Interesting concepts - bland delivery.

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	• Certain to Win Chet Richards Xlibris Corporation, 2004 - 188 pages average customer review:based on 17 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

Control is an illusion

In environments that are marked by rapid and frequent change, such as battlefields and business, there have been a range of management processes to deal with that change. Generally, the approach has been tools and practices that attempt to control the rate or prediction of those changes - two things that are impossible to control. One cannot predict every possible future or every possible change and cannot therefore provide a plan that will fit every contingency. Attempting to plan for and control every contingency is inefficient and ineffective. What if you could learn, instead of how to control, how to thrive in rapidly changing environments? What if change could be made an ally instead of an opponent to your plans? Dr. Richards, a student of the late Col. John Boyd, has developed insights into just how to let go of the illusion of control in favor of learning to thrive in the apparent chaos of business competition. As a long time software engineer, I find Dr. Richards' insight especially helpful in facing the challenges of ever changing requirements, priorities, rapid design cycles, and intense competition. It sits well with the "extreme programming" theorists that emphasize the same approach to everyday software development that gets away from the structured and unbending schedule plans of most software development processes. I am certain the same approach will be helpful to more than just software business practices.

Most business practices assume that we can control our environment and mold it into the image we prefer. But control is an illusion; Dr. Richards can help you break out of the illusion into the real world.

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Certain to Win

Chet Richards does an excellent job illustrating and exposing the ideas and brilliance of John Boyd, especially as it relates to business. Chet was not only a friend and acolyte to Col. Boyd, he became an equal and co-creator of John's wisdom and philosophy. This probably explains why he understands and instinctively knows how John might apply his "O-O-D-A Loop" or "Building Snowmobiles" to the business challenges of today. The philosophy detailed in "Certain to Win" is the key to solving the most difficult problems of business, government and society. Organizations which can understand and apply the four components of "Maneuver Warfare" will succeed when facing uncertainty and unpredictable change. Once we develop an awareness of our own paradigms (Boyd's Orientation Phase), and an ability to rapidly change or reorient those paradigms (Speeding-Up Our Decision Cycle) we can literally practice "Guerrilla Warfare of the Mind." Decisions and organizational thought processes become intuitive, combining the inductive and deductive approaches. By speeding up our ability to analyze and synthesize near simultaneously, we effectively create our own "Temporal Distortion," that is time slows down for us. In business, as in war, speed and cunning beats size and strength every time. Chet Richards is On Target & On Time with "Certain to Win." Cheers!

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Interesting concepts - bland delivery.

I thoroughly enjoyed the Coram book about Boyd, so I bought this book as a follow-up. I thought that Richards' ideas with regards to the application of Boyd's OODA loop concepts were sound - however I thought at times his delivery didn't do the topic justice. Several times during my reading I found explanations to be almost too rudimentary or obvious.

Great Stuff - Boyd on Business

Sadly it is only after his death that we have come to have widespread appreciation of Boyd's great intellect. This book is another great step in finding broader application of some of what Boyd taught.Chet Richards has done a great job of bringing Boyd's message to the business world.

Some have questioned whether a view of decision making in combat was applicable to business. The answer is yes, sometimes and perhaps more often than you think. Boyd is probably even more applicable to political campaigns.

Were I still teaching MBA students, some of the material from the book would be in the classroom, replacing more traditional materials.

I would read Boyd first as a foundation for this book.

Highly recommended.

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CERTAIN TO WIN

Dr. Chet Richards' work is an extraordinarily fine piece of tight writing designed to take the mystery out of the O.O.D.A. Loop decision cycle itself and how one might apply it in areas outside of the battlefield where it is often applied. Despite the handicap of being a brilliant mathematician Dr. Richards approaches and covers the topic utilizing a useful layman's view.

With clear language Richards presents the fundamentals of Colonel John Boyd's revolutionary thinking on decision cycles - which thinking became the genesis for modern manuever warfare. Dr. Richards' real contribution lies in his knack for taking what some might consider arcane military theories and laying them on top of current business models and making the case - successfully in my view - for their incorporation as the new "best practices in business.

The book is a delightful read which re-informs military types regarding the enduring value of "Boydian Thinking" - it will also stretch the minds of our keenest business leaders. Should be in any thinker and doer's personal library.

Bill Hayes
Major, USMC (Ret.)

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reviews: page 1, 2, 3, 4

Advance reviews of Certain to Win

Certain to Win [Sun Tzu´s prognosis for generals who follow his advice] develops the strategy of the late US Air Force Colonel John R. Boyd for the world of business. Robert Coram's monumental biography, Boyd, the Fighter Pilot Who Changed the Art of War, rekindled interest in this obscure pilot and documented his influence on military matters ranging from the design of the F-15 and F-16 fighters to the planning for Operation Desert Storm to the execution of Operation Iraqi Freedom. Unfortunately Boyd's written legacy, consisting of a single paper and a four-set cycle of briefings, addresses strategy only in war. [All Boyd´s briefings are available on Defense and the National Interest.]

Boyd and Business Boyd did study business. He read everything he could find on the Toyota Production System and came to consider it as an implementation of ideas similar to his own. He took business into account when he formulated the final version of his "OODA loop" and in his last major briefing, Conceptual Spiral, on science and technology. He read and commented on early versions of this manuscript, but he never wrote on how business could operate more profitably by using his ideas.

Other writers and business strategists have taken up the challenge, introducing Boyd's concepts and suggesting applications to business. Keith Hammonds, in the magazine Fast Company, George Stalk and Tom Hout in Competing Against Time, and Tom Peters most recently in Re-imagine! have described the OODA loop and its effects on competitors.

They made significan

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