When governments decide to go to war, they send in the special forces first and there are many stories of battles. Remembering they have guns with bullets and so does the other side or people lose their lives. In a book written by Mark Owen titled No Hero – the Evolution of a Navy Seal, published by Dutton part of the Penguin Group, New York, 2014, Mr. Owen focuses on the preparation needed to do a successful mission for the SEALS and something many of us non seals can learn. Mr. Owen writes there is no secret sauce – but there is hard work, dedication and drive. The reality is that SEALs do not think of themselves as special. We simply try to do the most basic tasks extraordinarily well.

One of the best leaders I know used to challenge his junior guys to be engaged and part of the team. At what level are you willing to participate, he would ask. All in, all the time was the only acceptable answer.

When the other side shoots real bullets, you have to trust you life to your team. Trust is built slowly through the character of the person, their leadership and being calm to make good decisions in battle. In battle the team is more important than the person, however it is expected not to accept anything but the best for everyone. Everyone works for the team and does their best all the time, then trust will be built.

One of the ways trust is easily broken is how are decisions made, Are decisions made from the top down or bottom up? The answer tends to build or not build trust quickly. If it is top down, although the people at the top have shown they made good decisions in the past, sometimes other reasons will go into their decision making. If you make it bottom up – many of the same visuals the top leaders has is shown to all and decisions will be made relating to getting in and out minimizing the risks.

The SEALs have a debrief or communication or After Action Review (AAR) after every mission. The group gathers and the purpose of the AAR is to teach the lessons to be learnt from the mission. Everyone talks about the mission what was good, what needed improvement, egos are left at the door and everyone needs to take hones criticism. For the SEALs the checklist is Mission Planning; Infil; Actions on the Objective; Tactical Questioning; Exfil; Communications; Intel; and HQ. Everyone is free to talk and encouraged to speak up and offer suggestions for improvements.

The benefits of the exercise is it eliminated any infighting. Everyone has a chance to say their piece and air any concerns. The issues were brought forward and some of the solutions require thinking outside of the box or finding a better way next time. The ability to communicate with complete openness and honestly solved the big and small problems. For the individual the lessons are learned to make the team better and it is not about the individual. Everyone makes mistakes and everyone can learn their mistakes. the team improves.

In the book, the SEALs use the technology and the backup of the military. Information from drones to watch for patterns which most of do. We all tend to follow patterns, for example, we like to sleep inside as opposed to outside. This means lights are usually off when we sleep. We tend to take our shoes off when we sleep. These are clues for patterns and decision making.

Linking to dividend paying stocks, trust and communication are always difficult, if you think about your reviews over the years these two issues came up the most to be improved. We are humans which means some see the big picture, some see the smaller picture and some see the in-between and how they come together will define how the team functions. For stock picking you are focusing on the senior management team.

There are more questions than answers, till the next time – to raising questions.