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Earlier in my Service career, as part of the promotion examination progression, I had completed a 2-year correspondence course in staff studies, the Individual Studies School (ISS). This course, which was actually very well constructed, attempted to improve the quality and clarity of our writing whilst familiarising students with standard formats of communication; letters, briefs and operation orders etc. One of the phases was devoted to “problem solving.” The fictitious scenario was set in the East of England where various fighter aircraft squadrons were constrained from completing their essential operational training through inadequate air to ground firing range facilities. The scenario was portrayed in the form of the verbatim minutes of meeting of interested parties. Not all the contributions to the debate made sense, some were off the point and others, although succinctly stated, were not apparently weighted.
Our first job, as students, was to identify the problem to be solved. Sifting through the scenario verbiage, discarding the irrelevant and distilling important stuff eventually revealed the problem which I think from memory was that a new air to ground range must be opened. But where, when, and how? The scenario provided numerous options and several red herrings – the object of the correspondence exercise was to solve the problem of providing a new firing range in a logical and auditable manner. The recommended technique to solve the problem, “the problem-solving technique” involved constructing a matrix of solution criteria down the side and potential solutions across the top. Solution criteria were classified as either “essential” or “desirable.” Desirable criteria were then ranked in order of importance. Down the left-hand side, therefore, we had a number of solution criteria that were essential; for example, training must not be disrupted for longer than 4 weeks, cost must not exceed £Xm etc. Beneath the essential criteria, the ranked desirable criteria probably included things like transit time to home base, re-use of existing facilities etc. Then across the top were the potential solutions, including, do nothing. Within the matrix it was now possible to tick compliance with each criterion.
Clearly, any solution not fulfilling all of the essential criteria was, by definition, discarded. There remained a few solutions which matched all the essential criteria and some of the desirable. It was then a relatively simple job to argue the case for the best solution possible. It sounds a bit “Noddy” but the technique worked, not just in the classroom but with real problems later in my Service life. Indeed, many Officers may have adapted the technique for solving domestic issues. From personal experience I recall the Engineering Officer with 28 Squadron in Hong Kong using the technique with his family when faced with the option of either retuning to UK at the end of this RAF tour or staying in Hong Kong and accepting a super job with the Hong Kong Aircraft Engineering Company. I think he got the right answer!
To the present and Theresa May remains surrounded by alligators in the stagnant debate over Brexit, a position resulting from her own poor leadership and the serial incompetence of those charged with negotiating the UK interest. Listening to the predictable and scripted rants of Honourable Member after Honourable Member, it was hard to believe that this was the same debating chamber that, less than two years ago, on 1 February 2017, MPs took an irrevocable step to take Britain out of the European Union by approving a Bill, by a whopping cross-party majority of 384, allowing the Prime Minister to trigger Article 50. For the avoidance of doubt, the article provides that the provisions of the Treaty of Lisbon will cease to apply to the leaving state from the date of any leaving agreement or, 2 years from the date of notification if no earlier agreement. Thus, we have extant and overwhelming parliamentary mandate to leave the EU by Friday 29 March 2019.
And she started so well – remember “leave means leave?” At Lancaster House, her aim, as defined by the popular vote in the referendum, was to free ourselves from the shackles of the EU – to make our own laws and control our own borders. But that was the end of the clarity. At the outset she appeared to concede control of agreeing the protocols for the negotiation allowing the EU to dictate the order and pace of any agreements. Stupidly, we agreed to pay them £39 billion before agreeing anything in return. Instead of telling the EU what we wanted she appeared to ask them what they could give. Unsurprisingly, they gave us peanuts. Rather than negotiate from a position of strength and ready to walk away if necessary, her preparations for this scenario were so poor that the EU would never have taken her seriously. If she ever had a strategic plan it was continuously eroded by tactical concessions to various factions (all of which must have been foreseen - how did she think, for example, the chicanery over the backstop would be viewed by her DUP partners)? She achieved nothing of legal substance on the format of our future relationship but manged to concede just about everything for the legally-binding privilege of withdrawing. Most of the time, it seemed, she was negotiating with her own side but in time to the EU tune. In essence, too mindful of the alligators around her, she forgot that the original aim was to just to leave the EU. She committed the classic strategic blunder, of which military history is littered, of failing to maintain the strategic aim through the tactical changes of the battle. How much better we might have been today if Theresa May had exercised a bit of problem-solving technique and, having defined her aim, stuck to it like Churchill?
As we approach March 29th, the BBC is already promoting its preferred solution of infinite delay, Channel 4 predicting untold misery and starvation without actually explaining why, Philip Hammond is promising to take the threat of no deal “off the table,” and Labour are demanding that May withdraws her “red lines (what’s left of them).” It would be easy to be despondent, but Mushroom is taking comfort from Parliament’s complete failure to agree on anything so far. How, he wonders, could they possibly agree what “no deal” actually means and then draft it into law? How little would a deal have to be before it became a “no deal?” Indeed, how little would "no deal" have to be improved before it passed the test of a being a deal? How long would we have to negotiate from “no deal” to get a deal? And so on which, hopefully, should keep them busy until 29 March when we can all start again with a clean piece of paper.
