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Team of Teams: New Rules of Engagement for a Complex World Hardcover – Illustrated, May 12, 2015

4.6 4.6 out of 5 stars 4,437 ratings

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From the New York Times bestselling author of My Share of the Task and Leaders comes a manual for leaders looking to make their teams more adaptable, agile, and unified in the midst of change.

When General Stanley McChrystal took command of the Joint Special Operations Task Force in 2004, he quickly realized that conventional military tactics were failing. Al Qaeda in Iraq was a decentralized network that could move quickly, strike ruthlessly, then seemingly vanish into the local population. The allied forces had a huge advantage in numbers, equipment, and training—but none of that seemed to matter. To defeat Al Qaeda, they would have to combine the power of the world’s mightiest military with the agility of the world’s most fearsome terrorist network. They would have to become a "team of teams"—faster, flatter, and more flexible than ever.

In
Team of Teams, McChrystal and his colleagues show how the challenges they faced in Iraq can be rel­evant to countless businesses, nonprofits, and or­ganizations today. In periods of unprecedented crisis, leaders need practical management practices that can scale to thousands of people—and fast. By giving small groups the freedom to experiment and share what they learn across the entire organiza­tion, teams can respond more quickly, communicate more freely, and make better and faster decisions. 

Drawing on compelling examples—from NASA to hospital emergency rooms—
Team of Teams makes the case for merging the power of a large corporation with the agility of a small team to transform any organization.
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Editorial Reviews

Review

“In addition to being a fascinating and colorful read, this book is an indispensable guide to organizational change.” –Walter Isaacson, from the foreword
 
“This is a bold argument that leaders can help teams become greater than the sum of their parts.”
—Charles Duhigg, author of The Power of Habit
 
Team of Teams is erudite, elegant, and insightful. An unexpected and surprising wealth of information and wonder, it provides a blueprint for how to cope with increasing complexity in the world. A must read for anyone who cares about the future—and that means all of us.” —Daniel Levitin, author of The Organized Mind
 
Team of Teams is a compelling, pragmatic argument for a more information-rich, decentral­ized approach to management from a leader who has successfully weathered storms with higher stakes than most business leaders will ever encounter. A must-read book for anyone serious about taking their leadership further, faster.”—John Venhuizen, president & CEO, Ace Hardware Corporation
 
“General Stan McChrystal’s
Team of Teams is an instant classic. Best leadership book I have read in many a decade, by one of our nation’s most gifted and iconic general officers.”—Admiral James Stavridis, USN (Ret), Supreme Allied Commander at NATO 2009–2013; dean, The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, Tufts University
 
“The lessons and concepts outlined in
Team of Teams provide a valuable blueprint for leader­ship across any industry or domain. The principles of classical leadership struggle to deal with today’s pace of change, free-flow of information, and the entrepreneurial spirit of the digital generation. Team of Teams harnesses these new realities as assets, providing a leader­ship framework to produce the inclusiveness and adaptability of a fast-moving start-up, at the scale of any size organization.” —Brad Smith, president and CEO, Intuit
 
“In
Team of Teams, General Stanley McChrystal, who won some of our most striking victories in the great war between nations and terrorist networks, shares insights for all in this lucid, persuasive, and sometimes wrenching account of our troubled yet transformational times.” —John Arquilla, professor, Defense Analysis United States Naval Postgraduate School
 
“In the fast-moving world of today and tomorrow, organizations that don’t adapt will sim­ply fade.
Team of Teams makes this case in compelling ways. I literally could not put the book down.” —Peter Bergen, author of Manhunt: The Ten-Year Search for Bin Laden from 9/11 to Abbottabad

About the Author

Stanley McChrystal retired from the U.S. Army as a four-star general after more than thirty-four years of service. His last assignment was as the commander of all American and coalition forces in Afghanistan. His memoir, My Share of the Task, was a New York Times bestseller. He is a senior fellow at Yale University’s Jackson Institute for Global Affairs and the cofounder of CrossLead, a leadership consulting firm.

Tantum Collins is currently studying international relations at Cambridge University as a Marshall Scholar.

David Silverman and Chris Fussell are senior execu­tives at CrossLead and former U.S. Navy SEAL officers.

Product details

  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Portfolio; Illustrated edition (May 12, 2015)
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 304 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1591847486
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1591847489
  • Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 1.1 pounds
  • Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 6.3 x 0.99 x 9.3 inches
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.6 4.6 out of 5 stars 4,437 ratings

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4.6 out of 5 stars
4,437 global ratings

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Customers say

Customers find the book engaging and well-written. They appreciate the insights and historical context provided by the author. The stories are captivating and interesting, with a great balance of narrative examples from both military and other industries. Readers describe the book as effective, useful, and revolutionary. They find the concepts accessible and approachable, providing a simple way to approach complex problems. Overall, customers praise the book's resiliency and effectiveness.

AI-generated from the text of customer reviews

317 customers mention "Readability"309 positive8 negative

Customers find the book engaging and well-written. They appreciate the authors' detailed exposition and great stories about the war in Iraq. The book challenges readers to reevaluate their organization from a new perspective. Readers also mention that the interpretations are fair and tied together.

"...The book is not a military history, but instead a concise and exceptionally “fun to read” collection of insightful ideas told through entertaining..." Read more

"...It will also be a good read for you if you’re intrigued with the military aspects of this, how the Joint Special Operations Task Force adapted to be..." Read more

"...But these ideas are interesting, told by someone who had to implement it under huge pressure, and the stories that serve as examples are..." Read more

"...It is a truly enjoyable read, both easy to read, yet intellectually challenging and stimulating...." Read more

286 customers mention "Insight"282 positive4 negative

Customers find the book provides great insights on how to approach problems. They appreciate the clear understanding of classical management and organizational theory. The book is relatable for those who work in teams, providing a useful guide for leaders seeking to speed up their organization. The short stories are the building blocks of the concept and provide a walk through history of management principles.

"...in the book are grounded in organizational management theory and leadership methods, but along the way gives a once in a lifetime look at the inside..." Read more

"...Great teams grow by collaborating in several successful ventures. Working together is how teams learn what teamwork is for them...." Read more

"...meeting with everyone to share information - introduce exchange programmes between teams to fight off tribalism - take the role of..." Read more

"...The book summarises the two core requirements for successful teams of teams: shared consciousness which is achieved by extreme participatory..." Read more

65 customers mention "Historical context"58 positive7 negative

Customers find the book provides an insightful view of history and military strategy. They appreciate the author's ability to tie historical changes that no longer work with the digital age. The book helps readers better understand how modern warfare has changed and why businesses must adapt. Readers mention the book has timeless relevance to the marshalling of our most important resources.

"...What results is a real-world example of actual changes that almost certainly would not have happened if some planning committee had tried to come up..." Read more

"...The book is part memoir, part lessons learnt from McChrystal's experience in the Middle-Eastern conflicts and part intellectual discourse...." Read more

"...Get and read this book, Team of Teams. It is riveting, historically provocative and a delightfully surprising reminder that indeed, we are all..." Read more

"...your mind popping and snapping as it grows, changes, moves to take in the new information...." Read more

52 customers mention "Storytelling"52 positive0 negative

Customers enjoy the book's storytelling. They find it engaging with compelling stories from both military and other industries, with a good balance of narrative examples and academic theory. Readers appreciate the real-life experiences and how they influenced the need for change. The book is described as interesting and memorable.

"...book is not a military history, but instead a concise and exceptionally “fun to read” collection of insightful ideas told through entertaining..." Read more

"...had to implement it under huge pressure, and the stories that serve as examples are gripping...." Read more

"...read, both easy to read, yet intellectually challenging and stimulating...." Read more

"...of ideas, "Team of Teams" offers something persuasive and memorable...." Read more

49 customers mention "Effectiveness"46 positive3 negative

Customers find the book useful and engaging. They say it's practical and applicable, providing valuable case studies. Readers also mention that the work was revolutionary and changed the battle against terrorists in Iraq.

"...Pages 184-188 detail the successful operations that the “Task Force” were able to undertake after the shift...." Read more

"...This is an effective an particularly vivid way of conveying and illustrating ideas...." Read more

"...resource about how to find more connectivity, peace, joy and productivity in all that we do and care about...." Read more

"...Stanley Mcchrystal does a fabulous job of conveying the outsize impact an interactive, hyper connected team of teams can have on business...." Read more

34 customers mention "Complexity"31 positive3 negative

Customers find the book provides a simple way to approach complex problems. They find the stories, examples, and concepts accessible when weaved together. The methodologies are forward-looking and the exposition on the problem confronts all organizations, not just military. It is easy to follow along with, and the tactics are adaptable.

"...Along the way the book covers related topics such as complicated vs complex, trust and relationships (oh so important), information sharing and..." Read more

"...different lessons throughout the book that provide insight into the complex not complicated environment we are functioning in at this present time...." Read more

"...Would recommend! PRO: Easy to follow along with. I often have to stop and start the book on my commute...." Read more

"...The methodologies are forward looking as well...." Read more

22 customers mention "Resiliency"22 positive0 negative

Customers find the book provides useful information on building resilient, flexible, and adaptable organizations. They appreciate the material on teamwork and leadership. The book is described as a solid read with great content and a cleverly woven narrative.

"...best people as ‘liaison officers’ or ‘embeds’; how resilient people make organizations stronger because they can adapt to changing environments;..." Read more

"...They were resilient because they were made up of many small units with freedom to act as fast as information-sharing suggested it was a good..." Read more

"...Discussions on resilience and anti-fragility of teams is very helpful...." Read more

"...Leadership is a muscle, it gets stronger when you work out...." Read more

13 customers mention "Connectivity"13 positive0 negative

Customers find the book helpful in recognizing how connected we are. They appreciate the strong internal connectivity between teams and the challenges with a more connected world. The book explains the advantages of networks and liaisons, and it serves as an excellent introduction to the other two books in the series.

"...achieved by extreme participatory transparency, and strong internal connectivity between teams...." Read more

"...and a delightfully surprising reminder that indeed, we are all inextricably connected and when conscious of it, we will be informed through this..." Read more

"...but IMO the authors’ interpretations are expressed fairly, and tied together. Impressive. Good job...." Read more

"...May seem repetitive at the start, but it is well tied together...." Read more

A book worth the physical read
5 out of 5 stars
A book worth the physical read
A book worth the physical read. It was recommended by my job when I joined to learned about our vision and culture. I like keeping tabs on books so I can always refer back to them. So it was worth the buy over audiobook.
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Top reviews from the United States

  • Reviewed in the United States on May 12, 2015
    Team of Teams offers insights into the modern practice of leadership and management required to navigate and succeed in this complex world. The book is not a military history, but instead a concise and exceptionally “fun to read” collection of insightful ideas told through entertaining stories ranging from industry to hospital emergency rooms. I recommend it for leaders and associates from all types of organizations who need to break down the effects of siloed teams in which information flow and decision making is ineffective in today’s increasingly complex environment. If you are working your teams harder and putting more resources against a problem that isn’t improving, READ this book and be prepared to look closely in the mirror.

    The discussions in the book are grounded in organizational management theory and leadership methods, but along the way gives a once in a lifetime look at the inside of the most storied Special Operations Forces (SOF) unit in existence today. This is not a book about the latest way to become a great leader. In fact it’s about becoming the kind of senior leader that can develop and sustain an entire workforce of great leaders. The lessons the authors put forward to challenge the typical (and often failing) organizational models and leadership approaches were paid for in blood over the last decade.

    I do not come at this review as a scholar of organizational management but rather as a participant and recipient of the Team of Teams approach in the military where I was a leader for over 20 years. I have known the author for more than 2 decades having served as a front line Soldier and leader in his unit and also as his assistant/confidante/advisor during his most senior command. Stan, along with his 3 co-authors, believes that the world is now so complex (vice complicated) that the old models of command and control are extinct. They are so passionate about this evolution that they have started a successful consulting firm to share their lessons. I have worked with 90 plus U.S. and international organizations in and out of government and I cannot think of one that would not benefit from this study.

    An alternate title to this book might have been Trust and Purpose meets Empowered Execution. The Task Force’s journey towards shared consciousness and smart autonomy starts in 2003 with the stunning realization by the commander of the world’s most precise and lethal Counter-Terrorism Task Force that they were losing the strategic war against Al Qaeda. From there the authors interlace examples and case studies of organizational models, leadership techniques, and technological advances from a myriad of areas. They include weather forecasting, basketball and soccer, engineering marvels, big data, airline customer service, aircraft crews, NASA, SEAL training, plastic surgeons at the Boston Marathon bombing, GM versus Ford, MIT studies, and the enduring effects of Ritz Carlton and Nordstrom. My favorite example is the Star Wars bar comparison.

    The discussions found in the various chapters of the book are wide-ranging but relevant to leading all organizations in this modern world. The following should be of interest to today’s leaders: the difference between complicated and complex environments; how having more information available does not improve prediction nor mean lead to smarter decisions at the top; Taylorisms and efficiency ideals may actually cost you more than they save; the ‘need to know’ fallacy; the value of using your best people as ‘liaison officers’ or ‘embeds’; how resilient people make organizations stronger because they can adapt to changing environments; learning from your adversary is time well spent--they might have a better organizational model not necessarily better people; how to delegate authority to take action until you are uncomfortable; how to build trust and a shared awareness of the big picture; ‘eyes on, hands off’ leadership; and the difference between creating Strategic Corporals and an organization full of Lord Horatio Nelsons.

    The book carries you forward in time to see how far the Task Force had come by changing their culture, structure, and habits to allow the larger corporate command to become as agile and capable as its commandos. Pages 184-188 detail the successful operations that the “Task Force” were able to undertake after the shift. This short example, that covers just 46 minutes of a follow-on-target operation, highlights sharply the outcome of The Task Force’s investment in transparency, trust building and empowered execution. The command took risks and luckily their bosses supported them and let them learn to beat AQI at its own game.

    Sir Lieutenant General Lamb, a close friend of Stan McChrystal, shared a paper with me once that he titled 'In Command and Out of Control' and it raises a lot of the same questions and concepts about how to lead in a complex and fast-paced world. The conclusions were similar. Success comes from giving freedom to subordinates, increasing speed of action, achieving self-synchronization---in a nutshell: decentralized command. The concept is literally about getting 'out of the control' business and realizing that in order for organizations to take advantage of fleeting opportunities teams must be empowered at the lowest levels to take action. McChrystal echoes this and the need to repeatedly broadcast so that everyone knows the goals and strategy of the organization. This includes letting everyone in the organization have a say about the direction of the ship and feel free to alert others of impending icebergs. McChrystal and Lamb’s cooperation in Iraq was not by accident but from years of trust building and a shared awareness of the big picture.

    Missing from the book is a deeper discussion on the role of planning, plans, strategic thinking and strategy. While the Team of Teams approach allows organizations to be adaptable and resilient there is still a key role for planning and strategy. Maybe it’s as simple as the old adage ‘the plan is nothing but planning is everything’ or maybe this is the topic for their next book. Although its demonstrated throughout the book its unstated that great leaders are often well-read. Only by studying leaders and organizations can you begin to see the need for the Nelson touch, to avoid the Perry principle, or understand the butterfly effect.

    The book is only 250 pages long but it is full of simple time-tested ideas that can be put into action with little cost. The difficult part of acting within the shared consciousness that Stan McChrystal describes is getting your people to realize they are empowered to make decisions. This task mostly falls on the senior leaders of an organization. This method can be exhausting and requires resilient and disciplined leadership at all levels, but the rewards are unmatched. I have personally served in organizations that utilize shared consciousness and empowered execution or have previously undergone a Team of Teams evolution. The fact that the culture endures after the leader departs says a lot about how powerful a culture change in an organization can be. I have also served in government agencies that just couldn’t accept that their strength truly lied in informed and empowered employees. Luckily the latter are destined for the dustbin of history.

    More and more often today leaders reinforce an environment that speeds up business failure. The world has changed and leadership models haven't kept up. This book can show you how to adapt to the complex world we find ourselves in. Team of Teams documents how the most professional and deadly special operations force found itself humbled by an enemy that was better adapted to the 21st century way of war. More importantly it’s about how leaders at all levels need to be humble enough to realize when to change their old ways and trust their people to make rapid yet informed decisions.
    126 people found this helpful
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  • Reviewed in the United States on June 26, 2017
    If you’re worried that a book with this title by a prominent retired General is just another version of “Super leadership secrets of the Navy SEALs” don’t worry.

    The lessons in Team of Teams: New Rules of Engagement for a Complex World were learned in war, a crucible that produces a lot of innovation. In this case, the innovation is in thinking about what most business writers call “management” or “leadership” or “organization,” and it’s one of the best books I’ve read on those topics.

    A decade ago, Gary Hamel and Bill Breen asked us to cast our mind “forward a decade or two” and ask what management will be like then. That was in their excellent book The Future of Management. Guess what? They got some things right, but missed a lot because they were the early warning system. Team of Teams is the latest report on today’s best thinking.

    The through-line of the book is about the formation and evolution of the Joint Special Operations Task Force. It is the story of the quest for members of that task force to find and defeat Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. It is not a story about a planned change.

    What McChrystal and his co-authors write about is an iterative evolutionary process of developing to understand and adapt to defeat an organization that was better suited for the modern battlefield than they were. It is also the story of how General Stanley McChrystal’s understanding of his role as the task force leader evolved. If he had stopped there, this would be another “this is how I did it” book. But McChrystal supplemented his experience with extensive research.

    Two Different Models

    In the beginning, the Task Force confronted Al-Qaeda in Iraq with a typical Industrial Age organization. It was designed to thrive in a complicated world, where relationships were linear and organizations strove primarily for efficiency. For that reason, the Task Force, like the rest of the Army, was hierarchical, with decisions moving up and down the chain of command. The task force relished planning, and had a culture of making decisions at the top.

    Al-Qaeda in Iraq was very different. Their organization was suited to today’s complex world. They shared information horizontally in an essentially flat organization. They were resilient because they were made up of many small units with freedom to act as fast as information-sharing suggested it was a good idea.

    In the beginning, Al-Qaeda in Iraq had the upper hand. Chapter 1 of the book outlines that situation.

    “To win, we had to change. Surprisingly, that change was less about tactics or new technology than it was about the internal structure and culture of our force – in other words, our approach to management.”

    The Task Force structure was the typical Army structure. It’s also the typical organizational structure since the Industrial Revolution. Those organizations are great at efficient execution of known and repeatable processes. McChrystal and his team concluded that efficiency is no longer enough.

    The challenge for the Task Force and for most organizations today is that technological changes have speeded up the world and made it more interdependent. In the old industrial world, complicated challenges would succumb to careful analysis. That made them predictable. Today, a fast-paced interdependent world is a complex phenomenon. Analysis doesn’t help much here. Instead of planning and prediction, what the task force found that it needed was resilience and adaptability. That requires a different style of management as well as different structure.

    McChrystal compares a command structure to a team. In a command, hierarchy, planning and executing the plan were the way to succeed. But, if you’ve ever been part of a great team, either a military team or a sports team or a business team, you know that teams are qualitatively different from commands.

    Teams are usually small but characterized by trust and information-sharing. Great teams grow by collaborating in several successful ventures. Working together is how teams learn what teamwork is for them. Team members learn each other’s strengths and weaknesses and tendencies. That’s why, on most great teams, there is almost a sense that each team member knows what the others are thinking.

    Transparency and information-sharing do not come naturally to most organizations, or even to most teams. For the task force to achieve what it needed to achieve, it had to go through several iterations where everything, ultimately, came up for review. By the end of the series of changes, the physical spaces where the teams worked were different, and almost every procedure had been changed in some way.

    McChrystal uses SEAL teams as his model for a great team. The book describes basic SEAL training and team development, and in the process, gives a different picture than most treatments of the SEALS. McChrystal and his team point out that the primary purpose of SEAL training is not to develop super fit warriors as much as it is to develop the interdependence and trust you need to function effectively as an elite combat team. Again and again, the book returns to trust and transparency and collaboration as keys to the way organizations can work in today’s environment.

    Other books that I’ve read have done a good job of describing elements of the kind of team organization that McChrystal and his co-authors are outlining. This book is different in two important ways. First, the book describes the development of team thinking in an organization that had to adapt to win. What results is a real-world example of actual changes that almost certainly would not have happened if some planning committee had tried to come up with them.

    The second thing the book does is bring in research in many different fields to explain why some of the changes they made in a process of trial and learning work the way they do. What that means for you, the reader, is that you don’t have to look at McChrystal’s experience and the team he and his colleagues developed as the only way things can work. You can learn from their experience, but adapt to your experience because of the additional insights the book brings you.

    There’s another big benefit to this book. Most of the key points about what makes a great team were things we already knew. McChrystal’s book puts them into a framework that’s helpful, but the book goes on to talk about how you expand that sense of trust and that transparency to a larger organization.

    The truth is that one reason teams can have the transparency and trust they do is that they’re small. Most combat teams are six to eight people at the most. The largest athletic teams may have 85 players, but only a core of maybe twenty work together regularly enough to develop a team chemistry. McChrystal and his co-authors describe techniques that can expand the trust, transparency, agility, and resilience model to a larger organization. That, alone is worth the price of the book, but you wouldn’t understand it without the 130-some pages that come before it.

    Bottom Line

    If you’re interested in or concerned about the ways organizations must change to be effective in a complex and fast-moving world, this book is a must-read. If you want a good study of team dynamics, this book will be worth your time. It will also be a good read for you if you’re intrigued with the military aspects of this, how the Joint Special Operations Task Force adapted to be more effective in Iraq.

    Overall, Team of Teams: New Rules of Engagement for a Complex World is the best answer I’ve seen so far to the question Gary Hamel and Bill Breen asked a decade ago.
    84 people found this helpful
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  • Reviewed in the United States on August 27, 2022
    The book can be summarised in a few points:
    - do a daily meeting with everyone to share information
    - introduce exchange programmes between teams to fight off tribalism
    - take the role of liaison officers seriously
    - delegate authority and focus on culture

    So sometimes the book feels a bit long, especially the long introduction. But these ideas are interesting, told by someone who had to implement it under huge pressure, and the stories that serve as examples are gripping.

    Recommended for everyone leading a large organisation and wondering how to to fight against bureaucratic tribalism.

Top reviews from other countries

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  • Luis Brito
    5.0 out of 5 stars doing the right thing
    Reviewed in Mexico on January 5, 2025
    Por la forma en que se comparten las experiencias obtenidas durante una guerra y su aplicación para cualquier organización emergente o ya establecida que tenga como visión la eficiencia permanente, a trav'es del trabajo en equipo.
  • Daiane Matias
    5.0 out of 5 stars Comprei para o meu superior e ele adorou!
    Reviewed in Brazil on January 4, 2023
    Ele disse que o livro começa abordando uma das coisas mais importantes antes de buscar a solução para um problema…que é saber fazer a pergunta certa.
  • Mark Freeman
    5.0 out of 5 stars Was a bit dry!
    Reviewed in Canada on March 26, 2024
    Better books out there - however, a good read!
  • Radek
    3.0 out of 5 stars Team of teams book
    Reviewed in Poland on October 2, 2024
    Package was delivered quite quickly. Unfortunately book it's a little damaged. Nothing huge but still. I don't have time to return it back and I'm not sure if it's transport demage or something else.
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    Radek
    3.0 out of 5 stars Team of teams book
    Reviewed in Poland on October 2, 2024
    Package was delivered quite quickly. Unfortunately book it's a little damaged. Nothing huge but still. I don't have time to return it back and I'm not sure if it's transport demage or something else.
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  • Standards Geek
    5.0 out of 5 stars One of the best descriptions of complexity
    Reviewed in Japan on January 25, 2020
    Although the whole book discusses complexity, there are better book-length technical discussions (Waldrop or Arthur, eg). As a book, it does a good job of merging discussions of the effect of complexity on military management and on management in general. For a more precise statement, I would expect there are several reviews by folks far more expert than I.
    This book contains some of the best short descriptions I have seen of the technical meaning of complexity, in contrast with complication. One example is the discussion of the fundamental contribution of Lorenz, and the “butterfly effect”. McChrystal et al. not only provide a perspicacious description of the effect and it’s relation to complexity, but also make the essential point the the central meaning of complexity is that the butterfly effect does not mean that you can control large phenomena with small forces. Rather, complexity means that in the presence of the butterfly effect, no mater how much information you have, you cannot predict, and therefore you cannot control a complex system. Unless you’re a specialist, that’s all you absolutely need to know!