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February 8, 2016 By Cliff Martin 3 Comments

Some examples of clarity

I thought I’d give some examples in history of clarity in action. Tomorrow I’ll show some examples of action without clarity.

The first Gulf War, sometimes called Desert Storm, was a conflict with a well defined desired outcome. Iraq had invaded Kuwait. The United States declared that the Kuwait must be freed from the aggression of the Iraqis.

To that end the United States created a coalition of Western nations that together with the UN decided on the mission. The mission was to drive Iraq soldiers out of Kuwait and help Kuwait regain their sovereignty. No added mission; kick them out and leave. This focus let the coalition fulfill their mission in a short period and for a modest cost. Their were elements in the US who wanted us to expand the mission to interfere in the internal politics of Iraq but the coalition held fast to their objective. The simply stated mission was easy to translate into action and easy to end the action because the goal was concrete.

Although not as clear cut and because of distance and time the Barbary Wars were another example of a well defined objective. The early United States was a target of North African states Tripoli, Algiers, and Tunis. They captured merchant ships and demanded ransom and tribute that were significant percentages of the US budget.

The US finally decided that they wanted to end the piracy of these states. They created a small navy with a force of marines. It took a while to establish their power but finally by 1805 they had brought war to these states and forced them to sign treaties to stop taking US ships.

The goal was simple. Stop piracy by these North African states. It took a while, as I said, but the mission was so defined and limited that the citizens of the US were behind the effort. The task wasn’t easy but the mission definition was clear; stop piracy. They did.

As an exercise look at some of your goals and see if they are 1) clear 2) have defined end points and 3) are actionable.

Until tomorrow.

Filed Under: action, goals, outcome

Comments

  1. Juan says

    February 8, 2016 at 8:44 pm

    I like that taking an historic event to show a learning point.

  2. Karen Langston says

    February 8, 2016 at 9:52 pm

    I most certainly do not want to inflict such aggression for my goals. I understand what you are saying… And, yes we can set goals but we must be clear on the goal and then do something to allow the goals to come to life..

  3. Cliff Martin says

    February 9, 2016 at 9:51 am

    You are right. In general violence isn’t the best way to live but it gives great examples of how to define goals and objectives clearly.

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About Cliff Martin

Cliff is a systems engineer with experience starting companies in medical and technical fields. He is an author, experienced martial artist and fascinated with systems thinking in history. His experience has made him an expert in the art of clarity.

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