to anti-access and area-denial stuff in the western Pacific for carriers. And so the question is, is this an equipment problem or is it something else? Is the third off- set machine intelligence and robotics or is it something else? … It’s not just an acquisition problem, it’s understand- ing that the nature of the threat and the speed that we need to respond have changed dramatically.”


Understanding the nature of the threat— knowing exactly the problem that you’re trying to solve—is the foundation of Blank’s Lean Startup method. “Lean methodology is not just rapid,” he said.


“It is not just cheap. It is not just fast. It requires deep understanding of, ‘What problem are we solving? And are we actu- ally fixing a problem or a symptom of a problem?’ ”


IT ALL BEGINS WITH IDEAS


Ideas drive innovation, and innovation drives the development of ideas into products. Establishing a methodology for this process is the driving force behind Blank’s Lean Startup. (Image by z_wei/ Getty Images)


in an intelligence community has two components. Tink of one as replenish- ment. Just like we replenish ammunition, we need to replenish innovation.” Tat, Blank said, gets DOD and the intel- ligence community on an even footing with potential adversaries. “Te second reason is why you do innovation: To get ahead of your adversaries.”


Hasn’t this always been the case? Hasn’t the U.S. constantly had to adapt to emerging threats? “In the 21st century, the rate of disruption is now exponential,”


Blank said. “In the 20th century, we had a single adversary—the Soviet Union— which was kind of innovating at our speed. Every once in a while we would do an offset strategy and they would do something else that was offset, but the clock speed was relatively simple. Yet in the 21st century we don’t have one adver- sary; you need a scorecard just to figure it out. You just can’t physically hire enough people and deploy enough weapon systems, because there are a variety of threats, everything from IEDs


[impro- vised explosive devices] in Afghanistan HTTPS: / /ASC.ARMY.MIL 129


Newell, Blank said, uses the example of the difficulty of providing energy and water to remote forward operating bases in Afghanistan, which in many cases required C-17 cargo planes to airdrop fuel and water, or running convoys to the outposts amid the constant threat of ambush or IED attack. “How many men were dying to provide fuel for the equipment generators and other stuff we needed at these outposts? How much human capital and military assets were consumed trying to protect them in the first place?” Blank asked.


“I would have looked at this as a forward operating base fuel problem,” Blank said.


“But Pete said, ‘No, no, no. It’s a long-tail supply problem. Do you know how many tens of thousands of gallons of gas and other things we are using just recharging batteries and running radios?’ He said if you don’t understand a problem and its consequences, you end up building the wrong solution.


CRITICAL THINKING


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