Logotyp: till Försvarshögskolans hemsida

One important question concerning a risk description is to what extentit should contain information about the uncertainty surrounding an estimatedprobability for an event, for example, by using some form ofprobability range. Presenting a point estimate together with a rangecan inform the decision-maker about both the best judgement as wellas the strength of knowledge regarding the probability in question, sothat the decision-maker can take this information into considerationwhen making decisions. However, communicating uncertainty in riskdescriptions may lead to delays in the decision-making process, due topeople’s general aversion to ambiguity and other forms of uncertainty.This can be devastating in time critical decision-making situations,where delaying decisions leads to substantial costs or losses - as in thecase of a military command and control (C2) situation or in crisisresponse management (CRM). This study investigated how 106 universitystudents handled a fictive time critical military decision-making situationwith imprecise probabilities presented in the form of ranges. Thepurpose was to make a first estimation regarding if presenting uncertaintyin risk descriptions could be a problem in these kinds of situations.The results show that almost half of the participants delayed theirdecisions and that many participants showed little restraint regardingtheir waiting time. These results indicate that communicating uncertaintyin risk descriptions can be a problem in time critical decisionmakingsituations, and that presenting uncertainty in risk descriptionsmay require decision-makers to be educated in the specific problemsassociated with decision-making in these types of situations.

Effective C2 requires the ability to cope with uncertainty and to make timely decisions in situations often characterised by risk. This experimental study, with 56 participants, investigated how decision-makers handled these problems in a fictive time critical situation. More specifically, the study examined the effects of presenting two different degrees of uncertainty (low/high) on the choice to make a direct decision or to wait for additional information, in order to test if increased degrees of uncertainty lead to more people waiting for information and to longer waiting times. The overall purpose was to contribute to the debate regarding how uncertainty should be communicated to decision-makers, and to our knowledge concerning the practical consequences of presenting uncertainty to decision-makers in time critical situations. The study could not demonstrate any effect of increased degrees of uncertainty on the choice to make a direct decision or to wait for additional information. Neither could the study demonstrate any effect on the waiting time. However, the results show that almost all of the participants in both the experimental and the control group decided to wait for additional information, and that most of them showed little restraint regarding their waiting time. These results strengthen the conclusion from a previous study by Rydmark, Kuylenstierna, and Tehler (2020) - that presenting uncertainty in risk descriptions can be a practical problem in time critical decision-making situations, and that educating decision-makers in handing these problems may be required if uncertainty is to be presented in these kinds of situations.

Framgångsrik insatsledning vid kriser och i krigssituationer kräver förmåga att fatta beslut i rätt tid i siutationer som präglas av både osäkerhet, komplexitet samt olika former av risker. Syftet med forskningen i detta delprojekt har varit att öka kunskapen om hur osäkerhet påverkar riskrelaterat beslutsfattande i tidskritiska beslutssituationer. I följande kapitel redogörs för tre empiriska studier som undersöker om metoden att presentera osäkerhet i riskbeskrivningar, genom att använda så kallade sannolikhetsintervaller, kan leda till fördröjningar i beslutsprocessen och därmed utgöra ett problem för ledningsprocessens kvalitet i tidskritiska beslutssituationer.

Two interconnected challenges in C2 are to cope with uncertainty and to make timely deci-sions. From the standpoint of a commander these challenges may easily come into conflict with each other. Uncertainty, i.e. gaps in knowledge, may be reduced by collecting and processing additional information - but this takes time. To handle this dilemma the com-mander and his/her staff may have to make assumptions. An assumption is "a supposition on the current situation or a presupposition on the future course of events". If the assump-tions being made are invalid it may have negative consequences for the ability to reach the mission objectives. It is therefore important to assess and to follow up the assumptions during mission planning and execution, in order to make it possible for timely re-planning if necessary. However, even though the handling of assumptions is considered to be im-portant in both NATO´s planning directive COPD and in the Swedish counterpart SPL, nei-ther COPD nor SPL gives a clear guidance on how to assess the assumptions - apart from an exhortation to use a risk evaluation template. To date there is no theoretically grounded and systematically tested technique for assessing assumptions in C2. By using a design logic framework and techniques from the area of risk assessment this paper presents the initial step to a possible solution to these problems. The results are a design logic scheme and a design proposition for a technique that is potentially suitable for assessing assump-tions, to be tested in forthcoming empirical studies.

Denna rapport diskuterar möjliga effekter av att ta bort en ledningsnivå samt hur detta påverkar ledningssystemets förmåga att uppfylla de tre övergripende designkriterierna; förmåga att hantera tidsfaktorn, komplexitet samt friktioner. Diskussionen sker inom ett designvetenskapligt ramverk i form av ett yttre system, ett inre system samt ett gränssnitt. Slutsatsen av diskussionen är att en minsk-ning eller hopslagning av antalet ledningsnivåer skulle ha både positiva och negativa effekter på ledningssystemets förmåga att uppfylla de tre designkriterierna. En minskning av antalet ledningsnivåer skulle kunna ha en viss positiv effekt på förmågan att kunna fatta snabbare beslut, förmågan att kunna erhålla informat-ion snabbare samt förmågan att kunna ominrikta verksamheten, men samtidigt riskerar dessa effekter att motverkas av att mer information måste bearbetas, analyseras och anpassas på de nivåer som blir kvar. Andra negativa effekter kan ses i form av ökat kontrollspann samt större staber med risk för ökad tröghet, ef-tersom allt fler och allt mer differentierade uppgifter med olika perspektiv, komplexitet och målsättningar måste hanteras på de kvarvarande ledningsnivåerna. Sammantaget visar diskussionen att vid en förändring av detta slag så måste vinsterna med att ta bort eller slå ihop ledningsnivåer vägas och balanseras mot förlusterna av en sådan åtgärd.

Diskussionen i denna rapport är av principiell natur, vilket innebär att vi inte med säkerhet kan uttala oss om hur stora de ovan redovisade effekterna skulle bli av en minskning eller hopslagning av antalet ledningsnivåer på förmågan att uppfylla de tre designkriterierna. För att få kunskap om detta krävs empiriska undersökningar och några sådana finns i dagsläget inte att tillgå. För att åstadkomma sådana skulle en möjlig väg framåt kunna vara att genomföra datorsimuleringar för olika scenarier. Sådana undersökningar behövde dock inte begränsas till att enbart undersöka vad som händer om man tar bort en ledningsnivå, utan istället skulle fokus kunna vara på att undersöka vad som är rätt antal ledningsnivåer för de uppgifter som skall lösas.

This is the second paper in a series where we try to understand what Clausewitz called the commander’s “coup d’oeil”, i.e., the ability to understand the situation on the battle field at a glance. We employ a standard paradigm from research on expertise where participants study a scenario and then reproduce it from memory. Last year we reported results consistent with other results from studies of expertise, viz., that experts recall meaningful scenarios better than meaningless scenarios whereas novices recall both types of scenarios equally badly. This year, we report four follow-up experiments. The first two study ex-perts’ and novices’ recall of scenarios after having seen how the scenario de-veloped over time and we do so under two conditions, one where the scenario develops violating constraints on how military units should move and one where they do not in an attempt to distinguish between two possible explana-tions for last year’s results: The constraints hypothesis and the pattern match-ing hypothesis. The results show that both experts perform better than novices but that both groups recall scenarios where the development did not violate constraints better than scenarios where the development violated constraints. We interpret these results as support for the constraints hypothesis. In Experi-ments 2 and 3 we vary the time allowed for inspecting static scenarios on the interpretation of these scenarios with both expert and novice participants. The results show that a short time for inspection affects the interpretation by novic-es to a greater extent than it affects the interpretation by experts, as was pre-dicted by Clausewitz. We interpret this to mean that novices and experts achieve their understanding of a military scenario in different ways.