Spoof - a training tool for cool, calm leadership through uncertainty

This is one of a series of articles on lessons from Commando training. Here is the full list.

The essence of leadership is managing uncertainty. Leaders assess their environments with incomplete information, and then make and communicate decisions with confidence and charisma. For many people the hardest challenge of leadership is accepting that uncertainty and incomplete information form the base from which they have to advance.

This is especially true in military leadership where the ratio of uncertainty to certainty is exceptionally high. Enemy action, environmental factors and changing higher commander's intent are just some of the factors that can challenge the premises of a military leader.

Throughout their training, Royal Marines are constantly challenged to make decisions on the basis of limited information, and then challenged further with disruption after disruption. Like leaders in any field, they learn to improve both their analysis of uncertain situations and their ability to communicate effectively despite this through practical experience. Royal Marine training, lasting 9 months for recruits and 12 months for young officers, provides ample opportunity for this, and after basic training, exercises and operations both develop and test the ability of marines and officers to function despite the "fog of war".

While certain factors such as the weather are non-human, many of the uncertainties faced by a Royal Marine result from human factors such as enemy action, changes in the dispositions, actions and priorities of other friendly forces, changes in orders from above and changes of performance within the team. And of course this is true for leaders in non-military situations too, where competitors, regulators, suppliers, customers and colleagues can all increase uncertainty and produce surprises. So leaders both in the Royal Marines and beyond need to become as comfortable as possible in managing uncertainty by reading the behaviour and intent of other people.

While the huge resources available for leadership training in the Royal Marines are rarely provided by or available to civilian employers, there is one simple tool which I first encountered while in Royal Marines training, and which I recommend as a quick and easy way to practise reading other people and managing uncertainty. This is "Spoof". Spoof is a simple game, and unusally for a game, it has no winner, only a loser. All that is required is 3 coins or items of a similar size per player, and a consequence for the loser. Often spoof is used to decide who will buy the next round for a group of drinkers. As a result, it has a rather disreputable image, but I suggest that it's a great training aid.

In spoof, each player puts one, two or three coins - or none - into their right hand, and then each in turn guesses how many coins are in play in total (between zero and three times the number of players), choosing a number that has not yet been chosen. When all players have guessed, all reveal their hands, the coins are counted up and whoever guessed correctly (if anyone did) leaves the game. This continues until only one person is left, and they are the loser, buying the round or whatever the forfeit may be. You can find full details of the game in this article by a Professor of Physics attached to the Complexity Centre at the University of Warwick. As you can see, spoof is of academic as well as social interest.

So if you want to practise and develop your aptitude for dealing with the unpredictability of other people, I recommend taking every opportunity for playing spoof. Whether it is for the next round of drinks or to choose who undertakes some unwelcome but necessary task, it spices up the process of finding a loser and gives some great insights into how other people think. To add an extra lesson in maintaining an unflappable exterior, I recommend the "non-emotional spoof" variant in which anyone displaying any sighs of relief on guessing the correct number of coins is put back into the next round.

Spoof is a simple game but with many permutations. As well as providing insight into the behaviour of others it also offers a means to distribute bad news without someone having to make a choice. The loser is the person left in the game, not the person chosen by anyone else.

In my own favourite game to date, I went out for a meal with 11 Army officers and before ordering we agreed to spoof for the whole bill. As a result, each of us ate and drank everything we could, reasoning that there was only a low chance that we would have to pay. After a huge meal, we played 11 rounds of spoof to decide who would pay the bill that amounted to a month's salary. I was lucky; I came out in round 7. With each successive round the pressure mounted until two men faced each other. One guessed correctly and impassively thanked his opposite number; the other, with no trace of emotion, picked up the bill. Both unflappable in victory and defeat.

This is one of a series of articles on lessons from Commando training. Here is the full list.

Understand, Decide, Communicate, Motivate. The NHS takes on the Army

I was invited yesterday to observe an Introductory Briefing of the NHS Staff College, following a presentation I gave on the subject of Perseverance on August 9th to a previous course. The aim of the briefing is to introduce groups of senior leaders in the NHS to a leadership course provided at The UCH Education Centre in partnership with Philip Mostyn Associates (PMA).

For me this was a great opportunity to see a thorough assessment and analysis process at work. While the delegates were being introduced to the course and invited to explore various aspects of leadership, their syndicates and group activities were filmed in readiness for detailed debriefing which is being delivered today. The assessment and debriefing methodology are based on techniques developed over many years by the British Army, who prize leadership development beyond all other forms of personal development. Those delegates that opt / are selected for the rest of the course will attend separate modules addressing

1. Self Awareness
2. Self Management
3. Leadership and Teamwork

As an organisation employing 1.3 million people, the NHS dedicates a relatively low proportion of its resources to leadership development when compared both to public and private sector employers, and this course is one of a number of initiatives designed to raise the quality of leadership in the healthcare sector.

To start the day, the directing staff led the delegates into a room with an instruction to say nothing. In silence they read further instructions on a flipchart and circulated around the room examining each other, restricted to non-verbal communication. They were then invited to separate themselves into various "Tribes". Separating factors included age, level of involvement with patients, gender, childcare responsibilities and style of dress. Having recently co-founded www.thistribe.com, I was pleased to see tribes used to describe the way people see themselves and their groups.

After this the delegates explored how leadership could benefit the NHS and patients in particular. One factor that was a common subject of discussion was "Silos". Delegates explored the challenges and opportunities posed by the co-existence of different tribes such as doctors, nurses, managers and physiotherapists. Communication and the need to coordinate the activities of teams made up of professionals from the different silos were key issues, and delegates considered the dangers of "Dysfunctional Tolerance" - the process of accepting poor performance out of a misplaced sense that challenging it is futile.

John Mackmersh provided a valuable distinction (following Grint's Leadership: A Very Short Introduction (Very Short Introductions)) between leadership and management. He described "Tame" and "Wicked" problems. Tame problems require the application of known processes, whereas wicked problems require the asking of questions and the development of new methods. Tame problems are the domain of management and wicked problems can only be addressed by leaders.

Philip Mostyn Associates specialise in the leadership assessment techniques that were first introduced by the British Army in the dark days following the crushing defeats of 1940. As Philip Mostyn explained to the delegates, these techniques were gleaned by studying the leadership of the German Army, and in particular its use of psychological profiling to identify leadership potential in recruits. The British Army Officer Selection Board (of which Philip was President for several years) has developed and refined these techniques over the subsequent 7 decades, and they have also been widely adopted by private sector organisations in the UK and the US. An early adopter in the US was the Office of Strategic Studies, the forerunner of the CIA.

PMA applies these techniques previously used for selection to leadership development by sharing the perspectives of the directing staff with the delegates. By replaying video clips of their group behaviour, the directing staff help delegates establish an objective view of their role and behaviour within the team. Each individual is assessed - and invited to self-assess - according to their ability to

• Understand
• Decide
• Communicate
• Motivate

As Philip pointed out to the delegates during his presentation entitled "How leadership can help the NHS", it is usually easy to spot the absence of leadership by asking the question

"who is responsible to whom and for what?"

If you are unable to answer this question in your team then it's time to find, or give, some leadership. I'm very glad that the NHS is taking the opportunity to apply such well-tested leadership development techniques to its formidable clinical skills portfolio.