O.O.D.A loop, do you train it/use it.

[hoshin1600]

We all have our little quirks. Mine is the OODA LOOP, (or the fruit loop/hula hoop, as we so callously called it) It's Not wrong, it's not, but it's inception was focused more on military strategy and later adapted to the paradigms of business. (I use such fancy talk - which fits right in with the whole OODA LOOP concept)

Please indulge me ...

As a young DT instructor, one of my Lieutenants came up to me and asked, "What equipment do you need?'.
I replied, "Actually, we're all set, Lieutenant."
He said, "well, get un-set. We got 2,500 bucks left in this years budget and if we don't spend it in the next thirty days, we lose that amount in next years budget.....so what do you need?"
"I need some good mats", I beamed.
We got the mats. (Yay!)

That seemed like a good thing to me, so, I went on a quest to learn more about budgets. We had a bunch of them. A DT budget, a General Training budget, a Research and Development budget, a Travel budget, this budget, that budget and all the other little budgets. Their respective fiscal years ended at different times, so I started tracking them. Any time one was nearing it's end, and there was cash available, I would put in a request for travel and training in anything that was even remotely related to DT.
Kind of a no-brainer. I mean, what would you rather do, work your regular shifts or go away, all expenses paid, to play rock and roll with some other guys who did DT?

At the time, eighties and nineties, the oodaloop thing was in vogue, it was all the rage, it had made a big comeback from the fifties.
I came to realize the folks teaching it were doing the same thing I was - milking the system. I was doing it to learn....maybe they were, too, I don't know. But it complicated the training. Confused it. Made it far more convoluted than was necessary.
(Young guys - look up "convoluted" to reacquaint yourself with the word)

The whole "orientation" part (the second O in OODA-LOOP), which was one of their keystones, and it's relations to Gestalt theory and Hicks Law (which should actually be called Hicks-Hyman Law)
SEE, see what I'm doing? I'm complicating the whole fricken' thing with words - and I'm not even trying to.

In reality, in OUR world, us Martial Artists, us cops, us regular people - when something happens - we act and adapt on the fly. That's really all there is to it.

It's why I've always hated the term OODA loop. It's why I always will.

there is another way to look at it. all the mumbo jumbo fruit loop stuff is not for the student, its for the trainer. in the same way that information about budgets changed your training. if you didnt know about budgets you would not have gotten all the extra perks, the students dont need to know about about budgets, only that they got new mats. students dont need to know about Hicks law ( as adult men we should not be thinking about the word hymen anyway) and the fruit loop/ hula hoop. but as instructors, knowing about it will effect the way and the content of the training.
i dont really need to talk alot about tunnel vision and cognitive tunneling. i just need to teach them to look beyond the sights before shooting and scan the area after you disengage.

 

[Brian R. VanCise]

The OODA loop is some thing pretty easy to understand. Observe, Orient, Deicide and Act. Pretty easy to understand right!

Here is a photo:

Once you understand this then you literally have it!


Or you can make it more complicated and super interrelated and come up with a lot more like this:

or this:

Personally, like Buka mentioned if I am in a moment of violence I do not have time to think about the OODA loop. I just have to do what needs to be done. On the fly just as Buka mentioned. It is okay to study the OODA loop, understand it but then you have to let it go. It should not in any way take up to much time in your training! Having said that it does not mean that it is not valuable to understand it. Just that minimal time should be spent on it!

 

[Juany118]

The OODA loop is some thing pretty easy to understand. Observe, Orient, Deicide and Act. Pretty easy to understand right!

Here is a photo: View attachment 20098

Once you understand this then you literally have it!


Or you can make it more complicated and super interrelated and come up with a lot more like this:

View attachment 20099

or this:

View attachment 20100

Personally, like Buka mentioned if I am in a moment of violence I do not have time to think about the OODA loop. I just have to do what needs to be done. On the fly just as Buka mentioned. It is okay to study the OODA loop, understand it but then you have to let it go. It should not in any way take up to much time in your training! Having said that it does not mean that it is not valuable to understand it. Just that minimal time should be spent on it!

I think you miss the point. The OODA loop isn't something you think about in a fight, it's something you incorporate into the training regime. As a soldier 25 years ago I didn't know about the OODA loop BUT now that I do I can see that it was used in the design of training for things like Immediate action drills. It is a tool used in training to build the proper reactions. I even use it today in training. Going through a shoot house (with simunitions) and clearing rooms with role players inside. You observe, orient, decide (whether it is shoot or no shoot) then act on that decision. I don't think about OODA but the trainer setting up the course has OODA in mind when he designs it.

 

[Buka]

I agree with you, Juany. And I think it's used more realistically in military and law enforcement than in anything else. Especially Martial Arts.

I still think it over complicates everything.

 

[Juany118]

I agree with you, Juany. And I think it's used more realistically in military and law enforcement than in anything else. Especially Martial Arts.

I still think it over complicates everything.

Well, my first career choice was a History teacher. The things you need to understand to set up a proper lesson plan to teach the student always seems unnecessarily complicated. Thing is if it wasn't necessary anyone could be a teacher, and we all know that isn't true .

 

[Brian R. VanCise]

I don't think I missed anything Juany118. I actually tell people about the OODA loop and demonstrate it. I just don't feel you should make too much of it or put to much time on it. When I go through a shoot house, etc. as I am moving along I observe, orient, decide and act. However, we all just do this naturally. It is good to have a brief understanding of it but that is really all you need! By the way I have sat through multiple lessons with OODA loop presentations in them. In other words I have wasted a lot of time.

 

[Juany118]

I don't think I missed anything Juany118. I actually tell people about the OODA loop and demonstrate it. I just don't feel you should make too much of it or put to much time on it. When I go through a shoot house, etc. as I am moving along I observe, orient, decide and act. However, we all just do this naturally. It is good to have a brief understanding of it but that is really all you need! By the way I have sat through multiple lessons with OODA loop presentations in them. In other words I have wasted a lot of time.

WE do that. I am talking about training for the new "boot", rookie officer, or civilian who has never been confronted by violence. It is for these people that I think using the OODA loops as a reference point for designing portions of a training program is useful. These are the people that can suffer from denial or have major issues with cognitive tunneling etc and training that involves the OODA loop can help overcome these issues.

Now does it seem useless after a certain point? Yeah but that is the nature of training. If I go to departmental training I have rookies in the room. If I go to train the trainer training, the host has a standardized program because their may be a genuine "new guy" there not familiar with it etc.

 

[Xue Sheng]

OODA loop, to be honest, I did not know this was a thing that had an acronym to describe it, but after 15 years of physical security and associated training, and over 40 years in martial I do this naturally... I just did not know it had a name.

 

[Brian R. VanCise]

Nothing wrong with bringing it to the front and letting people know about the OODA loop. (whether LEO rookies, martial artists, shooters, etc.) Getting them to understand it and that this is a natural human thing that we do. However, extensive training. Well you could spend your time and money better. Just my 02.

 

[Juany118]

Nothing wrong with bringing it to the front and letting people know about the OODA loop. (whether LEO rookies, martial artists, shooters, etc.) Getting them to understand it and that this is a natural human thing that we do. However, extensive training. Well you could spend your time and money better. Just my 02.

Oh I am not even saying THEY need to know about it necessarily, more so that I think an Instructor knowing about it is very useful in order to help create realistic training scenarios. From an instructor stand point it can also be useful in liability protection. In UoF situations the training can often be brought into question, the instructor can then be called to justify the training regime and that is where the knowledge can be VERY useful. Gotta love a litigious society.