Europe 2022
Operational Support in a Competitive World
As a community, we’ve learned so much from the military context — we’ve had the privilege of learning from David Silverman, one of the co-authors of Team of Teams, who was a Lt Commander in the US Navy SEALs, who taught us about how one achieves goals across vast network, which seems so familiar and so relevant to us in the DevOps community.
Last year, we learned about leader development from former Chief of Naval Operations Admiral John Richardson — he taught us about how to develop leaders so that we can radically delegate to fully unleash the full creative and problem-solving potential of people at the edges of the organization. And he is doing a workshop tomorrow with Captain Emily Basset.
But as interesting as that is, the purpose of the next talk is not about the military context — instead, it’s about a much bigger problem.
If you’re like me, you’ve been shocked and horrified by what is happening in Ukraine on the European continent — it’s a huge problem on so many dimensions: sociopolitical, economic, and worst of all, it has created a humanitarian crisis, creating nearly 10 million refugees.
If you’re like me, you’ve wondered how you can meaningfully help — and based on a series of conversations with some supremely talented and dedicated people, an incredible opportunity presented itself —
The next speaker is Andy Nicklin from the UK Military, whose remit includes addressing and solving some of these incredibly important humanitarian problems, and he will talk about things that matter to all of us.
AN
Andy Nicklin
British Military,
Transcript
Thank you, Dr. Cunningham as a community, we've learned so much from the military context, we've had the privilege of learning from David Silverman. One of the co-authors of team of teams who was a Lieutenant commander in the us Navy seals, who taught us about how one achieves goals across a vast network, a story that seems so familiar and relevant to us in the DevOps community. Last year, we learned about leader development from former chief of Naval operations, Admiral John Richardson. He taught us about how to develop leaders so that we can fully radically delegate to fully unleash the full creative problem solving potential of people within an organization. And by the way, he is doing an amazing one hour, 15 minute workshop tomorrow with captain Emily Bassett. But as interesting as that is the purpose of the next talk is not about the military context. Instead, it is about a much larger problem.
If you're like me, you've been horrified by what is happening in Ukraine on the European continent. It's a huge problem on so many dimensions, sociopolitical, economic, but worst of all, it has created a humanitarian crisis creating 10 million refugees. And if you're like me, you've wondered how you can meaningfully help. And based on a series of conversations with some supremely talented and dedicated people and incredible opportunity presented itself, the next speaker is Andy LAN from the UK military, whose remit includes addressing and solving some of these incredibly important humanitarian problems. And he will talk about things that matter to all of us. Here's Andy.
Good afternoon. I suspect many of you'll be wondering why I'm talking to you potentially from a world. So very different to yours. I sit as one of many CTOs in the military, leading, managing, and delivering technical operations and change within a large bureaucracy. I command an organization that seeks to push boundaries with technology solving complex problems at pace I've served a 22 year career in the military. I joined before the tragic events of nine 11, and as such, mine has been one dominated by demanding operations across the globe. However, the world has changed framed by Russian actions in Ukraine. What I'll say up front is that our worlds are very similar yet in my world, we are losing our operating environment is complex and complicated. The net effect is that we are increasingly surprised by our enemies by emerging technologies and by new risks, the cumulative effects of this increasing tempo of technical surprise is failure.
I need concrete help today to adapt the world we're operating within to deliver solutions tomorrow. This is a help for European security for us as a whole. Now with Ukraine as a focus, this could be as simple as providing early warning systems. So civilian populations at risk coordinating support resources for those in trouble or tracking activities to support future justice, all helping to understand and solve solutions differently. These are important and immediate problems that affect civilians. Now they need us. They need technology experts and offer the foundations for a new future. European defense has a collective problem operating in this increasingly digital world. My view of the world is that we need to accelerate our learning now to rapidly discover, disseminate, and adapt how we operate. We need that today. We need to overcome our technical debt. We need to overcome our fear of failure and we need to build for the future.
We need to bring multidisciplinary teams together faster to solve our problems. And we need a technical ecosystem that reaches across and pulls the best talent needed to solve a problem. People, ideas and technology in that order together with an appetite for change is key, but it must be a partnership operator, scientist, engineer, and industry working in unison. This diverse team composition increases adaptability increases understanding generates foresight, and is what gives us competitive advantage. Most importantly, I want to engage and employ your knowledge, your talents, and reach to inform our current digital challenges. And they're in our collective interests in generating ideas to increase our understanding through creative and novel digital means designing and architecting digital solutions to empower the public affected by security challenges and extending and deepening our network of experts who can help us to accelerate and outpace our adversaries. The answers to these collective problems, sit together, learning from each other. I know that together, we've got the answers. I thank you for your consideration. I thank you for your support for everything that you're doing already. If you want to speak to me individually, my email address is available and I look forward to hearing from you.
Thank you, Andy. So in this community, we talk a lot about doing work that matters. We just heard about how technology helped divert the worst outcomes during the COVID pandemic in Wales. Last year, we heard about how technologists at UK RRC helped avert economic ruin by getting public money to some of the most vulnerable in the population while the economy was forced to shut down. And just now we've heard from Andy about how technologists can help civilians in need help humanitarian and refugee efforts in the Ukraine, and which potentially affected the entire European continent. If you're interested in exploring how you can help, please email Andy I'll post his email address in the slack channel. You cannot imagine how many things were required for Andy to present it today. <laugh> but it was made possible by some of the most dedicated and talented people. I've met working across a very vast network, which are the people you'd be working with. Should you volunteer some of your time and expertise? And here is what they impressed upon me actions that we take today can have immediate impact that changes the operating environment that could save Ukrainians tomorrow. It's already an experience that I've found so incredibly rewarding. So I'll just pause for a couple moments. So you can email Andy perhaps was a simple note that says I'm in, along with your signature or LinkedIn profile.
Thank you. See you there.