Duyane Norman spent nearly 30 years in the CIA with three Chief of Station and multiple other tours in a variety of interesting geographies and also had a focus on technology issues serving as Deputy Director of the Office of Technical Service within CIA’s Directorate of Science and Technology, and as a member of the CIA Counterterrorism Center’s Incident Response Team. Duyane established a reputation as an innovator and a disruptor looking for ways for the intelligence services to flourish given the fast pace of technological change and the dynamic threats emerging on the global landscape. In this OODAcast we discuss his career in the CIA, how the agency must adapt over time, and the role disruptive technology will play in the geopolitical landscape. We also talk about his Station of the Future project and how that can serve as a roadmap for future innovation.

Official Bio:

Duyane R. Norman retired from CIA in March 2019 as a member of
the CIA’s Senior Intelligence Service with 28 years of distinguished service. He currently leads the Defense Innovation Unit’s engagement with the Department of Defense’s Agencies and
Activities and serves as DIU’s link to the Intelligence Community. He is the District of Columbia Chairperson for the National Board of State Funeral for World War II Veterans and an occasional consultant to a range of government agencies and private companies.

Mr. Norman has substantial leadership, operational and technical experience across a broad spectrum of military and government. He is a recognized leader in innovation, having founded and led the Central Intelligence Agency’s Station of the Future Program. He served seven overseas tours in the Directorate of Operations, in Central and South America, Central Asia, the Balkans, the Caucasus and Middle East, including three tours as Chief of Station and one tour as a War Zone Chief of Base. He served multiple assignments at CIA Headquarters including Chief of Operations for Latin America Division, with oversight and responsibility for all CIA operations in Latin America, as the Deputy Director of the Office of Technical Service within CIA’s
Directorate of Science and Technology, and as a member of the CIA Counterterrorism Center’s Incident Response Team.

Mr. Norman earned a BA in Latin American Studies from Vanderbilt University. He speaks Spanish, Portuguese and Russian.

Book recommendations:

Ghost Fleet

Flashman series

Greg Touhill is one of the nation’s premier cybersecurity, information technology and risk management leaders. As an Air Force officer he led technology efforts in some of our nation's most demanding organizations including combatant commands during time of war. He is an accomplished speaker and author and business executive and also served as our nation's first Chief Information Security Officer (CISO).

Touhill is currently the director of the Carnegie Mellon University Software Engineering Institute's CERT Division. In this capacity he leads one of the most highly regarded organizations in the cybersecurity community. The CERT is a diverse group of researchers, software engineers, security analysts and digital intelligence specialists who work together to research vulnerabilities, contribute to long term changes and develop cutting-edge information and training to improve the practice of cybersecurity.

In this OODAcast we examine Greg's approach to leadership and then get into:

• Operational views of the cyber threat that can help drive collective action in mitigating risks.
• Ways security leaders can continue to learn and grow
• The CERT's role in improving security through cybersecurity
• Lessons learned in communicating security topics with non technical audiences (including a fantastic discussion of lessons from SciFi)

In this OODAcast, we interview Ron Gula, co-founder and CEO of the highly successful Tenable Security(NASDAQ:TENB) and currently President of Gula Tech Adventures. Ron has a long history in the cybersecurity field that includes starting his career as an NSA hacker and then transitioning into an entrepreneur responsible for multiple innovations in the market and several successful companies. Ron remains a hacker at heart, and currently focuses his energy on investing in and mentoring emerging companies, improving public awareness on cybersecurity, and engaging in philanthropic efforts.

In our conversation with Ron, we explore his career history, the state of cybersecurity, where we should focus our innovation investments, and how cybersecurity professionals can help solve not just global problems, but get engaged in local solutions at scale.

Ron is President at Gula Tech Adventures which focuses on cyber technology, cyber policy and recruiting more people to the cyber workforce. Since 2017, GTA has invested in dozens of cyber start-ups and funds and supported multiple cyber nonprofits and projects. Ron started his cybersecurity career as a network penetration tester for the NSA. At BBN, he developed network honeypots to lure hackers and he ran US Internetworking’s team of penetration testers and incident responders. As CTO of Network Security Wizards, Ron pioneered the art of network security monitoring and produced the Dragon Intrusion Detection System which was recognized as a market leader by Gartner in 2001. As CEO and co-founder of Tenable Network Security, Ron led the company’s rapid growth and product vision from 2002 through 2016. He helped them scale to more than 20,000 customers worldwide, raise $300m in venture capital and achieve revenues in excess of $100m annually. Ron is President at Gula Tech Adventures which focuses on investing and advisement of two dozen cyber-security companies. Ron was honored and humbled to receive the 2017 Betamore BETA award, be named a 2016 Baltimore Tech 10 leader and a 2013 Maryland entrepreneur of the year by Ernst and Young.

Additional Resources:

Gula Tech Adventures

Ron on Twitter

Book recommendations:

Shards of Earth

A Big Ship at the Edge of the Universe

In this OODAcast, we talk with Jim Lawler who is a Senior Partner at MDO Group, which provides HUMINT training to the Intelligence Community and the commercial sector focused on WMD, CI, technical and cyber issues. Mr. Lawler is a noted speaker on the Insider Threat in government and industry. Prior to this, Mr. Lawler served for 25 years as a CIA operations officer in various international posts and as Chief of the Counterproliferation Division's Special Activities Unit.  We talk with Jim about his career in intelligence and national security, his views on the current threats including some of his fictionalized accounts in his novels, and his most notable intelligence operation; the A.Q. Khan nuclear takedown.

Mr. Lawler was a member of CIA's Senior Intelligence Service (SIS-3) from 1998 until his retirement in 2005. He was a specialist in the recruitment of foreign spies, and he spent well over half of his CIA career battling the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction. As Chief of the A.Q. Khan Nuclear Takedown Team, which resulted in the disruption of the most dangerous nuclear weapons network in history, Mr. Lawler was the recipient of one of the CIA's Trailblazer Awards in 2007, marking the 60th anniversary of CIA. In 2004, former DCI George Tenet sent Mr. Lawler a note which stated, “Jim, what you and your team have achieved will rank up there as one of the most spectacular intelligence accomplishments in the history of the CIA. It occurred because of your exemplary leadership. Not only are we in the process of taking down a network, we are also in the process of disarming a country as a result of your fine work. With respect, George J. Tenet” And former DDCI John McLaughlin noted that the effort was “the closest thing I’ve ever seen to a perfect intelligence operation.”

Mr. Lawler also received the Director's Award from DCI George Tenet, the U.S. Intelligence Community's HUMINT Collector of the Year Award, and the Donovan Award from the CIA's Deputy Director of Operations.

He is a graduate of Rice University, Houston, Texas; and the University of Texas School of Law. He is married to Ellen and has three children and seven grandsons. He has completed two novels: “Living Lies,” an espionage story of the Iranian nuclear weapons program, and “In the Twinkling of an Eye,” about recruiting a spy at the heart of a devastating covert Russian-North Korean genetic bioweapons program. Both have been cleared by the CIA’s Publication Review Board and are to be published in 2021. He is currently writing his third espionage novel, “The Traitor’s Tale,” which is about treachery and treason deep within the CIA.

Additional Resources:

Jim's book Living Lies

Book Recommendations: 

• The Recruiter
• First Casualty
• Slow Horses

Alyssa Miller is a life-long hacker and highly experienced security executive who has a passion for security and the security community. She is an excellent advocate for continuous improvement in the community and a frequent speaker to audiences of both fellow business leaders and security community audiences. This combined with her deep experience in the industry makes her the perfect person to research and write the Cybersecurity Career Guide. The guide is a much needed  resource  for our community.

In this OODAcast we ask Alyssa for context of use to cybersecurity professionals, including discussing insights important to those just starting out, those seeking to continue their self improvement journey, and those seeking to laterally move into the community. In the discussion we also capture the fact that the book is also a great resource for the most experienced cybersecurity professionals, since these more senior individuals are frequently asked for mentorship and other career advice and will find this to be a good source of current insights.

We seek to go beyond the advice in the book and believe you will find this interview and excellent window into the decision-making processes and perspectives of Alyssa. The attitudes and approaches of a hacker, including those great traits of curiosity, persistence and continuing self education are apparent and an example for us all.

The book is available now for pre-order and purchasing at this link will enable an advanced electronic copy for review:  Cybersecurity Career Guide

This OODAcast is a special edition focused on profiling Russian President Vladimir Putin with Dr. Scott Shumate, who has over 30 years of experience evaluating national leaders, terrorists, spies, and insiders.  Scott shares his unique perspective's on Putin informed by his extensive experience and insight.  During this session we explore:

• Is Putin suicidal?
• Is Putin a rational actor?
• How would Putin feel about an escalatory use of cyber attacks?
• What is Putin's primary motivation in attacking the Ukraine?
• How does Putin value propaganda?
• Should we expect more nuclear bravado from him?
• Is he a narcissist?
• Plus lots of additional insights...

OODA Loop members can find our quick summary of this profile here (Link)

R. Scott Shumate is the president of Valutare, LLC. He has overseen contracts with the Department of Defense, the Federal Bureau of Investigations, the Secret Service, and the Department of Homeland Security.

Scott worked for 19 years as an undercover operations officer, psychologist for the Central Intelligence Agency, he is seen as an expert in Counterterrorism, Middle Eastern, South-East Asian, Euroasian cultures including Russia and Chinese cultures. Scott left the Agency in 2003 to Join the Department of Defenses, Counterintelligence Field Activity as a Senior Executive where he led a multimillion-dollar Behavioral Sciences program that infused operational guidance to FCI programs as well as investigations.

Currently, Dr. Shumate has developed a new and creative Insider Threat program that uses big data to analyze metadata on a network that uses Context and Motivational analysis. The model is based on an offensive recruitment, crime and changes in the person’s environment. Through Valutare, he provides Counter-Surveillance, Elicitation, and Interviewing training as well as TSCM scanning.

John Chambers is the legendary former CEO of Cisco, a company he helped grow from $70 million in revenue per year when he joined in 1991 to $1.2 billion a year the year he became CEO to over $48 billion a year by the time he retired in 2015. As a leader John was always known for far more than just revenue growth, he was skilled at building an organization that treated people well, including employees, customers and the community.

In this OODAcast we discuss John's book, Connecting The Dots, which shares his insights into leadership including leadership of organizations that need to disrupt themselves. The lessons of this book can help those at any stage of a career improve in their ability to lead innovative companies. John speaks to many learning points in his career including early lessons on how governments and companies ignore transitions at their own peril. He draws lessons from lost opportunities that include things West Virginia could have done differently, as well as transitions missed by IBM and Wang.

We asked John to elaborate on his ability to spot market transitions and assess how they should impact business strategy and operations. This is a skill we are always seeking to improve at OODA and found his recommendations very consistent with our methods of keeping our ear to the ground and seeking insights from multiple sources, then dealing with reality as it is, not as you hope it will be.

We also ask John for his assessment into the changing economic situation because of the pandemic. We discuss how his projections at the beginning of the pandemic played out. We then get his assessment on what is in store for the coming months, resulting in advice which should be heard by any CEO seeking to serve. He tells us agility, a word he used to dislike because it sounded like marketing, now needs to be the mantra of every CEO.

"Agility is the watchword for leaders today"

John is currently the CEO of JC2 Ventures, a venture capital firm he founded to invest in and mentor startups he believes are positioned to become core drivers of economic growth and job creation in the digital age. We discuss his approach on finding these firms and mentoring them. The CEO of a key firm in his portfolio, Guarav Banga of Balbix, was interviewed for the OODAcast last year).

John concludes with advice for any leader seeking to succeed:

"You deal with the world the way it is, not the way you wish it was."

He also reminds us all that

"The winners are those that do not do the right thing for too long. The winners are those that are willing to disrupt themselves."

In this OODAcast, we talk with Simon Clark. Simon a British journalist and writer. He previously worked at the Wall Street Journal. His investigative reporting has led him to the poppy fields of Afghanistan, the copper mines of Congo and to many banks in the City of London. He was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize in 2016.

Simon is the author of the "The Key Man: The True Story of How the Global Elite Was Duped by a Capitalist Fairy Tale ". The book tells the story of Arif Naqvi and his Dubai-based private-equity firm Abraaj and how he attracted  billions of dollars in investment and shared the stage and social scene with the world's global elite in what would become one of the most audacious large scale frauds of recent times. The book also made my Top 10 Security, Technology, and Business book list for 2021.

We discuss the rise and fall of Arif and specifically look at the tragedy of root causes that shifted Abraaj from the beacon of emerging economy investments to a shell game of alleged deep investor fraud. We also spend time discussing why Arif was able to attract so much attention and the role transparency could have played in discovering the fraud sooner.

Podcast Version

Simon's Book:

The Key Man: The True Story of How the Global Elite Was Duped by a Capitalist Fairy Tale

Book recommendation:
Empire of Pain: The Secret History of the Sackler Dynasty

 

Charity Wright is a Cyber Threat Intelligence Analyst with over 15 years of experience at the US Army and the National Security Agency, where she translated Mandarin Chinese. Charity now specializes in dark web cyber threat intelligence, counter-disinformation, and strategic intelligence at Recorded Future. Her analysis has provided deep insights into a variety of incidents, activities and strategic moves by well resourced adversaries, primarily actors operating in China.

In July 2021 she led production of a report on China’s digital colonialism, surfacing aspects of espionage, surveillance and manipulation campaigns that were staggering in scope. China’s Digital Silk Road (DSR) initiative, announced in 2015, is an expansive global data infrastructure that does far more than serve users. It has been proven to have a dark side that includes exporting surveillance technologies to dictators and authoritarian regimes throughout the developing world, in some cases trading technology for access to sensitive user data and facial recognition intelligence. Domestically, China uses this type of technology to assert authority over its citizens, censor the media, quell protests, and systematically oppress religious minorities. Now, over 80 countries are enabled to do the same with Chinese surveillance technology.

In this OODAcast we examine Charity’s approach to analysis and review some of the key elements of her reporting on China’s Digital Silk Road. As we do we also examine ways that open societies can work together to help mitigate these threats.

We also examine Charity’s views on other global cyber threats and seek insights that can help any intelligence analyst continue to improve their craft.

Additional Resources:

China’s Digital Colonialism

Jan Chipchase is the founder and director of Studio D Radiodurans, a research, design and innovation consultancy. He specializes in identifying nuanced patterns of human behavior. The insight it generates informs and inspires design, strategy, brand and public policy.

Jan describes his work in design anthropology in terms of a satellite launched into space that is chartered with identifying new planets, existential threats, but with a lens that can also be turned back on earth to help his clients also understand themselves.

I've been fascinated with Jan's work for quite some time and had previously read and recommended both of his books. His research provides great insights into how products are being intentionally and unintentionally used and often take him into gray market environments.

In this OODAcast, we discuss Jan's work but also his insights into how to conduct field research, build focused teams, and what sorts of insights can be derived. He also shares some great OODA Loop stories where quick decision-making and disrupting expected behaviors allowed him to get out of some tight situations.

Earlier in his career he was Executive Creative Director of Global Insights at frog, a global design and innovation consultancy, where he headed up the global research practice. Prior to that he was Principal Scientist at Nokia where he specialized in entry level products. He's worked on products that have collectively sold over a billion units.

His first book Hidden in Plain Sight was published in English, Japanese, Chinese, Korean and Russian. It became a best-seller in South Korea, of all places. The follow-up Today’s Office was published in South Korea. He also wrote The Field Study Handbook.

At various times he has been based out of London, Shanghai, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Berlin and a decade in Tokyo.

Additional Links:

Studio D Radiodurans

Jan's Books:

Hidden in Plain Sight

The Field Study Handbook

Book Recommendations:

The Culture Map
Living in Data
Sensemaking in Organizations

Ben Dubow is CTO and founder of Omelas, a firm that provides data and analysis on how nations manipulate the web to achieve their geopolitical goals. He has a background in research on Russian and Chinese online information operations and is a recognized expert, having appeared on international media including Reuters, Bloomberg and Roll Call. Ben began his career tracking jihadi, white supremacist, and Iranian activity online before joining Google where he played a lead role in removing ISIS content from YouTube and establishing the Redirect Method to counter violent extremism. Before Omelas, Ben was Secretary of Code To Inspire, a nonprofit that teaches Afghan women to code. Ben speaks Arabic, French, Farsi, and basic Russian.

In this OODAcast we discuss Ben’s continuous drive to work in meaningful ways by contributing technical and cultural expertise to emerging challenges. Other topics include:

• The foundational story of Omelas and the needs for technology to help spot malicious influence operations via tracking open source information.  
• How to focus on missions by understanding what decision-makers need
• How authoritarian states manipulate open source data
• Why propaganda is effective and how the right information can help counter it
• How technology can improve scale of analysis
• The Omelas Wolf Totem dashboard and what it presents
• The metrics that can be applied to malign influence operations
• How to reduce the risk of our own analysts being biased in research

Additional Links:

Omelas

https://www.benjamindubow.com/

Book recommendations:

The Constitution of Knowledge: A Defense of Truth

The Invention of Russia: The Rise of Putin and the Age of Fake News

 

In this OODAcast we talk with Jahon Jamali of Sarson Funds about a range of cryptocurrency issues including his coming book Deep Crypto. We also dive deep into the coming Metaverse.

Jahon Jamali is a leading expert on emerging technologies, global risk management and international relations. He began his career as a U.S. Intelligence Officer with the Defense Intelligence Agency. He also has extensive experience in the high tech community creating and growing startups through to successful exits. All this makes him an even more credible authority when it comes to seeking the trends that are moving technology, business and government operations forward.

This discussion examines the role of Bitcoin and Ethereum in finance today and the especially important need for cryptocurrencies to provide a trust layer for the Internet. Think of this trust layer in the context of the coming metaverse. As Jahon makes clear, there have been great visions of a metaverse for years, but something has been missing: a trust layer. Jahon also builds a very compelling logical argument that free loving countries open societies should really embrace cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and Ethereum. Dictatorships and kleptocracies hate cryptocurrencies. This is a big reason he is quick to point out, in case there is any mistake, that “cryptocurrencies are as american as apple pie.”

Some of the topics we cover include:

• Money as a belief system and the current status quo of money
• The need to shift concepts of money and the need for trust
• Jahon's experience educating large financial institutions on the nature of cryptocurrencies
• The state of maturing cryptocurrency community
• What an immutable distributed ledger can do for establishing a foundation of trust
• The shifting of importance of geographical boundaries
• What everyone (yes everyone) needs to know about cryptocurrencies
• The waking up of governments, including state, local, and even national governments to crypto
• Some of the naysayers and arguments against the Metaverse and Cryptocurrencies

The OODAast with Jahon makes it very clear, he is a great explainer of topics like these, which makes us very eager to see the book Deep Crypto. Pre-order yours at: Discovery Deep Crypto

 

Maury Rogow builds a solid case that your brand will live or die based on the story you tell in the metaverse.

Maury is a pioneer in applying the art of storytelling to convey the value of technology in the Internet age. He built a successful approach to storytelling that made direct contributions to the success of some of the most important firms in the early wave of Internet companies. He later leveraged storytelling expertise and insights into a career in Hollywood which included producing films and helping craft storylines. After six years in Hollywood he shifted focus to how to help major brands tell their stories. His company Rip Media Group has helped companies from multiple sectors of the economy leverage the mobile Internet and video to improve their marketing and storytelling.

Today Rip Media Group, is preparing for another big shift, the transition to the age of the Metaverse. In this OODAcast we dive deep into how Maury sees the Metaverse shaping corporate strategies and ways leaders should be positioning themselves to serve the early adopters of the coming Metaverse.

What does Maury see coming?

The metaverse is the third big wave of change to sweep across the Internet. The first was the client server world of the initial Internet. Then the video mobile world of the last decade. Now the metaverse promises to be just as, or maybe even a bigger change than those first two shifts.

Maury encourages us to think of the Metaverse today as an infant, so new that it is hardly functional yet. But there is enough there to see something incredible is coming. Those that are grasping the power and potential of the coming metaverse today are those that are probably interacting with large online communities like those around the big 3D games. There are other use cases including medical, healthcare, industrial and retail already coming into focus. But all are in their infancy. The real power of the Metaverse will come when users will have persistence across multiple platforms including an ability to exchange value and be productive.

An example of a retail metaverse is RedFox, which has built a shopping mall which enables retail, entertainment, interaction with others and a blended approach to purchasing that bridges the virtual and real worlds.

We discuss retail and the huge economic potential for retail in the metaverse. We also discuss how just becoming part of the metaverse is not going to guarantee success. It will take marketing and advertising that helps people understand why to visit an online destination. Maury has crafted campaigns for metaverse companies already, and has found success by building stories that leverage timeless storytelling practices. When it comes to marketing to bring attention to metaverse capabilities, he describes his methods with an acronym that helps people understand the importance of action. The acronym is STUFF, which stands for:
1. The sizzle and sexy elements of a story
2. Touching or nostalgic story
3. Unexpected or unique
4. Funny
5. Fear of something

We dive into several use cases other than retail, including how metaverse enabled technologies are already helping in delivery of healthcare. The use of the metaverse for testing and training for the military, the use of the metaverse for education, real estate, legal advice, and business planning was also examined.

Maury and Bob discuss views on the great SciFi stories that have helped people understand the potential of the metaverse, including Snowcrash, Neuromancer, Enders Game, Ready Player one. SciFi stories can help conceptualize potential benefits and also potential pitfalls and problems. One example of the latter is conceptualizing security challenges, something rarely discussed these days.  Bob mentions two SciFi stories that can help us think through security issues related to the metaverse, one from Star Trek (Kirk hacked the Kobayashi Maru scenario) and one from Ready Player One (there was a credential theft scene). Bob and Maury discuss the "so-what" of potential security issues in this domain.  Clearly as we build our metaverse we really have to think about security, privacy and counter crime.

Maury’s advice for corporate metaverse strategies:

We are early. Which is good! Get involved nad keep a watchful eye on the space
The worst decision you can make is to do nothing.
As you build your metaverse strategy, build your communication strategy and know how you are going to tell your story across the brand.

Related Resources:
Rip Media Group

Maury Rogow on LinkedIn

The Metaverse at OODAloop

The Metaverse Is Coming And It Will Disrupt The Current Internet

The age of the Metaverse is upon us. The Metaverse is the successor to the Internet of today. It is a future state that will include persistent interoperable virtual worlds and the platforms required to support and interact with them. It will have its own thriving economy and deliver experiences unavailable in the physical world. It will be a primary means of educating our youth and delivering knowledge through life, and will be a leading form of social interaction and entertainment. For more see: What To Know And Do About The Coming Metaverse

Alan Cohen is a partner at DCVC, a highly regarded venture capital firm who pioneered the concept of investing in Deep Tech.

Alan has helped lead and grow some of the most influential enterprise IT companies in the world. This includes serving as a VP of Enterprise for Cisco. He has also advised companies like Box, Cohesity, Netskope and Mobile Iron. He has been on the leadership teams of breakthrough companies like Nicira and Illumio.

At DCVC he tracks innovations across multiple sectors of the economy and helps steer investments. He also sits on the boards of several DCVC portfolio companies, many of which we talked about in this OODAcast.

We certainly talk tech with Alan, and he is the perfect guy to examine some of the more exciting breakthroughs being achieved through Deep Tech investing. But were pleased to learn his foundational story was not in a high tech field. He was an avid reader as a child and for his education pursued an English undergraduate and then completed a Master of Arts in English. In our discussion it becomes clear his love for a good narrative story paid off in his ability to seek out the deeper meaning of tech and express its impact in the language of business decision-makers.

In our review of the narrative of Alan’s own career we suss out a significant lesson that informs his mental model for decision-making. There is a threat to good decisions, especially decisions in due diligence. This threat is the human mind’s ability to deceive itself, especially through confirmation bias. In Alan’s view, the hardest thing about being an investor or decision-maker is avoiding this confirmation bias. Things that make a person successful earlier in a career can be the things that trip you up at other stages. He sites Tony Soprano, who used to say ‘Remember when’ is the lowest form of conversation. Too much nostalgia leads to too strong of a confirmation bias.

Note: At the time of our interview with Alan one of the partners at DCVC had just returned from Space, having flown on the same Deep Blue flight with William Shatner. We discuss some of the relevance of this to technology innovation and leadership with Alan.

Some of the firms we discuss with Alan include:

Evolv: Applies sensors, data, and machine learning to detect and prevent a wide set of global threats to people.

Planet Labs: Planet uses over 150 of its satellites in orbit and powerful AI to image the entire Earth every day, making global change visible, accessible, and actionable.

Rocket Lab: Delivers a range of complete rocket systems and technologies for fast and low-cost payload deployment.

Capella Space: Persistent and reliable information from space independent of weather and light conditions using synthetic aperture radar.

Atomwise: Breakthrough products for pharma and agricultural companies with novel AI for atom-by-atom chemistry.

Recursion: Discovers transformative new life science treatments by applying breakthrough AI and computer vision to understand the behavior of millions of living human cells in parallel

Primer: Primer helps parse and collate a large number of documents across several languages

Illumio: stops cyber threats by dynamically enforcing segmentation and policy on every point of compute and storage, on premise or in the cloud, with lights-out, hands-free management.

Agility Robotics: Bi-ped humanoid robots to automate pick/place tasks in logistics.

Pivot Bio: Fueled by an innovative drive and a deep understanding of the microbiome, Pivot Bio is pioneering transformative advances in fertilizer and crop nutrition.

These are just a few of the Deep Tech firms the DCVC team has been investing in and helping grow. These and many others have already made direct positive benefits in terms of helping fight global warming, defeating pandemics, reducing death from terminal diseases and helping defend democracy from hostile threats.

For more see:

DCVC

Our OODAcast with John Robb in June 2020 has proven to be one our most popular ever, so we were excited to host him for a second interview.

John is one of the most disruptive thinkers of our time and is capable of drilling down on critical issues like security, society, and technology with deep authority and insights.

In this OODAcast, we discuss a wide variety of issues:

• The role that networked tribalism played in the election and the events of January 6, 2021, and what comes next.
• The role algorithms, AI, and Machine Learning will play in creating and/or disrupting networked tribes.
• The role emerging technologies will play in building a new data economy in which individuals establish digital self sovereignty and share in the value proposition of their data.
• Bitcoin in El Salvador and new models for economic disruption, development, and prosperity.
• How U.S. leaders suffered from OODA Shear in analyzing the dynamic situation in Afghanistan and the allure of framing the problem as Taliban 2.0 when we couldn't orient ourselves to ground truth.
• The role wargaming and red teaming can play in developing leaders that aren't as susceptible to OODA Shear.
• What is the Long Night? Is it inevitable, or can we work now to build resiliency against it?

Related Links:

OODAcast with John Robb in June 2020 where he discusses his background a variety of subjects.

The Global Guerrillas Report

John Robb on Twitter

John's Book Brave New War

Anathem (John's favorite book from the last year)

In this OODAcast we ask retired Admiral Bobby Ray Inman for insights into his approach to analyzing complex situation and managing intelligence efforts. Admiral Inman served in the Navy from November 1951 to July 1982, retiring with the rank of four star admiral, the first military intelligence officer to ever reach that rank. On active duty, he served as director of naval intelligence, then later director of the National Security Agency and as deputy director of Central Intelligence. After retirement Inman was chairman and CEO of the Microelectronics and Computer Technology Corporation (MCC) in Austin, Texas, for four years and chairman, president and chief executive officer of Westmark Systems Inc., a privately owned electronics industry holding company, for three years. Inman also served as chairman of the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas from 1987 through 1990. He became a adjunct professor at The University of Texas at Austin in 1987 and was appointed a tenured professor holding the Lyndon B. Johnson Centennial Chair in National Policy in August 2001. He recently retired from that position.

Decades ago he codified his principles in a list of rules he used to teach and lead others with. They are still exchanged and studied by leaders today, and they provided a good framework for our discussion in this OODAcast.

Inman’s Rules

1. Conservation of enemies: Be slow to anger and quick to build allies
2. When you are explaining you are losing: In most cases trying to explain away something never convinces the listener and just wastes your time. Learn from your mistake and move on. Sometimes the same thought is captured by the adage: When in a hole stop digging
3. Something too good to believe probably is just that, untrue: This remains important not just in national intelligence but in fighting fraud.
4. Go to the Hill alone: Supporting governance processes are just too important.
5. Wisdom in Washington is having much to say and knowing when not to say it: Never overwhelm decision makers.
6. Never sign for anything
7. The only one looking out for you is you: Take personal responsibility for your actions.
8. If you think your enemy is stupid, think again: Arrogance results in failure and surprise.
9. Never try to fool yourself: Too frequently it is easier to deceive ourselves rather than believe reality
10. Never go into a meeting without knowing what the outcome is going to be.
11. Don’t change what got you to where you are just to get to the next place.
12. Intelligence is knowing what the enemy doesn’t want you to know: It is about stealing secrets, not reading the news.
13. Nothing changes faster than yesterday’s vision of the future: Don't try to simply predict, you probably need to conduct scenario planning over multiple futures.
14. Intelligence users are looking for what is going to happen, not what has already occurred: Intelligence is not about history. Just because history is easier does not mean it is the mission.
15. It is much harder to convince someone they are wrong than it is to convince them they are right: This observation leads to the important point that intelligence professionals need a high emotional intelligence and ability to convey the truth in ways that get it accepted even when it is not welcome.
16. For Intelligence Officers in particular there is no substitute for the truth.
17. By the time intelligence gets back to a user with the answer the question usually has changed: Especially in operational intelligence.
18. Always know your blind spots, get help to cover them.
20. You can never know too much about the enemy: Do not fear information overload, manage it.
21. Tell what you know, tell what you don’t know, tell what it means: This framework helps decision-makers contextualize insights into ways that make intelligence more actionable.
22. Tell them what you are going to say, tell them, then tell them what you told them, they might remember something.
23. Never have more than three points.
24. Never follow lunch or an animal act.
25. Believe is correct, intelligence officers never feel.
26. The absence of evidence is not evidence of absence: Be proactive and seek more insights on the situation
27. Boredom is the enemy, not the time to any briefing.
28. If you can’t summarize it on one page, you can’t sell it to anyone.
29. Always allow time to consider what the enemy wants me to think, is he succeeding or am I?
30. If you can’t add value, get out of the way.
31. Beware of mirror imaging: Thinking the adversary or others are the same as we are has contributed to most major strategic failures through the years, including the 20 year involvement in Afghanistan.

 

Related Reading:

Black Swans and Gray Rhinos

Now more than ever, organizations need to apply rigorous thought to business risks and opportunities. In doing so it is useful to understand the concepts embodied in the terms Black Swan and Gray Rhino. See: Potential Future Opportunities, Risks and Mitigation Strategies in the Age of Continuous Crisis

Cybersecurity Sensemaking: Strategic intelligence to inform your decisionmaking

The OODA leadership and analysts have decades of experience in understanding and mitigating cybersecurity threats and apply this real world practitioner knowledge in our research and reporting. This page on the site is a repository of the best of our actionable research as well as a news stream of our daily reporting on cybersecurity threats and mitigation measures. See: Cybersecurity Sensemaking

Corporate Sensemaking: Establishing an Intelligent Enterprise

OODA’s leadership and analysts have decades of direct experience helping organizations improve their ability to make sense of their current environment and assess the best courses of action for success going forward. This includes helping establish competitive intelligence and corporate intelligence capabilities. Our special series on the Intelligent Enterprise highlights research and reports that can accelerate any organization along their journey to optimized intelligence. See: Corporate Sensemaking

Artificial Intelligence Sensemaking: Take advantage of this mega trend for competitive advantage

This page serves as a dynamic resource for OODA Network members looking for Artificial Intelligence information to drive their decision-making process. This includes a special guide for executives seeking to make the most of AI in their enterprise. See: Artificial Intelligence Sensemaking

COVID-19 Sensemaking: What is next for business and governments

From the very beginning of the pandemic we have focused on research on what may come next and what to do about it today. This section of the site captures the best of our reporting plus daily daily intelligence as well as pointers to reputable information from other sites. See: OODA COVID-19 Sensemaking Page.

Space Sensemaking: What does your business need to know now

A dynamic resource for OODA Network members looking for insights into the current and future developments in Space, including a special executive’s guide to space. See: Space Sensemaking

Quantum Computing Sensemaking

OODA is one of the few independent research sources with experience in due diligence on quantum computing and quantum security companies and capabilities. Our practitioner’s lens on insights ensures our research is grounded in reality. See: Quantum Computing Sensemaking.

The OODAcast Video and Podcast Series

In 2020, we launched the OODAcast video and podcast series designed to provide you with insightful analysis and intelligence to inform your decision making process. We do this through a series of expert interviews and topical videos highlighting global technologies such as cybersecurity, AI, quantum computing along with discussions on global risk and opportunity issues. See: The OODAcast

Bob Bigman spent a career in the intelligence community. He was the CISO of the CIA where he was tasked with leading efforts to protect the nation's most sensitive secrets. He remains a practitioner. Since 2012 he has provided direct consulting services to CISOs, CIOs, CTOs and CEOs seeking to reduce risk and improve security programs. Through it all he has built a reputation for rapidly assessing the state of enterprise security programs and then working to build action plans to drive continuous improvement.

This OODAcast examines aspects of Bigman's approach to security that can inform you own approach. We also solicit his views on compliance and security checklists, metrics, and the state of the IT industry (he does not hold back on any of those!).

Some other topics we covered include:

- His journey from history major to cybersecurity practitoner

- His views on why some organizations are better mitigating risks that others

- The importance of senior leadership in mitigating cyber risks

- The role of the red team in cybersecurity

- Advice for businesses that cannot afford a CISO

- The state of cybersecurity in local and state governments

- Why there are 1000's of cybersecurity technologies on the market today and what that says about the state of the IT industry

- The virtues of the MITRE ATT&CK approach

- Views on the future of cybersecurity

 

Related Reading:

Black Swans and Gray Rhinos

Now more than ever, organizations need to apply rigorous thought to business risks and opportunities. In doing so it is useful to understand the concepts embodied in the terms Black Swan and Gray Rhino. See: Potential Future Opportunities, Risks and Mitigation Strategies in the Age of Continuous Crisis

Cybersecurity Sensemaking: Strategic intelligence to inform your decisionmaking

The OODA leadership and analysts have decades of experience in understanding and mitigating cybersecurity threats and apply this real world practitioner knowledge in our research and reporting. This page on the site is a repository of the best of our actionable research as well as a news stream of our daily reporting on cybersecurity threats and mitigation measures. See: Cybersecurity Sensemaking

Corporate Sensemaking: Establishing an Intelligent Enterprise

OODA’s leadership and analysts have decades of direct experience helping organizations improve their ability to make sense of their current environment and assess the best courses of action for success going forward. This includes helping establish competitive intelligence and corporate intelligence capabilities. Our special series on the Intelligent Enterprise highlights research and reports that can accelerate any organization along their journey to optimized intelligence. See: Corporate Sensemaking

Artificial Intelligence Sensemaking: Take advantage of this mega trend for competitive advantage

This page serves as a dynamic resource for OODA Network members looking for Artificial Intelligence information to drive their decision-making process. This includes a special guide for executives seeking to make the most of AI in their enterprise. See: Artificial Intelligence Sensemaking

COVID-19 Sensemaking: What is next for business and governments

From the very beginning of the pandemic we have focused on research on what may come next and what to do about it today. This section of the site captures the best of our reporting plus daily daily intelligence as well as pointers to reputable information from other sites. See: OODA COVID-19 Sensemaking Page.

Space Sensemaking: What does your business need to know now

A dynamic resource for OODA Network members looking for insights into the current and future developments in Space, including a special executive’s guide to space. See: Space Sensemaking

Quantum Computing Sensemaking

OODA is one of the few independent research sources with experience in due diligence on quantum computing and quantum security companies and capabilities. Our practitioner’s lens on insights ensures our research is grounded in reality. See: Quantum Computing Sensemaking.

The OODAcast Video and Podcast Series

In 2020, we launched the OODAcast video and podcast series designed to provide you with insightful analysis and intelligence to inform your decision making process. We do this through a series of expert interviews and topical videos highlighting global technologies such as cybersecurity, AI, quantum computing along with discussions on global risk and opportunity issues. See: The OODAcast

Randall Fort is a seasoned security, intelligence and technology leader known for his grasp of enterprise mission needs and his ability to track the rapid advancing capabilities of technology to meet those needs. His background includes time as the director of global security for Goldman Sachs. He also led one of the most highly regarded teams of analysts in the world, the Department of State’s Bureau of Intelligence and Research. Randy later worked at Raytheon and is now now the COO of QWERX. He has also been a long standing member of the AFCEA Intelligence Committee.

Topics we discussed included:

• The nature of changes in both the physical and cybersecurity world that began in the mid 1990’s and continue to this day
• The Department of State’s Bureau of Intelligence and Research, with a focus on the organizational dynamics that have kept this small group performing at a masterful level
• Views on the cyber threat and concepts for mitigating key elements of the threat
• An examination of the megatrends of technology and where the convergence of multiple tech trends may be taking us
• Things the US intelligence community should be considering when it comes to future mission sets and the technologies required to prosecute them.
• The nature of the metaverse, from its beginnings in scifi to its state today to the very near future and beyond

Related Resources:

• Randall Fort on LinkedIn
• The Department of State Bureau of Intelligence and Research
• AFCEA Intelligence Committee

Related Reading:

Corporate Sensemaking: Establishing an Intelligent Enterprise

OODA’s leadership and analysts have decades of direct experience helping organizations improve their ability to make sense of their current environment and assess the best courses of action for success going forward. This includes helping establish competitive intelligence and corporate intelligence capabilities. Our special series on the Intelligent Enterprise highlights research and reports that can accelerate any organization along their journey to optimized intelligence. See: Corporate Sensemaking

The OODAcast Video and Podcast Series

In 2020, we launched the OODAcast video and podcast series designed to provide you with insightful analysis and intelligence to inform your decision making process. We do this through a series of expert interviews and topical videos highlighting global technologies such as cybersecurity, AI, quantum computing along with discussions on global risk and opportunity issues. See: The OODAcast

Amr Awadallah is widely known as a founder of Cloudera. Prior to that he was working on extreme scale data solutions for Yahoo. Most recently he was VP for Developer Relations at Google Cloud. Amr has a BS in EE from Cairo University, an MS in Computer Engineering from Cairo University, and a PhD EE from Stanford University. His experiences in tech and company leadership put him in the perfect position to help bring actionable insights to decision-makers today.

Topics we discussed include:

• Lessons from his foundational story which can inform how to inspire the youth of today to continue pursuing their dreams and reaching for deeper understanding of the world and how it works.
• The world before scalable data systems and the problems with old approaches to data
• The breakthroughs that came with the approaches detailed in Google papers on their file system and an approach called Map Reduce.
• What Hadoop is
• The Cloudera approach of making Hadoop and related capabilities safe for enterprise use
• The leadership approach at Cloudera
• Advice for founders today
• The biggest challenges and opportunities in enterprise IT today
• Views on the future of cybersecurity
• A discussion on the metaverse and what comes next