit itself to monetary assistance and arms supplies. Explaining his position before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, he stressed that anything more would entail such "commitments that the American people cannot accept." In the long run, the Secretary of State added, the Chinese themselves would regret foreign intervention. In addition, he doubted whether there were enough qualified specialists in America. Be that as it may, “it is not possible to calculate the final costs .... This operation will inevitably drag on for a long time. It will bind the current administration with obligations that will then be impossible to waive."

Apparently the most prominent achievement of his career was the so-called Marshall Plan. In 1947, Marshall decided that the economic condition of Europe required quick and decisive action. First, according to Marshall, the subject matter of the initiative was "not country or doctrine, but ... famine, poverty, despair and chaos." Second, he argued, "as a series of crises deepen, recovery efforts cannot be half-hearted": the plan must "cause radical healing, not temporary relief." Thirdly, the participation of the Russians and their allies must be welcomed, proceeding, of course, from the fact that they are ready for serious cooperation and do not seek "to extract political or other benefits from human suffering." Finally, the initiative must come from the Europeans themselves. They will have to jointly determine what they need first and turn to the United States for help.

Marshall's assessments were reinforced by the habit of considering time is like a stream. This approach to time has three components. The first is the realization that the future is not born of itself; it arises only from the past, thanks to which the gift of historical foresight is possible. The other element is the belief that all features of the present that are relevant for the future are born of the past; changes and shifts that change the usual course of time are constantly adjusting our ability to predict. Finally, the third component should be considered relentless comparison, almost continuous movement from the present to the future (or to the past) and back, allowing you to be aware of changes, study, limit, direct, slow down or accept them - depending on the results of such a comparison.

McGeorge Bundy's criticism of McNamara's 1965 defense initiatives (talking about the slide into the Vietnam War) refers to the same long-term consequences and dangers that had warned Marshall eighteen years earlier against intervening in China. Raek, who idolized Marshall, saw the same prospect; Let us recall the recommendations addressed to Bundy and McNamara to solve the problem in such a way that Vietnam is not abandoned and the American military presence is not increased. But it seemed to McNamara, at least in 1965, that if a problem was “driven to the door of his workshop,” then it should be “taken apart piece by piece” without further ado, without paying attention to context. This is how he took his duty.

Another politician who sees in the future a stream continuously flowing from the past, both American and Vietnamese, would be more careful - especially if he understood that the accomplished future can also deceive former hopes, as the present does. An example of opposing views is President Jimmy Carter. His approach was no more than one problem at a time; resolve the first, and only then move on to the next - and no holistic vision. In addition, in the face of possible difficulties, he showed self-confidence that bordered on stupidity.