Encouraging social entrepreneurs in defence innovation
The following remarks were delivered to the RAF’s Air Power Conference on 12 Jul 2017.
I am going to provide you a brief introduction to the Defence Entrepreneurs Forum and Hacking 4 Defense. In contrast to some of the incredibly stimulating technological presentations we’ve seen this morning, these are humble concepts. They are about people. But we believe they are part of the solution to the innovation challenge.
The Defence Entrepreneurs Forum
The Defence Entrepreneurs Forum, or DEF, is an American initiative, although it is now present in the UK and Australia as well. DEF describes itself as:
“A network of emerging defense leaders, civilian innovators, and social entrepreneurs who promote a culture of innovation and act upon transformational ideas that address national security challenges”
That’s a mouthful. In very simple terms, DEF was the brainchild of serving US military personnel who wanted to bring some of the dynamism and innovation of Silicon Valley into the military. This is why they selected the word “entrepreneur” rather than the more intuitive “intrapreneur” for the name of their organisation.
I would like to dwell for a moment on the DEF strapline, “inspire, connect and empower”, which appears in the tag of this slide. These words sound somewhat bombastic, but they are actually powerful and important. I will start in the middle.
Connect. We have all spent most of our careers in large organisations, and we know that the default mindset therein is siloed. But I think we forget, as we progress through these large organisations, just how siloed the lower and middle reaches of them are. If DEF did nothing other than bring people from different services together it would be valuable. It is fantastic to see a tanker, a fighter pilot and a submariner share a table and compare notes, and learn how many leadership and innovation challenges they have in common.
Inspire. Building on “connect” we have “inspire”. People in large organisations who are dissatisfied with the status quo, who want to make things better, are on a roller coaster. At times the experience is inspiring and invigorating, but at other times it is frustrating and exhausting. Having those same people around the table supporting each other on their innovation journey is immensely powerful.
Empower. DEF supports the chain of command, but of course sits outside the chain of command so does not have authority to formally “empower” people. But what it can do is what I call “taking the lid off” budding social entrepreneurs. Our best people invariably have very busy jobs. As you can all appreciate, they have so much to do that it would probably take eighty hours a week to complete it all. So it’s not at all obvious that these people will want to spend their own time to become social entrepreneurs, to ask big questions like “How can I stop putting out fires and start finding systematic solutions?” or “If I owned this organisation, what would I do to improve it?” But being able to get good people together and role model what is possible helps to take the lid off them. Let’s take one simple but tangible example. When you look at the LinkedIn profiles of key DEF members you’ll see that they have busy and successful jobs, but also write for various publications, have started several volunteer organisations, have graduate degrees, and may even do work for think tanks. They are really making a difference.
The DEF toolbox
That’s a little on the people and philosophy of DEF. Let’s get a little more tangible and discuss what sits behind those things: the DEF toolbox.
On this slide we have a spectrum of tools, that gets more demanding but more valuable as you move right.
- Writing. Writing is the easiest place to start. Writing is how you start change; it’s how you get noticed. The screenshot on the slide shows DEF Australia’s vibrant blog, full of people pitching ideas and challenging each other.
- Agora. Agora is a fancy term of a meeting, and can range from a “think and drink” to a more formal event with an agenda and specific outputs. The photo on the slide is of an agora in DC. This is the stage we’re at now in the UK. So far we’ve have seven agoras, covering such topics as McChrystal’s organisational innovation at JSOC, hardware hacking, and increasing cultural fluency in the military.
- Innovation pitch. Next we have innovation pitches, which require a lot more effort and planning. These can be useful for surfacing good ideas within an organisation, and building a critical mass of supporters for them. The photo is of a pitch by the Syria Airlift Project, which wanted to use drones to transport aid into Syrian cities.
- DEF[x]. A DEF[x] is a day-long conference. It requires significantly more planning but can be tremendously powerful in developing good ideas. The photo shows the first DEF[x] organised by DEF Australia, which took place last autumn.
- Annual conference. The penultimate tool is the annual conference, which takes place each year in the US. Innovators from around the US military, and increasingly beyond, meet at the conference for 2.5 days of debate and idea sharing. It’s sort of like Woodstock for defence innovators, but without the beer. Or the drugs.
- Report. This may not be the most demanding of the tools — perhaps it should be to the left of the annual conference — but it’s a significant undertaking. Last year the Pentagon asked DEF to prepare a report on what Millennials think of careers in the military. The result was the F5 report.
We’ll now leave the subject of DEF, although we can discuss it more in the Q&A.
Hacking 4 Defense
It’s important to say up front that we are not affiliated with Hacking 4 Defense (H4D), but we think it’s an interesting concept and are optimistic it will arrive in the UK.
You might not imagine that Silicon Valley would be fertile ground for defence innovation, but that is where H4D was born.
Its birth is due to two men coming together. First is Steve Blank, father of the lean startup movement. Steve has been involved in multiple startups and is now a professor at Stamford. He’s also a Vietnam veteran who remains passionate about national security.
Next is Colonel Pete Newell. Pete headed the US Army’s Rapid Equipping Force (REF), and was responsible for filling urgent operational requirements during the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan. When Pete retired, he moved to Silicon Valley and connected with Steve Blank. Their collaboration lead to H4D.
The H4D recipe
H4D is taught as a university class. It started at Stamford but has now spread to other schools. Thus the first ingredient is university students. The students use a defined methodology, which is based on Steve’s lean startup methodology with some tailoring for national security. Finally, elements of the US military bring unclassified problems for the course to solve.
Shaking these three ingredients up — students, a methodology and unclassified defence problems, H4D in turn produces three outputs: solutions, service and startups. The solutions consist of prototypes that will probably require further development. Service refers to young people who are eager to contribute to national security but who may not wish to work on weapons. Although it’s still early in the life of H4D, it is hoped that some of the teams will go on to launch startups based on the work they’ve completed.
Wrapping up
I hope this brief presentation has been a useful overview of DEF and H4D. The last thing from me is to invite you to join the network. There’s no commitment involved — it’s just an opportunity for you to stay abreast of what DEF is up to.
