This is part two of the series. If you haven’t read part one, do yourself a favor and read it here first.
In this post, I’ll discuss some of the common objections to the Objectives, Principles, and Techniques (OPT) framework that I laid out in the last post.
Shouldn’t we just teach everyone to do the same thing?
That might work if there was a single tactic or procedure that successfully addressed all possible problems. Unfortunately, there isn’t. Response to these events is highly variable. There is simply too much complexity to have a single tactic (or even small set of tactics) that can solve all problems.
Let me give you an example. The diamond movement tactic (see figure below) is a good tactic for moving in hallways, but it can’t be used in every hallway. Many hallways are too narrow. Some hallways are so narrow that the team will only be able to maneuver in a straight line directly behind each other (e.g. a stack). If you only teach the diamond, what is the team supposed to do when they can’t use the tactic?
The Diamond Formation
Also, what happens when you go to do training at an agency that has already decided that they like some other formation, say the T formation (see figure below)? This is also a good interior movement tactic, but it requires an even wider hallway. Do you argue with the agency about the diamond being better? Do you just accept it? If so, on what basis?
The T Formation
Now let me flip things and use the OPT approach. The objective of using team formations in interior spaces is to allow the team to move through the area while maintaining their safety. This safety comes in two forms. One, the formation helps the team to cover angles so that they can address threats. Two, the formation helps reduce fundamental firearms rules violations (particularly team members flagging each other).
We have the following overarching Principles in play: 4 fundamental firearms safety rules, communicate, 540 degrees of coverage. We are in an interior space, so we add stay together as much as possible. This is because it allows the team to cover threat angles more efficiently. I would also add mass firepower to the Principles. The idea is that you put firepower toward areas where you are most likely to encounter a threat. The default is toward the front because most officer-suspect encounters in active attacks involve head-to-head contact. This doesn’t mean that you drop rear security, it just means that you put more guns to the front when you can. It also means that if you encounter a threat, you try to get as many guns as possible into the fight. Of course, they must do this while still complying with the firearms safety rules principle.
Finally, we show trainees examples of techniques (formations) that meet these concepts and principles. The diamond would be one, but we can also show the T or any other formation that is consistent with the principles.
Now, lets talk about how these approaches play out in practice. Lets say we are teaching the diamond and only the diamond. We demonstrate the diamond and tell them why it is a good formation. Next, we put the students together in teams and we have them form the diamond. Then they move up and down hallways in the diamond. When they fail to keep the formation, we prod them to keep the formation. After they master moving in the diamond, we might start adding threats that they must react to (if we have time). Then we say they know the diamond and we expect them to use it when they run scenarios.
Now lets take the OPT approach. We start by discussing the objective(s) of using team formations while moving down a hallway. Next, we introduce the new principles. I am going to assume that this is not the first thing that the students have done, so they already know the overarching principles, we just have to add stay together as much as possible and mass firepower. We then show some examples of the principles in action by showing some specific formations. Then we practice. The practice is focused on achieving the objective. So when the team is moving, we place threats in the environment that they must address. This is to make them focus on the objective of safely moving down the hall. The cues that we use are to focus their attention on the relevant principles. Are they getting spread out? Stay together! Only one person in a firefight? Mass firepower! Flagging their teammates? Laser! Notice we are not prompting them to use a specific formation. No two practice reps are the same. We change the environment constantly. Sometimes we make a teammate do dumb things so that the rest of the team must react.
What is the outcome of these two different approaches? In the technique-based approach, the teams execute really good looking diamonds during practice. When you put them in a force-on-force scenario, the diamond disappears. You have what we refer to as the tactical blob.
In the OPT approach, you don’t see clean formations emerge in practice, but the students become more and more effective at achieving the objectives and formation-like things emerge. They tend to develop heads that are on swivels and react quickly to changes (threats). They look the same when they run force-on-force scenarios. You don’t see clean formations, but they focus on achieving their objectives and don’t violate the principles when doing so.
So what’s the real difference? At the most basic level, when you focus on the objectives, the team is worried about finding and addressing threats. The particular configuration of the team is secondary. When you focus on a specific tactic (formation) the primary focus is on maintaining the correct formation. Addressing threats is secondary. I have seen many teams move down a hallway in a perfect diamond while blowing right past a suspect with a gun.
Additionally, when you practice using the OPT, the participants are learning to act safely and effectively in an environment that is close to what they will experience in an actual event. When you practice based upon the tactic, participants are learning how to achieve objectives and act safely in an environment that is idealized - one they will not encounter during an actual event. When you focus on the tactic, you teach the student to look good in practice. When you focus on outcomes, you teach the student to achieve their objectives. It is somewhat like the difference between teaching the steps to a specific dance verses teaching the someone to move with the music.
So you’ll see that the question above about what happens when technique X won’t work isn’t relevant to the OPT approach. The principles are flexible enough that there should never be situation that can’t be addressed. You have built adaptable responders who can address all sorts of situations and aren’t limited to a single tactic.
What about when you run into an agency that really likes tactic Y? You can now say it is acceptable or not based upon the principles. Chances are that it will be because agencies often put a lot of thought in to what techniques they are going to teach and the principles are common to all the ones that have been used over time. When you want to move them away from from their preferred technique, you just put them in an environment where it won’t work.
What about safety?
One of the objections I often hear to this type of approach is about safety. I agree that safety is an important issue and one that we should always be concerned about because we are dealing with firearms. That is why the first overarching concept that I mentioned is the 4 fundamental firearms safety rules. These should constantly be monitored and reinforced in all training activities!
But I also think we might need to rethink what safety really means. In much firearms training, students are taught the four rules and then they do their training in situations where these rules really cannot be violated. They are on a rectangular range with targets at one end. There is never anyone in front of them. There is a nice backdrop to catch rounds behind the target. Everyone stands on the same line. You never draw until instructed, and so on.
This is certainly safe and there are definitely times where you want this level of safety, but I would argue that by ensuring that the 4 rules are always perfectly met, you are not teaching officers to implement those rules in the real world. In an active attack, officers are going to have their weapons drawn and pointed in the direction they are moving. Civilians or other officers may suddenly step out in front of them. The officers will need to adjust how they are carrying the weapon (e.g. go to Sul) to stop lasering the person who just appeared in front of them. When an officer encounters the suspect, he may be in a room full of civilians and some of them might be in the backdrop of the officer’s most direct shooting lane. This requires the officer to adjust his shot. I’m sure you can think of lots of other examples. How are officers supposed to learn to deal with these situations if they never encounter them in training? For SWAT officers, they learn these things in live fire shoot houses, but most officers never participate in this type of training.
I think the same logic extends to many instructors’ thinking about teaching specific tactics for active attack response. If everyone is taught to do the same thing, then we all know exactly what everyone is going to do and where everyone is going to be. This should mean that everyone is safer. Except that isn’t what actually happens. We rarely see anyone perfectly execute any of the tactics that they have been taught in practice when they are placed in force-on-force scenarios.
The same extends to real life situations. Metropolitan Nashville Police Department (MNPD) had a very successful response to the Covenant School shooting in 2023. The video is here. MNPD has fully bought into ALERRT. They have done our training for years and provide their officers with far more training than the state minimums. Yet if you look at the video, they did not use any of the specific techniques that ALERRT demonstrates. What they did do was understand that their objective was to stop the killing and then used the principles that we teach to achieve that objective.
This also leads to a coaching/training question. As a trainer, do you tell the officers that responded to the the Covenant shooting that their tactics were terrible, or do you congratulate them for stopping the shooter and saving lives? Or do you give them a good job, but here are all the things you did wrong type of talk?
Also remember, not everyone is going to be taught the same techniques no matter how often they are declared the national standard. On top of that, people also are going to do things that you didn’t expect when they are placed under pressure. Shouldn’t training reflect this reality and teach officers how to apply the fundamental firearms safety rules in a complex environment?
What about interoperability?
Another objection I hear is how can different agencies work together if they are not doing the same things? That is certainly a potential problem. I see a couple of things that overcome it. First, if everyone buys into the same structure of objectives (e.g. Stop the Killing and Stop the Dying), then that is a start. I haven’t heard anyone push back on Stop the Killing and Stop the Dying since we started using them, and other training groups seem to be teaching the same objectives (even if they call them something different). If you are trying to achieve the same things, you will be able organize to meet those objectives.
Second, it is much easier to get people to buy into principles than specific tactics. Believe me. I have spent years involved in arguments between SWAT guys about room entries. Everyone has their favorite. No amount of data will change that. Hunter and I published a little book with a whole series of studies where we to tried an parse out which entry was better. We found a particular entry that was better. The group of SWAT officers that we work with loved it, but when we went to another group they said, “I don’t care what your paintball studies say.”
The cool thing about principles is that once you identify them, you can see how they play out in the different techniques that people use. Then you can show how the different techniques are just variations on a theme (principle). Certain variations will have advantages in some situations and others will be better in different situations. Many times which technique would have worked best can only be known after the situation is over. I also suspect that many people implicitly know these principles and pointing them out will be like flipping on a light switch.
Once you understand the principles, you can coordinate effectively even when someone does things differently. Say I show up to an event and hook up with a team. I am expecting them to run a diamond, but they run a T instead. No problem. I still know that our objective is to move safely down the hallway. To do this I am going to obey the 4 rules, communicate, maintain 540 degrees of coverage, stay together, and mass firepower. Following these principles will allow me to attach myself to whatever formation the team is using and contribute effectively. If I only know a specific tactic and someone does something different, I am lost.
Third, if you want to be able to work together efficiently you must train together regularly. Even if we were all taught the same tactics, there is still going to be variation from agency to agency in how they are done. Training together helps both to smooth those differences and to understand where you differ from the other agency. There is simply no replacement for training together.
Wrap-up
I hope I have made a decent argument here for using an OPT approach to standards. In this approach, the most critical component is that everyone shares the same understanding of objectives. Next, principles are introduced that impact how people are going to achieve those objectives. The use of these common principles allows officers to work together safely while also focusing on key aspects of the objectives. Finally, specific techniques are shown as examples of how to apply the principles to obtain an objective, but they are just one way, among many acceptable ways, to achieve the objective.
I also want to point out that while I tried to keep things very plain English, there is a solid body of research that underlies this approach. Those of you who are familiar with this substack will see that the OPT approach is really just a variation on the overall Ecological Dynamics approach, and that we are really creating a framework that instructors can use to inform a Constraints Led Approach (CLA) to training. The objectives are clearly intentions, but can also be seen as invariants. To resolve the event, you must stop the killing and stop the dying. This doesn’t change no matter what the event is. Exactly what principles are is a little more ambiguous. I think they most closely map to attractors. These are more efficient ways to solve problems that we have discovered and we are pointing out to the trainee. Staying together inside more efficiently provides threat angle coverage than being spread out. But sometimes the principles also seem constraint like. Telling participants to stay together is definitely a constraint. You are taking away the option of spreading out. Constraining someone in the direction of an attractor is an efficient way to get more out of the training when we simply don’t have time to allow the trainee to explore the whole search space. Finally, the OPT approach to techniques is clearly consistent with the repetition without repetition aspect of the CLA. OPT is focused on repeating outcomes without much concern for repeating specific physical actions.