Red Teaming
Bryce G. Hoffman
“THE GAME-CHANGING APPROACH TO STRATEGY AND PLANNING THAT WILL KEEP YOUR BUSINESS AHEAD OF THE COMPETITION. Developed by the military and intelligence agencies, red teaming is a revolutionary way to stress-test strategies, flush out unseen threats and missed opportunities, and execute more successfully in an increasingly uncertain world.”
I was pretty pumped when I first saw this book because, well, it’s red! I had high hopes for an exciting read, but boy, was I let down. The beginning of the book dragged on with long-winded chapters all about military stuff. It was like the words were just sliding off the page instead of getting into my head. Sure, we needed some background info, but that was way too much. I get that the principles are based on military history, but a little less history and a little more about applications of those principles would be usefu.
It seemed like the author was more interested in telling their life story about how they got into red teaming. I kept waiting to get to the good stuff about what red teaming actually is, but instead, it was all about setting up for it with no real substance. Finally, toward the end, we kinda sorta got to the point, and it turns out that red teaming is just a mishmash of thinking techniques you’ve probably heard of before. The author basically said, “Use the one that works for you, in your current scenario.” So, not exactly groundbreaking.
Don’t even get me started on the company examples they threw in there besides all the military based stuff. McDonald’s, Uber, Google – we’ve heard it all before, and they barely scratched the surface. Honestly, skip this one and go read “Thinking in New Boxes” instead. I’m giving “Red Teaming” a solid one-star rating – I gave up and couldn’t bring myself to read the final chapters.
