Genesis of a leader

An example of a growth as a leader

This narrative is a personal story of the writer’s own growth as a leader when serving the Finnish Defence Forces as an officer 1984 – 2012. For reference purposes, stages are reflected three growth models: John Maxwell’s (2011), Jim Collins (2001) and Bill Torbert’s (2004). The paper has two goals: 1) to illustrate evolution of a leader and importance of reflection, 2) to provide references for learning, self-reflection, and self-control.(Pardon me for not being able to include the footnotes with this version)

Short introduction to growth models for leadership

John C. Maxwell is approaching leadership modelling it with five following levels of maturity . His model is providing a clear base for development and values as a leader. He recognises that each level includes the previous levels, and leadership is built by accumulating them in each situation. The following matrix is illustrating Maxwell’s five levels as a leader.

Levels	Features
5. Pinnacle	These leaders have reputation and respect. They use intuition and time their effect intentionally. It requires to develop followers rather than lead followers. They create a legacy within the organization, extended platform for leading.
4. People Development	The key thing is empowering others. Leaders use their position, relationships, and productivity to invest in their followers and develop them until they become leaders. Teamwork is highly appreciated as tasks are distributed but responsibility is centralized. Growth is built by developing people with vision that inspires. This level allows the leader to take larger responsibilities.
3. Production	Leader gains influence and credibility by getting work done and goals achieved. The leader becomes a change agent: tackle problems, support people to the new level of effectiveness. There is a danger in doing things oneself and not with people and forgetting to take care of relationships.
2. Permission	The level is defined by relationships. Treating people as individuals with value provides ground for influence. Gradually there is trust growing between leader and her people as they become more familiar with each other. Leader switches from “Me” to “We” and openness creates the positive working environment. Permission seeking leaders may appear too soft and indecisive.
1. Position	An entry level of all leaders. Position as a manager is based on rights granted by position, title, and rank. Position based “boss/chief” has subordinates who are controlled with rules, policies, and regulations. The level is an invitation to growth for a possible leader. Staying at this level may lead to emphasizing manager’s rights more than responsibilities.

 
Jim Collins with his team analysed all Fortune 500 companies from 1965 to 1995 and found eleven good to great examples . Then the team analysed those 11 with their hypothesis model of six features where leadership was the first. They defined features for level 5 leadership that were an enabler for companies to break from good to great. The levels are explained in the following matrix.

Levels	Features
5 Executive	Builds enduring greatness through a paradoxical blend of personal humility and professional will.
4 Effective leader	Catalyses commitment to and vigorous pursuit of a clear and compelling vision, stimulating higher performance standards.
3 Competent manager	Organizes people and resources toward the effective and efficient pursuit of predetermined objectives.
2 Contributing team member	Contributes individual capabilities to the achievements of group objectives and work effectively with others in a group setting.
1 Highly capable individual	Makes productive contributions through talent, knowledge, skills and good work habits.

 
Bill Torbert and his team created an action inquiry – a systems thinking approach to describe transformation of a leader . The development process was tested in Boston College. Unlike other models, this provides a roadmap of different paths between stages but for the purpose of this narrative, the model has been simplified to linear growth as illustrated in the following matrix.

Levels	Main features
7 Alchemist	Moves between levels and utilizes the best applicable action-logic to the situation and group. Meets each situation at the pace and action logic of the group he is interacting. Ability to transform the pace and focus of the current conversation or meeting. Seeks analogies across different domains and promoting collaboration using his spiritual energy. Stands in the tension of opposites and aims to blend them. Has grown beyond his ego and promotes the society and higher values.
6 Strategist	Is more self-aware of action and time. He uses all four conventional approaches when the situation requires and aligns individual, team and organizational goals. He recognises levels of other people and enables their development. He allows others to make mistakes but assures that they will learn from them both at behavioural and strategical levels. Strategist consciously seeks new ways of framing opportunities, dilemmas, and conflicts. He actively seeks resolutions both inner and outer paradoxes and tries to use apparent conflict as empowering leverage. Strategists expressions are spontaneous, both genuine and intense. His focus is on the continuous development of himself and others.
5 Individualist A transition phase	Takes relativistic perspective focusing on both present and historical context. He feels conflicting emotions when facing situations and seeks independence, creative work. He is attracted by difference and change more than similarity and stability.  He influences more by listening and finding patterns rather than advocacy. May not provide certainty and firm leadership often expected by more conventionally oriented employees.
Threshold of self-awareness and self-control
4 Achiever	Works with 1-3 year period juggling creatively with shorter time goals. He shifts between planning, performing and assessing to gain outcomes that matter. Achiever makes incremental, single loop changes in behaviour to eventually reaching the planned results. Satisfaction occurs when “I have achieved outcomes by successfully juggling with quick wins, agreed-on deadlines, and efficient work”. Achiever seeks more long-term effectiveness than short-term efficiency. Achiever values more teamwork and agreements reached through consensus. He welcomes feedback and seeks mutuality in relationships with co-workers. He might though be myopic in comprehending the feedback and does not easily deviate from his proven mind models.
3 Expert	Concentrates on a strategic level as he is improving in mastering his discipline. He emprises projects from 6 months to 12 months by wielding logistical power. He feels satisfaction when “I accomplished the task as efficiently as possible”. The expert does not identify himself with the group but seeks to stand out from others. They are typically hard project workers, seek completion of the task, and willing to learn from experts more acknowledged than themselves. Experts are perfectionists or competitors that find hard to work in teams. They also find it very uncomfortable to work outside their area of mastery.
2 Diplomat	Concentrates on performance by gaining self-control to act effectively. He seeks high-status group members and tries to imitate their routines. The basis of his authority is norms and routines of his organization. He concentrates on routine tasks and feels satisfaction, when he is on time for work, meeting or completing the routine task. He takes the values of significant others the highest good. Behavioural skills – right moves and words in right times – are main tools towards acceptance. At best diplomat provides reliability, loyalty, and goodwill that improves trust and morale in the organization. Diplomats avoid negative situations, cannot criticize others, or question group norms.
1 Opportunist	Concentrates on the physical world and trying to gain control over it. He has short time horizon when trying to grasp opportunities and firefight emergencies as they occur. The opportunist achieves his goal when declaring “I won”. At best opportunist is good at short-term actions to unchartered areas in work. Longer-term these short-term wins will appear to be costly. Opportunist typically avoids responsibility and seeks externalizing blame.

Next chapters are narrating particular features through four stages that writer has lived through last four decades. These features are projected over the levels and descriptions of above three growth paths in intention to show that person can improve his managerial and leadership skills. 

Stage of maturity
Maxwell’s	Position>	Permission	Production	People	Pinnacle
Collins	Individual	Team member	Manager	Leader	Executive
Torbert’s	Opportunist	Diplomat	Expert	Achiever	Individualist	Strategist	Alchemist

The three models have implemented into the same matrix, but their levels or stages are not normalised, so they are not comparable. Bolded, big font indicates the stage and arrow (>) points towards possible transformation as a leader and a person.
 

My story

When I was in my twenties just out from Military College, I thought that being the best operator of all technical systems and leading by excellent example in accomplishing were the only things needed to be a successful leader of Signal troops. I hated every undefined feature in Signals procedures and spent hours in writing how things should be done. I pressed my subordinates with both lengthy instructions and dynamic behaviour. I competed against my peers and superiors in being most skilful, strong and strict young officer in the field of Signals business. 

Up to a certain level, everything went well. Conscripts followed my instructions, sometimes out of fear towards my temper and overarching skills, and sometimes just to get things over with and return to barracks. My peers did not like me because of constant competition, and I did not gain any close friendship with them. My superiors either disliked me and turned their attention somewhere else or trusted me and gave me freedom of action.

I felt left alone with my role of being the best. Gradually, I changed my behaviour to be more supportive towards my peers. I shared my work with them and helped them in their problems. I teamed up with some splendid fellows to study together, and we all were successfully in gaining entrance to General Staff College. I learned that sharing will enable collegial support, and that will get you further than selfish hoarding of information and constant comparison and competition.

Later I realized that I had been risen to behave like that. The whole education system was driven by recognition of individual success .  Through my entire education, competition among students was constant as we were judged every time in exercises, exams, and tests. Only in conscript training some credit was gained by the team as we were together able to survive in skiing through the dark forest, settling a camp and countering an enemy attack just before sunrise. Even that was ruined, when bonus holidays were given based on individual success in shooting, running or exams. Team sociology  was educated at Military College only in theory when competition between cadets was constant, and only sanctions were addressed on team bases. 

After graduation from Military College, I was given a task to compose integrated teams of signal out of a heterogeneous group of conscripts under my responsibility. I did not have any practical experience on building team integrity, but taking them out into the woods, and assigning them with challenges to overcome, were producing results. Otherwise my expert skills and the way of using them to humiliate my conscripts or peers were only counterproductive.

Transfor- mation	Twenties
Maxwell’s	Position>	Permission	Production	People	Pinnacle
Collins	Individual>	Team member	Manager	Leader	Executive
Torbert’s	Opportunist	Diplomat	>Expert	Achiever	Individualist	Strategist	Alchemist

When I was in my thirties, just out from General Staff College and an eager student of telecommunications technology, I thought that, if I just make sense of every technical detail and compose them properly as a system, I would be able to build a better world. I spend hours in making sense of complex C4I systems, designing better information and telecommunications structures, and defining better processes for telecommunications network operations. I drafted orders that gave very detailed instructions on how to install routers and modems within telco facilities. I thought that strict project management was the key to success. People and systems would bend to my will if they were just managed in a strictest and controlled way all the time.

By collaborating with my peers and subordinates, I was successful in building technical systems, but almost all attempts to change the behaviour of people were failing. I tried to create bridges between telecommunications and information technology people. I provided them with designs combining telecommunications and information technology. I described them use cases, where both network and session engineering was needed to make whole OSI-stack functioning. I had no success in getting them closer and cooperating. Not even having their rooms on the same aisle made any changes to their confrontation. I tried to introduce common processes to improve their combined service production with no results. I was doing my best in sense making and designing systems. I spend nights in drawing logical charts on how processes should be running. Although all logic was speaking towards the change, people were afraid, not sharing the same language or distrusting each other. Moreover, I was not able to take them into the forest to overcome shared challenges.
I threw myself into studies of change management  and iterative development . There I found my first understanding and tools to lead changes by using my personality and human social behaviour . I abandoned strive for significant, one-time change and went after evolution with smaller steps.  I invited people in exercises to share their problems and seek for combined solutions. I spoke with people, visited their sites of work, listened to them, and recognised their skills and achievements. I was seeking their permission to lead them forward.

Later, I realized that I was educated to approach all subjects in a systematic way. All the education in General Staff College and the University of Technology was preparing me to understand and design  material and immaterial systems , not more complex systems that are a mixture of people, machines, and their interrelationships. I was provided with many tools to change technical systems but non to support human being in leaving his/her area of comfort. My communication was based only on analytical and logical facts, and they were not enough to move people from their comfort zones they had built in their history. 
I did not touch their feelings, changed their attitudes, nor was I able to help them to process their fears of new and unclear future. My education was perceiving a human being just as a piece of machinery that followed technical procedures . With my rational explanations and demands, I was seen more as a threat than as a leader that would take everyone along a safe journey towards the better future.

Transfor- mation	Thirties
Maxwell’s	Position	Permission	Production	People	Pinnacle
Collins	Individual	Team member>	Manager	Leader	Executive
Torbert’s	Opportunist	Diplomat	Expert	Achiever	Individualist	Strategist	Alchemist

When I was in my forties, I thought that managing programmes, making sense of everything, meeting people and telling stories of safe roads and better futures were the keys to making things to happen.  I was managing programmes  of hundreds of millions of euros, which were meant to change the behaviour  of thousands of people. Since timetable was tight and I had to detach money from current operations to finance the change, I was forced to use much outside help in planning and executing the transformation. I did manage changes through the whole DOTMLPFII  sphere extending over four years. The transformation was done incrementally, and I did my best to walk my talk among people.  

I was lucky to work with some bright individuals and able people. The technical transformation was achieved according to the schedule partly also because it was executed supported by outside professionals - best in Finland. However, I failed miserably with my people. I was thinking of combined effort of mine and outside professionals within integrated project teams. In the planning phase, my people took the role of audition rather than co-planning. In the design phase, they adapted role of judgement and critic rather than sharing information and gaining competence. In the implementation phase, they were good only to comment proceedings and achievements from seats of stand. In the operation phase, they were incapable of taking over the new systems and their administration as an organization. I had to hand pick individuals amongst them and assign responsibilities in the new organization. Despite the time and money spend in my people, they were not ready to take new steps and improve their competence along the program.

I stumbled over a culture of the workplace. I thought that people I had worked with were eager to make changes after few years of less intensity, but I was wrong. Their culture had reversed from where I had left them four years earlier. They had lost their common spirit and were divided into small groups of “tribes” with rivalling mind-sets. Some people were almost aggressive in their reaction declaring that “the world sucks, and you are from deep with your talks”. Most were perceived things with an attitude of “we have already tried that – it will not work”. Moreover, some people were trying to shine more than actually do. As an organization, they were not ready to start any journey of transformation, so they marginalized themselves to be the audience rather than real players in the field.
I lost those people. It was not enough to give people as clear technical concepts as possible. It was not enough to appoint capable managers to head the projects. It was not enough to talk with individuals and motivate them. Social structure, common spirit and adhered procedures kept good people from changing. I had to work around this group of people, and it left me very frustrated and sad.

Later I learnt about organizational cultures  and their maturity for change . I studied social structures in workplaces and was astonished when reading about tribal leadership .

Transfor- mation	Forties
Maxwell’s	Position	Permission	Production>	People	Pinnacle
Collins	Individual	Team member	Manager>	Leader	Executive
Torbert’s	Opportunist	Diplomat	Expert	Achiever>	Individualist	Strategist	Alchemist

When I reached fifties, I took time  and effort in migrating and integrating different cultures within my organization by gradually involving them into new challenges and offering mentoring and help adjusted to each specific need.  I even fabricated some crises to weld people together by outside threat.  I was also distributing projects so that there were always parallel paths in progress to ensure that single failure did not end up as a disaster.  I was able to deliver the planned services with my organization, but I was not successful in transforming them at capability level.

Users were keener on clinging existing tools and procedures than adopting any new ways of working.  My ICT efforts were not transformed to new procedures and further capabilities of fighting forces.  I was using advanced technology, good practices, and best people to deliver world class information services, but my superiors were seeing me more as an expense rather than an enabler. Successes inside were not transferred as a value outside of my organization.

I tried to create examples. I asked Commander to act as an example, use new services himself and demand his subordinates to utilize them also. I was using collaboration tools weekly to manage my distributed organization and thus being an example for my people to market new services further. I required my staff to utilize wiki to manage both current operations and planned issues. We were flat and efficient ICT-organization, but still our clients, the end users, were shy to adopt new ICT services.

Together with other process owners, we initiated doctrinal, organizational and cultural transformations:   

• the renewed fighting of Land Forces together with Chief of Operations and inspectors of Infantry and Sappers utilizing Battle Management System;  
• improved intelligence with the Head of G2; 
• enhanced artillery fires with the Inspector of Artillery; 
• standardizing the C2 processes with the Chief of Readiness;
• implemented a new way in maintaining of programmable electronics together with the Head of G4 .

We defined progressively advancing measures for each field exercise for troops and guides instructors to improve their troops. We composed joint exercises to give meaning for co-operation and new tasks to benefit from new ICT-services.  We produced concepts, guides, presentations and videos to help instructors in their new training. Every public occasion was used to recognise behaviour towards the future model. We planned an information operation to get people and units to change their behaviour and culture. This was possible only with shared understanding and unified effort to make a change towards achieving greater goals than any single unit or branch were able to accomplish.

Only after the owners of the core businesses started transforming, I was able to support them with ICT services and evolve the capabilities of the Land Forces. My staff and people of Signals begun to feel being a part of something bigger and doing meaningful work. That empowered them for further achievements. I learnt that, if you want to make a change, first you have to get people moving, and then you might be able to steer the movement and energy with quick wins, recognition and bright vision. 

Transfor- mation	Fifties
Maxwell’s	Position	Permission	Production	People	Pinnacle
Collins	Individual	Team member	Manager	Leader	Executive
Torbert’s	Opportunist	Diplomat	Expert	Achiever	Individualist	>Strategist	Alchemist

Today, I sometimes feel, that I know how the world is running. For these occasions, I have wallpaper titled Egocentricity . Human being has a tendency for being egocentric: 

• Egocentric memory is a natural tendency to forget information that does not support the adopted line of thinking. 
• Egocentric myopia refers to thinking within an overly narrow point of view.  
• Egocentric righteousness is a tendency to feel superior based on the belief that one has actually figured out how the world works.  
• Egocentric blindness is the natural tendency not to notice facts and evidence that contradict one’s beliefs or values. 

Having this reminder, I try to continue my journey humbly and work harder to improve my understanding of how world functions, people behave, societies interact and technology develops towards more complex and interdependent global system.  

Remembering that even to produce a simple household item like a toaster from scratch is not possible for any one man.  

Bearing in mind the saying of Peter Drucker: “Culture eats strategy for breakfast” . 

Envisioning, that sometime in the future, I might be feeling the euphoria of finding features of Alchemist  in me.

List of references

• Maxwell, John C. (2011): The 5 levels of leadership. Center Street. ISBN: 978-1599953632
• Collins, Jim (2011): Good to great. Random House Business Books, London. ISBN: 978-0712676090
• Torbert, Bill and associates (2004): Action inquiry. Berret-Koehler Publishers Inc. San Francisco. ISBN: 978-1576752647
• Smith, Frank (1998): The book of learning and forgetting. Teachers College Press, New York. 
• Pipping, Knut (2008): Infantry company as a society. Original in Finnish 1947. Translated by Petri Kekale. National Defence University of Finland. Publications 3/2008. Helsinki
• Kotter, John P. (1996): Leading change. Harvard Business Press. Harvard.
• Boehm, Barry (1988): A spiral model of software development and enhancement. IEEE Computer 21(5):61-72, May 1988
• Kauppinen, Tero J. and Ogg, Alexander (1994): VIA – The leader’s guide to driving change in turbulent times. Leadership Studies International, Inc. San Diego. ISBN: 0-964078708
• Mattila, Juha (2004): A variation of spiral development method applied to military command, control and communications system production. National Defence University Publications ISBN: 951-2514990
• Stallings, William (2011): Data and computer communications. 9th edition. Prentice Hall. New Jersey. ISBN: 978-0131392052
• INCOSE (2015): a guide for system life cycle processes and activities. 4th edition. John Wiley & Sons, Inc. New Jersey. ISBN: 978-1118999400
• Van Creveld, Martin (1987): Command in war. Harvard University Press. ISBN: 978-0674144415
• Mattila, Juha (2004): Challenges in managing networked business in military environment. Original in Finnish: Verkostoituneen toiminnan johtamisen haasteet sotilaallisessa ymparistossa. ISBN: 951-251518
• Managing Successful Programmes, Axilos
• Burnes, Bernard (2014): Managing change. 6th edition. Pearson Education, Ltd. Harlow. ISBN: 978-0273778967
• Doctrine, Organization, Training, Material, Learning and Leadership, Personnel, Facilities, Information, and Integration
• Mattila, Juha (2015): Introduction to ICT rationalization program of the Finnish Defence Forces from enterprise architecture viewpoints. See: http://c4isys.blogspot.sg/2015/12/introduction-of-ict-rationalization.html
• Harford, Tim (2011): Adapt. Little, Brown. London. ISBN: 978-1408701522
• Kegan, Robert and Lahey, Lisa Laskow (2009): Immunity to change. Harvard Business School Publishing. Boston. ISBN: 978-1422117361
• Logan, Dave et.al. (2008): Tribal leadership. HarperCollins Publishers, New York. ISBN: 978-0061251306
• Kotter, John P. (2014): Accelerate. Harvard Business, Review Press. Boston. ISBN: 978-1625271747
• Cameron, Esther and Green, Mike (2012): Making sense of change management. 3rd edition. Kogan Page. London. ISBN: 978-0749464356
• Mattila, Juha (2014): Lessons from developing Army command, control and information systems for Finnish Land Forces during 2007 – 2009. See: http://c4isys.blogspot.sg/2014/03/lessons-from-developing-army-command.html
• Mattila, Juha (2014, March): Developing tactical communications for renewed land fighting. See: http://c4isys.blogspot.sg/2014/03/developing-tactical-communications-for.html
• Duhigg, Charles (2012): The power of habit. Why we do what we do and how to change. Random House Books. London. ISBN: 978-1847946249
• Choo, Chun Wei (1998): The knowing organization. How organizations use information to construct meaning, create knowledge, and make decisions. Oxford University Press, New York. ISBN: 019-5110129
• Laloux, Frederic (2014): Reinventing organizations. A guide to creating organizations inspired by the next stage of human consciousness. 1st edition. Nelson Parker. Brussels. ISBN: 978-2960133509
• Mattila, Juha (2013): How to command and control the renewing land component of Finnish Defence Forces and how to support it with Signals. See: http://c4isys.blogspot.sg/2013/04/how-to-command-and-control-renewing.html
• Mattila, Juha (2013): Development of military C4I system of systems. Original in Finnish: Taistelujarjestelmakehitys 1 ja 2. Sotilasaikakauslehti Elokuu ja Syyskuu 2013
• Mattila, Juha (2014 June): How Signals training should evolve to meet requirements of digitalized battlefield and post-modern society? See: http://c4isys.blogspot.sg/2014/06/how-signals-training-should-evolve-to.html
• McChrystal, Stanley et.al. (2015): Team of teams. Penguin Publishing Group. New York. ISBN: 978-1591847489
• Dobelli, Rolf (2013): The art of thinking clearly. Hodder & Stoughton Ltd, London.
• Gunderson, Lance H. and Holling, C.S. (2002): Panarchy. Understanding transformations in human and natural systems. Island Press, Washington. ISBN: 978-1597269391
• Thwaites, Thomas: How I built a toaster – from scratch. See: http://www.ted.com/talks/thomas_thwaites_how_i_built_a_toaster_from_scratch
• Drucker, Peter F (1999): Management challenges for the 21st century. Elsevier Ltd, Burlington. 
• Coelho, Paul (2014): Alchemist. HarperOne. ISBN: 978-0062315007

Management of ICT related issues in Military Organization

Principles of system and its management

Every enterprise creates a viable  system that functions within a viable system. Every system can be described by defining the operation i.e. system. The operation has an overlaying metasystem for control i.e. management. This cybernetic structure is functioning in an appropriate environment affected by many interactions. According to Stafford Beer (1981), these three functions are necessary to any organization. A military organization may be described by using Beers model as illustrated in Figure 1.

Figure 1: A generic model of a military enterprise with its management structure

Each of the Services (Land, Navy, and Air) operate in their particular area of operation. They are commanded with their operative level management. The Armed Forces is having management (Commander in Chief) who has command (Direction) over all Services . The Commander and his general headquarters also coordinate the effort between Services with one hand and with another hand he audits the interaction between services and their area of operation to judge the outcome of their effort. Besides the current operations described above, the Armed Forces need planning function to analyze possible futures and prepare forces for both opportunities and challenges. Since planning and current operations may have contradicting focuses, there needs to be a strategic vision, identity, to drive the balance between everyday operations and preparing for the future.

The following story may describe a military organisation in its operation:
The commander of Land Forces is executing his mission for preventing adversary to approach key terrain in the desire to gain leverage for their offensive. The commander is facing a dominant adversary with lots of indirect firepower and asks fire support to suppress the artillery battalions his troops are suffering. 

The joint chief of operations receives a request from Land Forces, assesses the situation and issues support task to Air Force as they are the quickest to provide it. He also tasks his operational division (J3) to coordinate support between Air and Land Forces. The commander of Air Force receives the request for support and task to provide it. He establishes a connection between his staff and the headquarters of the Land Forces with the assistance from the liaison officers of each staff.

Meanwhile, the Joint Chief of Intelligence meets the Joint Chief of Planning in General Headquarters with alarming news. There is evidence that the adversary is transporting more reserve troops to the theatre of operation via railroad. They meet the Joint Chief of Operations and try to find a balance to Joint Fires situation. The Commander in Chief makes the decision to constrain Air Forces support to what has already being prepared, assigns heavy artillery battalions to support Land Forces and gives a mission to the Air Force to destroy transport avenues and suppress the reserve units.

The military organization is viable when it survives the external threats, maintains its integrity against internal threats, evolves as environment changes, can create synergy with its parts and is able to maintain dynamic equilibrium with its parts. The usage of information supported by Information and Communications Technology is essential in enabling the viability of a military enterprise.

Delivering military value with ICT

The traditional military capabilities are Force Utilization, Force Production, and Force Support . Military command and control is a bundle of processes that monitors, assesses and directs the before mentioned capabilities. The loop of Observing, Orienting, Deciding, and Acting  is the foundation for all command and control (C2) in military affairs. ICT –structure bounds the C2-functions together over boundaries of organizations and distance of geography. The information that ICT-related functions provide enhances military command and control processes - i.e. adds value - in Force Utilization for example as follows:

• the effect of kinetic arms by accurate, on-time targeting data, improved ballistics, cursor-on-target, fire-and-forget
• Situational awareness by providing both blue force and red force pictures
• Commander understands the possible future
• Trust between units and entities in the battlefield.

The value of information and supporting ICT-functions for the force utilization capability can be defined as the following use case: 

Reconnaissance observes that motorized enemy formation is advancing. The event is forwarded with ICT based systems both to the commander and his troops. The commander includes the event to his orientation. He decides to launch one of the prepared countermeasures. Units receive these orders by ICT-based systems right after getting the observation of inbound motorized adversary. 

The air surveillance detects incoming enemy fighter/attackers. The event is forwarded to all units as part of Recognized Air Operational Picture, RAOP. Based on the information, land units take cover and anti-aircraft units prepare to fire. 

The value of information in OODA –loop can be illustrated as a stream in Figure 2: Observer – ICT – Orienteer – ICT – Decider – ICT – Actor. The information is the glue to a battle system. Information is provided by ICT functions that bind military force as System of systems. 

The Red Force (i.e. enemy) is trying to gain dominance at information level by surprise, deception of sensors or sense-making, or trying to deteriorate the trust between commanders, their troops, and ICT-systems of the Blue Force. They use all means and ways of the Information Operations to gain this effect:

The Red Force deploys trolls to create fabricated discussions in social media, sends malicious manipulated content with Twitter, and has famous people to promote their agenda. The Red Force conceals the identity of the force they send to the operation and thus denies the action of international agreements and coalitions. The Red Force has breached the ICT-systems of Blue Force and now launches the countermeasures for their processing capability. They deny the availability of ICT-services, deny the truth of data, and launches malicious software to increase complexity in the cyber environment. 

The enemy collects electromagnetic radiation to analyse the operation idea and weaknesses of the Blue Force. They launch jamming operations to conceal their true movement and prevent the Blue Force to use their communications freely. The Red Force tries to locate the command structure of the Blue Force and suppresses their command posts by missile attacks, special operation forces attacks or terror attacks.
 

Figure 2: An example of value stream enabled by ICT functions

The value ICT-functions are providing is defined as information that binds different parts of force utilization together, produces understanding to commanders, produces awareness to troops and builds trust among all stakeholders and their tools . If the adversary can suppress ICT-functions at least for a time, the Military System of systems disintegrates to sub-systems inefficient independently.
The valuable information is more appreciated if it is provided with:

• On-time and in-place of need
• Flexibility to adapt changes in situation
• Support that response within expectations
• Ease of use, resiliency and security
• Integrity, accuracy and continuous flow.

The value is perceived differently at each level. The commander appreciates more if information improves his understanding of possible future, information enables him to achieve an advantage over the adversary, or information leads to success. Troops appreciate more if information comes when needed and is true so they can survive the battle and be successful.
 

Enabling military capabilities with ICT

Information Superiority over one’s adversary can be defined according to Sun Tzu: “if you know your enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles” .  The knowing can be divided into two attributes: Understanding and Awareness. The information flow, supported by ICT-functions, improves Commander’s Understanding and Situational Awareness of troops as depicted in Figure 3.

Figure 3: An example of Information and its meaning to Force Utilization

Reconnaissance has observed that motorized enemy formation is advancing. Observation is forwarded both to the commander and his troops. The commander reflects this event to his operational analysis, which is based on a combination of historical, resource and doctrinal knowledge about the enemy. He identifies expected a pattern in the enemy maneuvering and decides to launch one of the prepared countermeasures. Units receive the orders right after they become aware of inbound motorized adversary in their view on Recognized Ground Operational Picture, RGOP.  They commence a prepared action based on Blue Force Track of their units and engage the approaching enemy based on Target Acquisition information from the position that gives a terrestrial advantage to them. The commander monitors the proceedings of his troops from Recognized Operational Picture.

The air surveillance detects incoming enemy fighter/attackers. The event is forwarded to all units as part of Recognized Air Operational Picture, RAOP. Based on the information, unit commences their prepared countermeasures. The commander of the operation gets confirmation of pattern he recognized earlier. The enemy has launched deep flanking manoeuvre with strong air to ground support. He notes this as operation plan of his adversary and assesses again all other ways that adversary can surprise him with means in reserve.

As information becomes a value, it needs to be managed and governed. There needs to be accountability defined within the military force. The owner is responsible for the particular type of information through its life-cycle. Records Keeper stores information according to requests from the owner and keeps records available. The user of information is getting the value out of it. The provider of information pushes or publishes information as events or stream to all possible users. The protector is accountable of defending the confidentiality, integrity and availability of information.

Managing Risks of Information and ICT-functions concerning Operational Security

As information becomes more valuable to military force utilization, the aspiration of the adversary to suppress it grows. If the adversary can deny the information flow either from commander or troops, they become disabled. Suppression happens when the adversary can disable ICT-functions so that the Blue Force is disintegrated to elements, platforms or units of single function. 

When considering the information value chain described earlier, the trust between men and their machines become the most desired target for an adversary. Further the chain of information extends and comes more interdependent, the easier it is for an adversary to break it and deny the availability of information. With few sequential breaks, service is suppressed to a degree that people start losing their fate on machines. More intense the situation, quicker people switch to alternative methods or busy themselves with meaningless work. Once lost trust is hard to regain and sometimes takes, even more, time than building trust up in the beginning. 

Besides trust, the other important factors in risk analysis are Reliability, Integrity, and Confidentiality, all parts of Security. Long chains of information service are vulnerable since all links are needed for fully functional service. One link down in the long chain of information service is a seed for mistrust. If the incident is not remedied led by service driven process, then availability is lost for a longer time, and trust deteriorates beyond repair.

A standard military procedure is requiring three independent detections of the same target before data is qualified as trustworthy. With three sources of information, one will achieve 50% probability of getting true detection. It does not need a lot from adversary to turn the table to his advantage with a little deception of sensors or man-in-the-middle manipulation.
The last essential foundation for trust is sureness that the enemy does not know as much as you do. If the confidentiality of the information flow is lost and the enemy may gain information superiority this way, the trust to technical systems is lost. 

Risk management of ICT-related issues in a military environment is crystallized into TRUST. The trust is a function of Availability and Security as depicted in figure 4. 

Figure 4: The essentials in managing risk of ICT systems

The availability of ICT system of systems is also endangered by continuous change. There are a plethora of sources for changes in ICT systems. Vendors are updating their software products in continuous streams.  The detection of malicious software requires updates several times during the day. It becomes harder to keep up detecting specific fingerprints of new viruses, worms, and other malevolent applications as their production rate is almost 100 000 new variations per day. Changes are also due new requirements that users are expressing as their operation advances. The adversary is also trying to disintegrate the ICT system of systems into dysfunctional parts and changes are made to remedy lost assets. 
Most of the military ICT service providers do not allow untested changes in their operational environment. Thus, they have established Testing and Evaluation environments to do pretesting, staging and integration before releasing new configurations to be implemented through change management. The change management is one of the foundations for ITIL service delivery processes.

The importance of trust may be illustrated with the following story:

Besides being surprised by the thrust of German armoured left wing through the Ardennes, the Allied defeat in France in 1940 was because of inadequate communications. The telephone system was unreliable; telegram messages were chronically late. The high command was not able to communicate with its subordinates and become divorced from reality. The British communications relied on wired lines, which were not applicable in mobile warfare. The few radio connections were overburdened with encrypted messages. Thus, intolerable delays were created. 
 

Managing the performance of ICT related functions

The performance of military ICT related systems, processes, and people may be expressed emphasizing the user view of value with function pictured in figure 5:

• Quality of services 
• Availability of services
• Security of information and ICT assets
• Timely provided services
• Cost-efficiency from operational expenses viewpoint
• Return of Investment from capital expenses viewpoint
• Added ICT capability to provide new opportunities to military affairs.

The weight on current operations emphasizes the lagging metrics for performance. Only the last metric is more leading in building added capability for future.

Military environment emphasises the current performance over possible future. As defined earlier,  Availability and Security are the main performance indicators in a military environment. The commanders of forces require ICT services provided in new positions, with different quality and pace. They expect these requirements to be fulfilled on time aligned with the proceedings of their operations. When users face problems in using ICT services, they expect to get resolution promptly. Information services provided to units vary in volume, sensitivity to delay and integrity. All these features are included in Quality of Service. 

The value chain that provides ICT services is measured against the cost-efficiency of operations, OPEX and ability to provide Return on Investment, ROI through the life-cycle of system components. Finally, the last key performance indicator is measuring the leading feature of being able to build future ICT services and implement them as part of System of systems.

Figure 5: Performance of ICT system of systems

The following story illustrates the challenges in managing performance of CIT services:

A Signals Force was used to take care of their ICT -systems and believed that the systems were valued by their supported. Great was the confusion, when the Joint Chief of Information, JCIO demanded performance to be measured based on the availability of connection. The telephone was not the service but just a mean to deliver a connection to end user. The quality of voice communication and accessibility of subscribers become more important for the JCIO than the mere device. 

Furthermore, the JCIO preferred the swiftness of change of a subscriber access line and accuracy of the telephone catalogue over the model of a telephone. The commanders of Signal units were appraised based on how much human resources they were spending per connections and subscribers. They were shocked since this was entirely new management culture they were expected to adapt. 
 

Managing ICT related resources

The means, that ICT Services are made of, include human capital, material, immaterial, financial, organizational and facility resources as depicted in figure 6. These resources are transferred to ICT Service Production with other enablers: Principles, Processes, and Culture . The resources are distributed through the life-cycle: 

• means that are sustaining the older, legacy parts of ICT System of systems
• means that are operating the principal parts of the current system of systems
• means that are involved in developing new features or components for a future system of systems
• means that are kept in reserve.

Figure 6: Resources enabling the production of ICT services

The adversary that is bound towards attrition type of operations tends to use force in destroying resources as much as possible to exhaust their opponent. Thus, military ICT needs to have resources in reserve, survivability under the fire, resilience in their utilization and reliability in the structure of ICT system of systems. The requirement for survivability may be illustrated as follows:

The structure of military ICT needs to follow architecture beyond the high availability of civilian IT or n+1 reliability. The rational adversary is trying to disintegrate the physical and logical topology of military ICT structures. He optimises the usage of warheads in the main nodes in the topology. The simple topology of the hub to spoke requires only one strike to take down the centre and leave the spokes isolated. More connected topologies require more strikes but only fully connected provides the best survivability if the structure is self-healing as illustrated in Figure 7.

Figure 7: Examples of topologies and their survivability in military area of operation

There should be a constant change ongoing to keep the cost-performance of ICT system of systems in balance. If though, for some reason, there is a need to do more discrete change, the management of resource transformation from legacy structure towards a structure that provides new capabilities might become a challenge. There is a minimum level of ICT capability that needs to be ensured through the entire transformation. Almost all existing information needs to be migrated from old systems to new systems. Thus, it takes time and resources to transform modern ICT structure. This is illustrated in the following story and Figure 8:

Signals provide continuous service and readiness to bind together all components of military force. Thus, there is a minimum level of capability that Signals is required to provide continuously. When Signals is facing a major technology transformation, it needs to extract its most professional teams from providing legacy service, lower the service production to its minimum level and assign these most competent teams to build new technology and processes. Sometimes this requires also other changes in sourcing the legacy services. The sustaining units may have to take new responsibilities of old users. Vendors may be needed to take responsibility in operating some legacy but familiar ICT service while Signals units focus on building new capabilities. 

Building new capability sometimes follows S-curve. In the beginning, it takes time to have new systems settled and processes in place, but once the pilot is accomplished, then migration might be accelerated. From another viewpoint, the end user may be slow in adapting new services but after first quick wins and reliable production, they become the quickest learners for the new features.

Figure 8: Managing the transformation of CIT capability 

Assuring the strategic alignment of ICT efforts

The ICT service production is firmly a user and client driven chain of value. The major drive is to fulfil everyday needs of users, commanders, and maintenance. Everyday challenges of units pull the ICT service production to consume more resources in resolving end user problems at the tactical level. The operational level Commanders project their new requirements with a strong will. The ICT service development is driven strongly by these demands towards achieving immediate operational objectives. 

Every ICT service provider has their flow of maintenance changes that alter the configuration daily. There is also development stream particular to each service provider that provides new components fitting into their future special needs. Thus, it is difficult to maintain strategic focus and use resources in building new ICT capabilities for future through the entire value chain.

Figure 9: Challenges in gaining strategic alignment

The strategic goals and programs should be presented together with tactical and operational requirements on the boards of decision making. Every decision of change should take ICT services towards strategic goals, or else entropy  will create disorder within the System of systems. There should be Chief Information Officer, CIO responsible for both usages of information and production of ICT services at all levels from strategic down to tactical. The CIO is the adviser to the commander in information and ICT related matters. The CIO does monitoring, assessing and directing  using the ways of guidance of the ICT capability owner, the hierarchy of military command and control, and coordination and auditing of a general model for management. 

Since ICT structures have complex interdependencies, the CIO needs to hold in one hand a Portfolio to manage HOW things are proceeding. The ICT portfolio includes both legacy capabilities and new capabilities for balancing their transformation and sustaining the minimum level of readiness. The portfolio also helps in managing key resources as most competent teams of CIT professionals and other sources of professional service production.

In his other hand CIO holds an Enterprise Architecture to define WHAT needs to be built in proceeding towards different and sometimes contradicting goals. The Enterprise Architecture explains how functions of military affairs are supported with Information, which is supported by Information and Communications Technology. It helps CIO to communicate his strategy to his superiors when asked about reasons to invest in Information and ICT. It also helps him to communicate the requirements and meaningfulness to his subordinates who are otherwise interested mainly technical issues. 
 

The Governance model for ICT related issues

The governance of ICT related matters include all aspects of COBIT 5 management  mainly strategic alignment, value delivery, risk management, resource management and performance measurement. Before defining the management, this paper described the value stream and all value chains related to ICT service production. The basic process of governance is a cycle of monitoring, assessing and directing  according to level and model of the Armed Forces general command and control structure. 

The cycle of governance uses ICT capability portfolio to refer HOW the thing was planned to do versus how they are implemented. Governance also uses Enterprise Architecture from strategic level down to tactical level defining WHAT is done currently versus what needs to be done to achieve goals.

Figure 10: A simplified model for the Governance of ICT-related issues in Military Environment

The ICT governance framework depictured in Figure 10 above is a basic method to govern or manage from strategic level through operational level down to tactical level. Only focus and ways are different at each level.

The main challenge for governance is the nature of value chain structures needed to put together and provide information based value to military users. The length of value chain may stretch all way from Redmond, Washington (Microsoft) to Shenzhen, Guangdong (Huawei). Unlike other pieces of military armament, no one manufacturer takes the life-cycle responsibility for all components of ICT. The only responsible remains the Armed Forces themselves. The mainstream of ICT development is not following military requirements but needs of consumers and civilian enterprises.

Using Evolutionary Theory in Explaining System of systems Development

Introduction

The paper describes one way to model evolution and development of System of systems. In the context of this paper, the System of systems is a socio-technical structure where Information and Communication Technology is intertwined with human and other structural components. Because of openness and intertwined components, System of systems is complex in nature. Thus, there is a need to understand better the relationships and interactions between components and their environment.

The hypothesis for a model is based on Darwinian (1859) Theory of evolution. It is expanded by Mokyr’s (1998) application of the evolution of technical systems. The Mokyr’s system is modularized using Andriani’s and Carigani’s (2012) approach to modular design and innovation. The modular system is then generalized as System of systems.

Mokyr defines knowledge as underlying structure needed to design systems. The model for knowledge is extended using features of Choo’s (1998) model for Knowing Organization. The extended model is projected to the environment of generic human community and military affairs to expose dependencies between entities and their environment. The forces exposed are explained by combining Mokyr’s and Choo’s theories and reviewing them with Bertalanffy’s (1968) general system theory.

Finally, the model is simplified to illustrate essential interactions and dependencies. The simplified model is easier to use in studies of Information and Communications Technology development. For this purpose, the extended and streamlined model is also explained using classical military development example of mechanized forces and maneuver tactics (Vego, 2007).

Darwinian evolutionary model as basis

The standard Darwinian model includes an Underlying Structure (genotype) that defines the Manifested Entity (phenotype). This connection between Structure and Entity is tight so at moment t Structure produces (maps) similar Entities. However, Darwinian model is a dynamic system. Within time, the Structure might change (mutation) and produce different Entities. When Entity (t) and Entity (t+1) are facing the similar stress of Environment, Natural selection may occur. One of the Entities may adapt better to the stress Environment is causing. The reproduction of better adapted Entity may be more vigorous and gradually overtake the less adapted Entity. See illustration in Figure 1.

Figure 1: a standard Darwinian model for Evolution

Natural selection shapes the character defined in Structure and expressed in Entity. Adaptation means that characters of an Entity evolve gradually to fit better into required function. Exaptation means that a character adapted to a particular function is adopted to a new use (Gloud; Vrba 1982). 

Extending the definition of Knowledge and System

Joel Mokyr (1998) uses the Darwinian model in explaining the evolution of technical systems in Human Societies. He names Knowledge as the Underlying Structure that defines the characters of technical System (Manifested Entity) pictured in Figure 2.

Figure 2: Mokyr’s model for evolution of technology

Mokyr proposes that designing or building a technical system needs useful knowledge. The useful knowledge at the moment (t) defines the characters of System (t). The system is used by a community of people for a function in a particular environment. New knowledge can be created by research or experimenting with existing systems. If the newly accumulated knowledge appears to be useful, then new system (t+1) is designed   and build. Natural selection occurs when the community is comparing new and old system and adopting either of them for further use.

An alternative evolution path is opened if users start to use old system for some new functions. While learning by doing, the user might not understand the principles of this new combination, but it seems to produce results. 

The Mokyr’s evolution model for technical systems has been further extended by Andriani and Carigani (2012) in their study for modular exaptation. It states that Systems are most usually evolving at substructure, module level. In combining System from different modules, it becomes possible to adopt modules elsewhere and use them as part of the new combination. The approach opens the third path for evolution model: new modules are designed, composed of previous modules, and existing modules elsewhere are included into the composition. The composition is further called System of systems (Wikipedia 2016) as it is defined by interrelated modules or sub-systems that produce or enable more functionality and performance together than separately. Figure 3 presents an extended evolutionary model for System of systems development.

Figure 3: Evolution model for System of systems

Cattani (2005) extends the evolutionary model further by proving that organizations can accelerate their knowledge creation by preadaptation. An organization can produce modules to fit better in existing the System of system and further usage within the community when they are running parallel design lines and experimenting with various combinations. Preadaptation provides a wider variety of possibilities to choose for production. Accumulated creative capital may appear to be useful further when new functional demands rise (Harford, 2011: 234).

Features of knowledge and information

In Mokyr’s evolutionary model, knowledge is accumulated by research and experimentation. There is also the possibility to learn by doing, but it transfers to knowledge only if the phenomena can be explained with some existing model, thus understood. When knowledge accumulation is studied from Choo’s (1998) knowing organization approach, knowledge creation provides a model to enrich tacit knowledge to explicit with Nonaka’s (2015) SECI process. Innovation is also often based on coopting modules or subsystems elsewhere and utilizing them in a different combination (Christensen, 2011). 

Knowledge can be active when it is referred, and it remains accessible. Knowledge can also be dormant, kept in storage, and not utilized in designing new components. Knowledge has characteristics as follows (Dalkir 2011:2):

• Using knowledge does not consume it.
• Transferring knowledge does not diminish it.
• Knowledge is plentiful, but there are only a few opportunities to use it.
• Much of the explicit knowledge is lost in filing and much of the tacit knowledge out the door at the end of the day.

So there is a window of opportunity for each piece of knowledge if it is available at the time. As the human community is now doubling its amount of information every two years, there is always information which never reaches the level of knowledge. Besides learning, research, and knowledge creation, an organization can also acquire knowledge with new hires.

Mapping knowledge to design and building new or legacy systems depends on the following status (Mokyr 1998):

• As long some selecting agents do not share the consensus of knowledge, there remain old design and systems as niches. The military has a tendency to sustain traditions as horses in their ranks long after they were fully replaced by motor vehicles in operations (Guderian, 2001).
• If some part of knowledge is rejected by the majority of selecting agents, it does not vanish but survives in records. There is a change that after generation change among selectors, previously rejected knowledge find a new use. Frequent rotation of officers in several positions sometimes provide opportunities both to senior and junior officers to proceed with their earlier ideas (Harford, 2011:50).
• Most of the information are dormant. There is no know utilization for that information until new ways of analyzing information emerges. Business Intelligence and Big Data are trends in trying to make use of exponentially increasing the volume of data (Schmidt & Cohen, 2013:34).
• Human way to process information. There is a loss of information in human communications. All ways of communication need to be enforced to transfer knowledge. Human recognizes patterns and matches them with most recent or familiar ones to create understanding. Human thinking is tuned towards satisfying rather than optimizing (Snowden, 2012).

Mokyr modeled the awareness of existing knowledge, the unknown knowns, with access cost. The access cost is replaced with Choo’s (1998:61) model for information use as illustrated in Figure 4. For more complex approach one should see Dalkir’s (2011) Knowledge Management in Theory and Practice.

Figure 4: Mokyr’s Evolution Model extended with Choo’s model for Information Use

Choo’s (1998) process for information use includes three functions: Information Needs initiate Information Seeking, which enables Information Use. There is feedback from Use to Needs as process unveils possibilities and constraints. The process runs embedded in two sub-environments: 

• Information processing environment, where the need and seek processes are affected by cognitive needs and affective responses.
• Information uses environment, which is defined by the situation of use.

The cognitive needs in processing environment are affected by situational stops, where human faces different gaps, barriers or options when reaching after information. The human uses available bridging strategies to overcome these gaps. Human also has different habits in using acquired information. The affective responses include feelings that are defining behavior. Uncertainty, confusion, and anxiety are examples of prohibiting feelings. Feelings of confidence, optimism and clarity are driving information seeking. Relief, satisfaction or disappointment are the possible outcome from information usage.

Work and social settings define information usage environment. Varying the combination of people facing the same problem produces different outcomes as social structure affects their thinking. Organization, task domain and access to information also define the outcome. Also, expectations concerning resolution and the way it is communicated, have an impact on the solution.

Effects of Community and Environment of use

The model assumes that System of systems is open. It has external interactions with its environment and in this case particularly with its users, the community of human beings (Bertalanffy, 1969:141). Mokyr (2004) defines features of resistance in adopting new systems. Meanwhile, Harford (2011) defines features that might accelerate adaptation. 
In process of natural selection between legacy system and new system, Mokyr defines the following sources for resistance to adaptation:

• Value. The change will have effect in existing value chain and power structure. There will be stakeholders within the community that feel losing either value or power if the new system is being adapted. Thus, they will oppose the change.
• Ideology. Human community includes a degree of phobia and conformism that will resist all new. They may be defined at political, religious, cultural or ethnic levels.
• Epistemology. The existing system and knowledge hold a status of general acceptance. Human nature has a tendency to value possessions over future options. Thus, new information or components may be opposed as they do not fit into accepted understanding or usage.
• Systemic. Individual autonomic systems differentiate from others only per their features or price. In the other hand, if the new component has a decisive dependency on other parts of System of system, then systemic resistance needs to be considered. When the system of systems grows beyond control, as telex, land line telephone or TCP/IPv4 has, it slows down the evolution.
• Dependency on frequency. The rate of change and adoption depends on a number of users. In one hand, smaller and better-connected communities adapt new feature quicker than larger. The other hand, the large, well-connected population may adopt new features faster as social imitation/learning surface extends and touches more people. Some changes do follow a particular path of evolution that makes them more resistance to further changes. For example, a service established by legislation may enjoy protection from competition and natural selection.
• Comfort. Human being is seeking status quo with routines and rituals that provide comfort for everyday life. This comfort is further stabilized with habits that lessen the stress of decision making. In stressful situations, human often has a tendency to use familiar or previously proven solutions than unprecedented. Similar deepening comfort zone i.e. funnel of comfort is with communities as they seek stability (Duhigg, 2012).

There are also features in organizations ability to design new system that produces natural friction:

• Lack of complementarities. New knowledge may be available and useful to design a new module, but manufacturing technology is not mature to support building the physical form. The asymmetric situation is familiar to communities, whose strategy is defined by staying on the very edge of technical evolution.
• Speciation. Language is used in communicating existing and new knowledge. Some areas of expertise may develop jargon to differentiate themselves from the rest. This linguistic speciation may prevent dissemination of knowledge. Differentiation may also be founded at political, ethnic or ideological level. New understanding does not easily overcome barriers rooted in beliefs or upbringing. The base of trust is also powerful differentiator especially in the area of information security. It is hard to move the base of trust from physical formats towards virtual formats (Mattila, 2016).
• Organization structure. The organization, that is ought to produce new systems or their components, effects the outcome. Deeply functional and specialized organization can produce mainly components sized according to their functional unit. Cross-unit development does not occur unless there is a willing authority above all units involved. Matrix or composite organizations are more flexible and oppose less when creating new concepts and designs when a network of value changes (Christensen, 2011:33). Connectivity of the value network is also defining the adaptation of new modules. The more connected organization is, the more open it is to new knowledge and exaptation of useful modules.
• Entropy. The second law of thermodynamics can explain the loss of information as well as the gradual disorder that grows in open evolutionary systems. Information loses its content and integrity when communicated due uncertainty or entropy in a channel. The open socio-technical system also has some dynamic microstates with their agendas, both human and technical. The human community always has subcultures and unofficial organizations that affect the official organization and dominant culture. (Bertalanffy, 1969:143)

Figure 4 illustrates the effects of community and environment to embedded System of systems.

Figure 4: Environment and community effects in evolution of open System of systems

There are also positive forces in environment and community that may accelerate the evolution:

• Curiosity is a mean that fulfills the human need for knowledge or truth (Reiss, 200:31).
• Strategic transformation or changing environment is best approached with adaptation. Based on Donald Sull (Syrett, 2012:100) this is achieved by building three capabilities: 

1. A strategic anticipation to recognize patterns of change
2. Organizational agility to exploit opportunities or mitigate threats as they unfold
3. Resiliency to absorb uncertainty and surprises

• Adversary or Competitor may change the status quo of confrontation by action because of intolerable pressure or try to exploit occurred opportunity. Both states and enterprises are mutually dependent in a way that action prompts a reaction from other stakeholders (Porter, 1980:16). 
• Challenges of everyday life drive the process of evolution. When facing a problem, one tries out few variants available to solve it. Failures are weeded out and successes copied. This process of variation and selection goes on and provides constant drive (Harford, 2011:12). The sociotechnical system evolves with this process at the micro level (Tavistock, 1989). 
• Maturity. The S-curve theory of technical improvement explains that in the early versions of new systems, the pace of technical improvement is slow. With better understanding, control and diffusion, the rate of technological improvement will accelerate. In later stages of maturity, improvements will asymptotically reach a natural limit, hence the S profile (Christensen, 2011:44).

 

Optimistic model for evolution of System of systems

A system that composes of individual subsystems that are interrelated is called System of systems (SoS).  The SoS is open and interacting with its environment and community that is using it. The SoS has been designed to fulfill a function based on knowledge that the community possess and can use. As an open system, the SoS has a tendency to lose its coherence gradually with time. Friction and entropy are powers that change the structure and usage of SoS at the micro level. 

There are three main paths for System of systems to evolve:

1. Preadaptation is driven by the need to develop new SoS’. It includes research, experimenting or acquiring new knowledge with other means. Several optional solutions may be produced and explored to find the best fit. Gained knowledge and prototypes are used to design new SoS’ to fulfill the requirements of the new function.
2. Adaptation happens when the SoS is coopted gradually for different usage without necessarily understanding why it fit to the new function.
3. Exaptation occurs when component C from another system is coopted as part of SoS’ in making it more efficient or fitting to the purpose.

There are driving and resisting forces that effect in the evolution of function and SoS. This optimistic model is simplifying them into two opposing forces: Resistance and Drive. The optimism is the decline in the picture in Figure 5. The model assumes that there is a generic drive to improve and develop the performance of community, systems it is using, and knowledge it possesses.

Figure 5: An optimistic model to explain evolution of System of systems

Knowledge is imperative in preadaptation and exaptation. For knowledge creation there is a process of information need, seek, and usage. Environment and community are affecting this process from cognitive, affective and situational dimensions.

The model can be explained with different evolutions of socio-technical systems, but one of the military classics is the development of mechanized warfare before the II WW. Heinz Guderian has been recognized as one of the main inventors of mechanized warfare. He wrote 1936 a book called Achtung – Panzer that described battle tank as component enabling mobile warfare when supported with radio communications, motorcycle reconnaissance, and close air support. He proved the case by leading the attack of his armored forces through the Allied defense 1940 with speed that overtook the Allied leadership by surprise both at tactical and strategical level. Speed and firepower of maneuver tactics were named “Blitzkrieg”. Later 1951 in his book “Panzer Leader”, he described the challenges faced when trying to develop new mobile tactics within the Wehrmacht through 1930’s. The first battle tank was coopted (Exaptation) from earthmover as tracked vehicle that was able to carry armor, large gun or having high maneuverability.  Singular tanks were used during I WW with variable success. After the war, their technical development went further, but tactical use remained at the level of singular weapon platform (Adaptation). 

Guderian explained these facts, proceedings in technology, and defined new tactics for land warfare in 1936 (Preadaptation). The generals of cavalry did not favor his ideas (Resistance). Despite this, he continued developing (cognitive means and affective responses) panzer tactics in motorized logistics company using trucks and cars (Experimenting or Domain-driven Design). He also cooperated with Luftwaffe as they were developing dive bomber (Ju 87) 1935 and introduced close air support (Exaptation). Artillery pulled by horses were not quick enough to support mechanized spearheads.  The strategic need (Drive), for Germany to increase tactical speed, overdrive the resistance. When Germany launched the offensive 1940 against France and Allied defense, there were as many battle tanks on both sides. The Guderian way of using armored divisions and operation plan created by Manstein (Melvin, 2010) made the crucial difference and results prompted others (Soviet Union, USA) to copy (Adaptation) mobile tactics with variable outcomes.

Discussion

The main objective of this paper is to present a logical model to study the life cycle of open socio-technical systems and causation of their development. The model seeks to improve the understanding of evolution in the usage of Military Information and Communications Technology.

The model is based on Mokyr’s evolutionary model for technical development. It is further extended by Andriani and Carigani’s (2012) modular exaptation to create a better understanding of System of systems development. Intentional knowledge creation is explained using Cattani (2002) model of preadaptation. Choo’s (1998) approach for the Knowing Organization is used to understand better forces affecting information processes. Christensen (2011) introduces exaptation as a possible path for evolution. The composed model is evaluated against Bertalanffy’s general system theory as major forces effecting evolution are simplified. Finally, a practical, optimistic approach (exploitation phase in the flow of events in Gunderson & Holling’s (2002) Panarchy model) is chosen in providing the model with a positive incline towards development.

The model is defined only to sufficient level to gain a robust understanding of forces and interrelationships in the evolution of socio-technical complex systems. The model is used in other papers to study the evolution of military Command, Control, Communications, Computers and Information System of systems and related functions.

At the macro level, the model does not consider for example transformation model developed by Gunderson and Holling (2002). At the micro level, presented model does not describe a holistic open system with feedback and decision-making functions special for social behavior (Ackoff & Emery, 2008). It requires further Systems Thinking, Modeling and experimenting to be matured and detailed. The model creates a generic framework to study recent Information and Communications Technology related developments, especially in Military Communities.