Ma'asei Aman - Permanent Change in a Changing Reality

• Outlining and defining the changes in the strategic and operational environment (the change in the nature of conflict), led by head of the MID Research Division;
• Outlining the IDF’s existing and developing response directions in force design, headed by the Head of MID;

•  Research and investigation of the technological potentials emerging in the realms of intelligence and the military, headed by a research and development officer;

•  Systemic directions among the enemies and within the environment as objects for intelligence collection (i.e. challenges posed by our enemies in terms of intelligence), led by the Head of the Operations Division;

• “The Cyber Within Us,” or how the organization could better realize the potential of the internet capabilities of the 21st century, led by the Head of the Center for Intelligence Research/Computing and Information Systems Division (MALAN);

• Cyber as a new strategic and operational dimension, led by the Head of Unit 8200;

• The covert warfare field, led by the Head of the Operations Division;

• Social and economic trends and an outline of the resource situation affecting MID, headed by the Head of MID;

• MID and the wider intelligence community, led by the Head of Unit 8200;

• The need for change in organizational concepts and definitions, led by the Head of the Malan. Each leader put together a team that included colonels and lieutenant-colonels, from MID as well as from the rest of the IDF, to assist in formulating their recommendations.

•  The senior learning group - the leadership forum - convened from March to August 2011. The detailed work of the ten research groups was presented to the forum, often requiring more than one or two meetings. Occasionally the teams were required to amend their work based on questions and insights which arose during the discussions. The discussions themselves deviated from IDF’s customary protocol. The group held lively discussions, at times stormy, without keeping to the customary order of speakers.

  An onlooker might have thought this was an argumentative and unproductive group, heading nowhere. In practice, the discussions progressed well and from time to time led to a breakthrough, creating new insights. The lively discussions not only helped to clarify and deepen understanding of relevant issues, but exposed internal organizational tensions, hidden basic assumptions about MID’s conduct, stories of missed opportunities characterizing any organization, and especially opportunities (and frustrations) noted by group members - arising from the gap between their desire to act and their ability to do so.

  As time passed and the learning process progressed, we left our comfort zone and started formulating understandings regarding the gaps on the one hand and the desired reality on the other.

  The Main Insights Formulated During the Design Stage and MID's Organizing Concept[2]

  At the conclusion of the learning and design process, which was the result of hard work involving over one hundred hours of debates among senior leadership and hundreds of hours of work in the research teams, the insights were formulated in a directive that enabled us to proceed to the planning stage. It started with the major changes in the operational environment and their implications; the current challenges and tensions in MID regarding the identified changes; the enabling factors which had to be dealt with in order to face the challenges; and closing with the organizational and cultural emphases that stood out during the discussions and needed to be addressed.

  The changes and their implications – The changes in the operational environment facing the IDF in general and the MID in particular included the following trends:

  •  The senior learning group - the leadership forum - convened from March to August 2011. The detailed

  • Exponentially growing rocket threat on the home front, its scope, range, and accuracy, and the way it blends into populated areas in a way that threatens the home front and greatly expands the expected combat zones

  • “Disappearance” of the enemy into populated areas and underground, intended to prevent our forces from detecting it and taking action;
  • Dramatic increase in the scope of the relevant theaters for intelligence and the tasks required of the MID. uring the process, turmoil erupted in the region. This included Egypt and Sinai, Sudan, Syria, terrorist organizations, and other activities such as weapons transfers from distant countries to terror organizations.The regional upheaval required the focusing of attention not only on new theaters but on different communities and new players including the Arab public as a whole;
  • Networked nature of the enemy - the fact that terrorist organizations and their sponsoring states cooperate closely in tight networks;
  • Delegitimization and public opinion as Information Operations (IO) and political weapons used by our enemies;
  • The rise of cyber as an intelligence, military and organizational field of historic importance.

    By mapping the major changes, we deduced a series of concrete implications with which MID would have to deal. The main conclusion we simply called "intelligence^6" (Intelligence to the sixth power). MID saw a sharp increase in the scope of the required intelligence, some of which were new types of intelligence with which we had hardly dealt thus far. The intelligence needed to be more diversified, with an emphasis on intelligence sources, because of the great heterogeneity of the intelligence collection objectives and fields of interest. MID would have to put an extensive emphasis on operational and tactical intelligence.[3] With regard to the latter, intelligence would have to be of a much higher resolution to be useful for combat. This would require the development of real-time intelligence. Intelligence would have to be accessible to the combat forces, to allow the maximization of time and space in a relevant manner to the battlefield at the tactical level.

    Accordingly, we would have to operate through the tactical ICT systems, where we were not previously present. The accessibility and speed of information transfer must vary in relation to the tactical levels, but also with respect to senior officers. Another key conclusion was that by virtue of being the dominant and most experienced entity in the field,[4] MID would have to take the leading role in introducing the IDF to cyber activity.

    The new emphasis on real-time intelligence, operational intelligence, the strategic entry into cyberspace, and the need to deal with the growing rocket threat and weapons transfers to the enemy, brought forth another important understanding. MID was required to go beyond the traditional intelligence framework, which was limited to describing the enemy, and would need to delve into the enemy’s broad realm of influence. MID would become a partner in the IDF’s decisive victory war effort, and in influencing the environment in the ‘campaign between wars.’

    The challenges - Outlining the changes in the environment and their implications for intelligence has allowed us to grasp the challenges and the tensions created between the manner in which MID functions at present and the needs and changes we had identified. Among the challenges identified were the following:

    Operational intelligence – In the past it may have been enough to provide the tactical level with the general position of enemy units in a given area and their basic combat doctrine. However, today, when the enemy is hiding and constantly disappearing, a general description of the location and nature of the forces is no longer enough. This meant that MID’s priorities and focus would have to change (but not at the expense of traditional important intelligence collection subjects). The way that MID was designed to support the intelligence needs of the tactical levels would have to change. A deep technological, organizational and cultural change would be necessary, which will affect intelligence collection processes, distribution, and accessibility to the units. Out of this tension grew the concept of Intelligence-Centric Warfare - ICW (later defined as Intelligence-Utilizing Warfare).

    A networked and inter-theater enemy - Over the years MID was organized mainly into regional desks (called “theaters”). This type of organization allowed more profound intelligence assessments of enemy states, and the development of a high level of professionalism among intelligence personnel in certain fields. The networked and coordinated characteristics of today’s adversarial axes (be it Hezbollah-Syrian regime-Iran in Syria, Palestinian Islamic Jihad in Gaza, Palestinians in Syria or jihadist organizations throughout the Middle East), require a different outlook - inter-theater, dynamic and changing. However, shattering the structure of regional theaters to adapt to the new situation would take a heavy toll on basic intelligence coverage and the expertise of intelligence personnel in specific areas and organizations. We understood that this tension required a more flexible organizational structure that would permit the conservation of the advantages of a theater-specialized organization, but would also enable us to cope with the inter-theater challenges related to the relationships between enemies and in inter- theater activities, such as different channels for weapons transfers.

    The tension between disciplinary professional specialization and Jointness - We were always required to combine different collection sources in order to learn about enemy elements. In the traditional world, we could feed the research system with SIGINT, HUMINT, and VISINT sources, and expect the research process to produce comprehensive intelligence insights. However, outlining the changes in the environment has taught us that the traditional way of combining sources is no longer sufficient. Contemporary enemies have become much more aware of the need to guard their secrets. These secrets, in turn, have also become widespread and decentralized (missiles, rockets, anti-aircraft missile systems, anti- ship missiles, etc.). Accordingly, the required intelligence resolution , the advanced counterintelligence capabilities that we operate against, the required timeliness of intelligence (e.g. in cases of weapons transfers or warnings of terror attacks), all call for an efficient, rapid and large-scale fusion of various collection sources into an overall picture. The organizational tension, therefore, relates to preserving the units’ esprit de directorat and the great professionalism of the disciplinary collection systems on the one hand, while enabling information fusion and breaking organizational walls on the other.

    Cyber - It was agreed that the cyber dimension holds infinite and unprecedented potential and that this potential will be a major growth engine for MID. It was therefore decided that cyber is a key capability to be developed and intensified, from allocating the right personnel and resources to cooperation of all the relevant units inside MID. In addition, we realized that there exists a significant tension between the cyber intelligence expertise accumulated in MID units and MID’s core function as an intelligence agency. On one hand, no other IDF entity could lead the military into an era of additional and much-needed activity in this new domain (such as defense and offense, for example), however on the other hand, traditionally, intelligence agencies are by their nature not leading entities, certainly not in fields deviating from intelligence collection capabilities. This meant that MID would have to assume a new role going beyond its traditional vocation of merely collecting and evaluating intelligence, in tandem with maintaining its nature as an agency whose primary interest is intelligence.

    MID’s information systems and ICT organization - In order to realize insights such as those mentioned above, a substantial change was necessary in how we build our main intelligence weapon – our information systems. In the past, each unit of MID was responsible for the development of its own information systems and dedicated infrastructure. Now a different architecture was called for. Here, the organizational tension was among the worst we’d come across. MID units’ specialized IT systems were tailor made to serve specific purposes and essential to their sources of power. We realized that we had to continue to permit this independence in developing targeted professional capabilities and on the other to set up joint IT standards, promoting much needed fusion and integration. This tension was retroactively revealed to be the most complex to mediate, not only because of technological challenges.

    We need not review all of the challenges, tensions and opportunities identified in the process, but we will mention some of them. We found that MID needed to improve its organization in order to serve the warfighting efforts that gradually increased between wars, and serve as a key factor in their initiation. We also found that we needed to change certain elements in our processes and organizational culture, which had become hierarchical, stiff, and slow over the years, and we needed to implement principles of agility and flexibility. We realized that the IDF’s rebasing to the Negev was a strategic opportunity for MID to implement cultural and organizational changes that in another context would require investment and efforts beyond our capabilities. This understanding developed during the process, although MID’s move to the Negev was not initially recognized as a major subject for analysis. We decided to make the most out of this strategic opportunity and therefore decided that designing and planning the transition would be an outcome of the Ma’asei Aman decisions, and be influenced by them.

    The Enablers: Beyond these issues, we designated five areas that we defined as ‘Enablers.’ Without the fostering and strengthening of each of these, it would be very difficult to put into practice the decisions made during the design stage. Each of these Enablers had its own purpose, but simultaneously also accelerated all other change processes.

    "(1) Networked intelligence – Creating a joint cyber environment characterized by a central ICT architecture (communications protocol) enabled the development of dedicated knowledge and weapons in the various units, as well as functions and information sharing and fusion among MID units.

    (2) Strengthening MID units and their organization - Strengthening the primary source of power in MID - (the professionalism of the individual units and the development of their knowledge - thus improving their abilities for more effective internal conduct.

    (3) Strengthening and re-organizing MID Headquarters[5] - Improving MID’s ability to operate and coordinate the directorat’s unity and efficiently maximize the usage of resources, directing the power structure and the outputs in light of tasks requiring integrative vision and employment of MID.

    (4) Supra-Theater- the ability to organize and conduct cross-theater and regional intelligence efforts without giving up the benefits of regional expertise in the existing MID theaters.

    (5) “Flexibility-Availability-Agility” - Taking advantage of the structural organization into different administrations[6] alongside a profound change in the MID’s command and management culture, reflected the directorat’s improved ability to respond quickly to circumstances and adjust its operations when faced with ad-hoc tasks. It also reflected the need to change focus or to reallocate effort and engage in reorganizations, which vary from time to time, all this within short time constants, and with a dynamism that characterizes the environment.”[7]

    Other highlights: In addition to the five ‘Enablers,’ we highlighted three mainly cultural, topics which required attention and care:

    Outward openness – Over the years, MID adopted a self-perception focused on its role as the ‘National Intelligence Appraiser.’ We realized that a deep cultural change would be necessary within the organization, through which the various units and personnel would internalize the essence of MID as an intelligence enabler of IDF operations in their entirety and hence, the necessity of connecting with various IDF units. At the time, we realized the uniqueness of the regional commands’ intelligence departments as sources of knowledge which could not be generated from the viewpoint of the General Staff and the necessity of direct relations between MID’s units and other units in the IDF (in practice, up to the brigade and division levels), without mediation or barriers.

    Personnel - MID is based on the best human resources the country can offer. From surveys of officers and interviews conducted during behavioral science studies, we realized that this is not enough. Alongside the professional ethos, which is still very dominant, we need to more intensely cultivate a culture of leadership and more systematic and individual care of our people.

    Resources - Although all these changes and expansions in functionality within MID required additional resources, we realized that we could not hope for a one-to-one ratio between the scope of the tasks, the extended missions we would undertake and the required investment in the organization on the one hand, and on the other hand the additional resources that would be granted. Therefore, it was decided that aside from the issue of cyber, all changes would be executed using existing MID resources, through the diversion of resources, streamlining processes and practices, and changing priorities.

    The broad scope of endeavors, insights, tensions and opportunities forced us to bring together, as much as possible, all the necessary centers of gravity to allow the implementation of all the processes and changes that were taking shape during the design stage. To this end, we formulated the elements within the framework of an overall ‘organizing idea.’

    The Organizing Idea

    After mapping the environmental changes and identifying the gap between them and the organization’s functionality, we were ready to discuss the mission and functions of MID, and the broad idea that would organize our continued work. Figure 2 reflects, within the required limitations, the principles of the organizing idea as formulated. The inner circle depicts the additions that we undertook to the missions of MID (in red - the traditional mission of MID. The changes are highlighted as follows, in green - our new interpretation of MID’s traditional mission; in blue – the new mission and responsibilities undertaken by MID), in addition to the missions and functions as defined until then. The second circle reflects the five enablers whose implementation would accelerate and pave the way for most of the other changes we intended to implement. The outer circle reflects the conceptual and organizational changes to deal with. Around the edge of the slide are the contexts that define the organizing idea. Above - the strategic changes in the environment; on the bottom right - MID as we would like to see it at the end of the process, in nature and outputs; and around the slide - the values, opportunities, and management principles that would help us move forward.

    The organizing idea included not only the abstract ideas we were aiming to achieve, but also the practical directions which could be derived from the ideas. In other words, the process’s structure dictated that the design phase should be completed with concrete understandings, which would enable in turn the practical planning phase and the execution thereof.

    That being the case, in addition to its traditional purposes of providing national, strategic, operational and tactical intelligence, MID undertook to develop and establish a concept which we called ‘Intelligence Based Warfare’ (our revised interpretation of the ‘Operational Intelligence’ concept, and a conscious effort to regiment its handling, turning it into a system), to lead the IDF’s entrance into operations in cyberspace; to play an active role in the ‘campaign between wars’, and to develop intelligence about different publics. The extended definition of the mission and the organizational roles would be realized through the five operation principles (enablers) described above – networked intelligence, supra-theater, strengthening MID’s central headquarters, strengthening the arrays and “Flexibility-Availability-Agility” – creating flexibility and availability mechanisms in the organization.

    In order to be clearly understood, we expressed the organizing idea in another graphic form. This form reflected a change in emphasis, although rendering the idea in a simplistic fashion, has great power in clarifying ‘the spirit of the organization’ to the most distant units and junior levels.

    The Contribution of the Design Stage

    In the previous paragraph, we seemingly summarized the products of the design phase. However, looking at this phase purely in terms of its content-related contribution is to miss the point. The design stage is the constitutive and driving component of the change process in more ways than one: First, before the design stage, the concept driving the fundamental change required in MID was only shared among a few. The design discussions in the teams and the senior steering committee presented to MID as an organization a clear and common ‘mirror’ that reflected, for the first time for everyone, the gaps between what was and what should be.

    Second, the understanding that a gap existed between MID’s conduct and outputs, and the sharp debate regarding the origins of this gap, forced us to quit our comfort zone both as individuals and arrays.

    Third, only by quitting these comfort zones could we expose and discuss some of our basic assumptions, some which were not even known to us then. An example was the seemingly obvious assumption that every collection system in MID should have its own IT and applications unit. Some of these basic assumptions were changed.

    Fourth, the joint process, through which the organizational gaps became clearer, created a sense of urgency in the senior steering group, and the need for change propelled further processes. One expression of this was the beginning of independent thought processes in the arrays. Thus, alongside the progress of Ma’asei Aman, the Research Division developed a strategic thought process of its own, called Change2, dealing with the concept of intelligence research. This process drew from Ma’asei Aman but also contributed to it. Similar processes took place in the special operations unit, in Unit 8200 and elsewhere. Finally, the design phase concentrated all the viewpoints of the various arrays for the first time into a joint thought process, creating new understandings among and within the arrays. The organization’s senior echelon jointly formulated a mutual and well-examined interpretation, both as to where MID was at the time, and to the direction in which it should be headed.

    The Planning Phase

    The conclusions of the design phase included not only the MID organizing idea and an updating of MID’s purpose and roles, but also, and maybe chiefly, a path that could bridge between the idea and its realization. The insights accumulated in the design phase taught us that the depth and scope of the change process called for change in all dimensions of the organization. In fact, if we wished to truly implement changes in the organization, we needed to make not only conceptual changes in the organizational strategy, but also practical changes to the organizational culture and to the way the organization perceived its personnel and vice versa.

    All these dimensions of change relate, of course, to the concrete operational-strategic context we perceived and to our insights regarding the four levels of intelligence required from us. This was, therefore, multi-dimensional change, whose different dimensions we compared to Rubik's cube - only handling it in its entirety, in all of its dimensions, could generate the required whole.

    A mistaken shift of one side would impact and affect the rest of the cube. The opposite was true too - a decision regarding one side, or part thereof, must include intended changes to the other sides. Simply put - a change in strategy cannot take place without affecting the processes and culture, and a change in the processes or structure will affect both strategy and culture.

    To this end, following the completion of the design phase, the way in which we would manage the practical planning was defined. Thirteen planning teams were created and were tasked with transforming the principles, directions, and ideas that had been formulated into practical plans. In order to ensure progress towards implementation, we defined clear principles for the planning stage:

    Plan with a broad vision - The teams were instructed to plan with complete freedom of action, to recommend changes and solutions for all elements of the organizational change (organization, processes, culture, organizational structure and even new missions).

    Learning - The teams were instructed to hold their own learning processes, rather than relying only on processes carried out during the design stage. In this way we could ensure control and various enriching viewpoints while promoting the processes.

    Jointness (Synergy) - The planning teams were comprised of selected delegates from all relevant MID arrays and some included relevant representatives from outside, such as combat brigade commanders who were integrated in the IBW (Intelligence-based Warfare) team.

    Integration - The planning took place within a tension that exists between having the teams focus only on their respective fields and the implications and joint ideas of the different teams. For example, the team working on new collection methodologies was both influenced by and influenced the team handling up-to-date research methodologies. We solved this complexity by emphasizing the need for continuous meetings of heads of teams and for integration meetings led by the Head of MID.

    Seniority - All teams were led by senior commanders in MID, Colonels, and Brigadier Generals. The ability of senior officers to conduct their work by both integrating and subverting conventions, was of course different than for junior officers. Furthermore, the direct and intensive involvement of MID’s leading forum in the planning, conveyed to the organization a message of determination and harnessed more people from different levels and positions. All teams were instructed to present their recommendations in a clear and practical manner, combined with a detailed plan (Gantt chart) for implementation, including the resource implications of the plan.

    The detailed plans, a product of the teams’ work, were discussed on several occasions in the MID steering forum. The planning outputs were presented by the teams and by the Head of MID himself on several occasions, both to the General Staff forum and to a forum of MID officers from the rank of lieutenant colonel and above. The commanders’ feedback was heard and studied and following corresponding changes and updates made within the teams, detailed plans for the required changes in MID were presented in a summary booklet in February of 2013.[8]

    The plans presented included changes in structure, organization, and the key processes within MID, as well as to culture and approach. Among the plans approved in the planning phase were the establishment of a central headquarters in the MID research division, as a response to a need identified for a deeper fusion of research related areas of expertise. Other plans included the establishment of a new theater in the research division, which was the conclusion of an understanding of the need for continuous handling of cross- theater issues; the establishment of an MID war room which would coordinate the collection and research arrays and operate on a 24/7 basis, in response to the need for available and flexible intelligence; new approaches and methods of intelligence collection in the cyber and SIGINT fields; establishing an IBW administration headed by a colonel, which would implement the concept that MID must produce and furnish the tactical levels with up-to-date intelligence at a resolution that would improve the forces’ effectiveness; the establishment of a MID Information Systems Department (Marom), and included a presentation a completely new network architecture reflecting changes in structure, organization, processes, and culture; changes in the structure and policy of MID’s cyber activity; establishment of a regional theater in the Operations Division; defining a new training approach for continuous officer training within MID; creating a service framework agreement for those serving in MID, including principles and emphases for personal advancement and fostering of personnel alongside structured service trajectories, promotion channels, etc. The list also included other changes which have not been listed here due to space constraints.

    IBW: To illustrate the relationship between design, planning, and implementation, we will outline the IBW concept in greater detail in this paragraph. One of the meaningful processes in MID was the change in the status of what we called Operational Intelligence and its place in our mission concept and duties. MID understood that the IDF could not maximize its strength when fighting against enemies who adopt disappearing tactics while employing significant fire capabilities, unless very specific and detailed intelligence was available to the forces at the micro-tactical level. This required MID to change its employment dimensions and among its collection tasks to prioritize tactical intelligence purposes over other tasks.

    From 2011, MID gave top priority to collecting and researching intelligence on various enemy warfare arrays, resulting in a sharp surge in the scope of relevant and accurate intelligence. In order to implement the Intelligence-based Warfare (IBW) concept which was shared with the ground forces, a series of steps were planned, including adapting sources, developing specific accessibility to operational intelligence, integration of information systems, participation in brigade and divisional exercises, aligning OPSEC definitions etc.

    As mentioned before, it was decided to that an IBW administration be established, led by a colonel with IBW representatives placed in all military services. The plan included a series of practical, organizational and procedural changes. Staff and intelligence personnel were added to divisional headquarters. Augmentation of intelligence personnel was also planned (and later implemented) in the maneuvering brigades’ headquarters. The intelligence information systems were changed to meet the new operational requirements, and were connected to the ground forces' command and control systems, while creating new and complex solutions to the OPSEC challenges. The MID field research unit was calibrated to meet the new requirements, based, among others, on an understanding of the centrality of field research for the new tactical needs. Later, in the implementation phase, the IBW concept was jointly exercised by MID and the ground forces during the main IDF exercises in recent years, where hundreds of Unit 8200 people, the directorat's VISINT unit and field intelligence personnel participated in preparing and overseeing each exercise.

    We also had to align our force design to the new concept. MID now invests more resources in real time intelligence collection projects, aimed at providing the tactical forces with the most up-to- date information about the enemy forces in the field at a high resolution.

    The IBW concept is no trivial process, not for the intelligence personnel nor the ground forces. The concept raised, and continues to raise issues such as the tension between the need for enabling intelligence and the understanding that friction and uncertainty are constant elements in the battlefield, and the tension between allowing combat forces maximum accessibility to the highest quality intelligence and the basic need in the intelligence world to ensure information security and to protect sources. There is also the fear of creating too strong a dependency among the combat forces on intelligence as a condition for taking action. These and other tensions need to be the subject of further development, joint thinking and experimentation by MID and the Ground Forces.

    The Implementation Phase

    Design ideas and detailed plans can go to waste if mismanaged and led improperly. In order to succeed, as we had in the design and planning phases, each implementation task was headed by an unit chief or a brigadier-general, required to run it as a project for all intents and purposes and to periodically present a progress report to the Head of MID. Progress reports on the main projects were presented periodically to the steering forum as well and occasionally further thinking was dedicated to the linkages and reciprocal relationships that existed, or were required, among the different projects and the way in which they should be conducted. At the same time, MID and the Heads of the Planning and Logistics Directorates oversaw the practical and detailed consequences of the implementation of the different projects and the connections between them.

    For major projects like IBW, networked intelligence and cyber, presentations and discussions were held very frequently with the Head of MID. In order to enrich the learning process and improve project management, seminars and learning groups were conducted throughout the projects’ progress.

    Additional projects that were born along the way, such as the ‘intelligence paradigm’ (which will be elaborated on below), were allocated special attention, experimentation labs and test periods and were later improved on in different forums, including the steering forum.

    Two main principles guided the implementation stage. First, dedicating time to follow-up discussions and showcasing products, and second, flexibility, adaptability and change during project development.

    The second principle included information dissemination, implementation, and impartation of insights in different forums – General Staff, commanders, general and specific conferences, lectures etc., conducted by unit chiefs and the MID chief. During most conferences, time was allocated for questions, criticism, and general discussion. In cross-unit projects (which constituted the majority) and in those maturing to cross-service and cross-command (such as IBW, and networked intelligence) quarterly cross service status discussions were conducted (in IBW for example, a ‘Three Generals’ forum was established, including the Chief of the Ground Forces Command, Head of the C4I Directorate and the Head of MID and relevant position holders, who met and jointly agreed upon directions for development and force generation).

    Management oversight was performed for the majority of tasks using the “control and monitoring officers” procedure, both by the Chief Intelligence Officer and the Bureau of the MID chief.
    The very existence of these follow-up discussions, the time and attention dedicated to them and especially the message: “We mean what we say,” created momentum (as opposed to endless discussions).

    As in the planning phase, during the implementation phase we remained open to new ideas and criticism of vectors already agreed upon. Nothing was perceived as ‘too late.’ Thus, misgivings, criticisms and new insights which were heard at this stage produced a new chapter in the process Ma’asei Aman 1.2. We will elaborate on this chapter later on.

The fifth circle was regular and direct updates about the process to all mid-level and senior MID officers, and through the “Head of MID Update"[11] informed MID officers of the process' progress and its content. It also informed these officers through briefings and educational programs in the arrays and through additional briefings given by the Heads of arrays and brigadier-generals in the Directorat.

The Value of Teams and Group Learning

The section above can also teach us about the power of group learning. It is likely that we would not have set up an integrated team (for collection and research) to improve intelligence analysis processes and later fully developed a “new intelligence paradigm” without the aforementioned officer’s remark. On the other hand, his comments would not have been possible without the preliminary work which provoked it.

This is also the case in more intimate learning groups. New knowledge cannot be learned or developed without creative friction between members of the group, bringing different, often conflicting, approaches to the table. In order to maximize group learning, the appropriate conditions had to be created. This meant giving up the hierarchical military discourse patterns that are familiar to us.[12]

All the teams involved in the design phase were instructed to follow this methodology (self-examination from the past to present and future), developed by the Intelligence Research Center and including a critical genealogical investigation of this kind. The product did not let us down. Investigating the shift by going back in time, in order to develop and form a future potential - is one of the principles of advanced strategic and organizational learning, according to the principles of the systemic approach.

The concept of IBW is an example of this. Placing the “age of fires” (enemy rockets and missiles) at the center of the threats and the IDF’s response is another. Along the way, concepts created through Ma’asei Aman became a direct basis for the concepts and concrete actions of the IDF. The term “age of fires” became a collection campaign and was also implemented as an IDF campaign, as decided by the Chief of Staff. IBW became an official IDF concept and it too was approved and became a General Staff concept.

In fact, one of the strongest incentives for rethinking, critical self-examination and creative streamlining is a shortage of resources. Indeed, once the organization recognized that it did not intend to relinquish any substantial or relevant areas of MID’s output and more importantly, that new tasks were about to be added to the workload with no significant[17] addition to its resources, then creative solutions began to emerge.

Under the concept of systemic learning, the need to do more within a given resources framework is not a contradiction, but a tension which needs to be resolved through inquiry and learning. This tension enabled us to reexamine our assumptions and behavioral patterns that we had come to take for granted. Converting dichotomous choices into tension is, therefore, a principle of systemic learning. Insisting on the ‘both ways’ concept did not reduce the effectiveness of the process, but was an important underlying principle for taking action.

Changes That Generate Change

Ma’asei Aman created a movement within the organization and generated currents whose influence went beyond the specific decisions taken during the process. In the spirit of IBW, in the spirit of the need to improve the handling of regional and inter-theater issues, in light of the directions decided upon in the networked MID or the covert campaigns between wars, suggestions for innovation and improvement arose from below. In the Research Department it was Change2, the strategic process launched shortly after the completion of the Ma’asei Aman design phase. The process, led by Research Division Head BG Itai Brun, complemented the Ma’asei Aman principles on the one hand, while bringing about many changes of its own on the other.

Based on an understanding of the limitations of time and attention and in order to re-ignite a process of motivation and identification with the goals, we defined Ma’asei Aman 1.2 as a debriefing, intended to review the progress of the implementation of Ma’asei Aman. It was allotted a short time period compared to Ma’asei Aman 1.0. Four key subjects were reviewed by teams led by a brigadier general, and were responsible for implementing the debriefing and presenting possible actions. The most outstanding issue, networked intelligence, can serve as a good example of the necessity to make organizational learning continuous and constant (for which typical staff work is not a substitute). The team investigating the subject under the Chief Intelligence Officer revealed and poured content into the term ‘Lost Year.’

Among the findings of this investigation, we learned that despite the vision of networked intelligence, the different arrays were continuing to routinely develop software in isolation from one another. We found that in different respects, MID software was lagging behind what was available on the Internet, partly due to the way that we rewarded personnel and units for immediate operational successes, which in effect negated the requirement that they implement our long-term vision. We also learned that various MID databases were incompatible, that there was no overall vision of operational-critical applications, and that a series of previous decisions could not be implemented, simply because the organizational structure would not allow it.

‘MID in Color’: Indeed, only a year after we had made the decisions and seemingly set out on our path (we even established an Information Systems Department for this purpose) this fundamental examination made clear the concrete reasons why we were not progressing towards the vision we had set for ourselves. The conclusion of this investigation was that, in a stark contrast to the position with which most of us had held when beginning the process, a radical reorganization of the MID’s IT system was required, as well as a substantial change in the way we develop our human resources and measure the output of units and commanders. The Directorat's C4I units, and those in the various arrays were dismantled. They were replaced by five C4I units, each with a specific designation and areas of professional expertise under a broad MID outlook. In this way, instead of each unit being fully supported by its own ICT unit, each reorganized unit would specialize in providing unique professional services to all the arrays, thus achieving compatibility of standards, communications and applications within all arrays and between them and headquarters units. Each C4I unit would be subordinate to a different unit in the Directorat, according to its traditional professional orientation and all the units’ work would be coordinated by a new C4I department set up in MID Headquarters.