The Need for Organisational Resilience - Chapter 7

Step 1 – Identify the specific task that they are to undertake. This may range from scrutinising

underpinning data and assumptions through to considering the project or plan in its entirety.

Step 2 – Identify an appropriate red team leader and potential red team. The team must possess

the right mix of skills and expertise necessary to address the problem. It is likely to comprise a

combination of:

critical and creative thinkers;

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subject matter experts;

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analysts;

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cultural advisors; and

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role players.

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To achieve such a team, the end user may require a reachback capability through which they can

call on wider expertise. Most importantly, the size and membership of the red team should match the

task in hand. Red teaming should not be considered a ‘one-size-fits-all’ activity.

Step 3 – Task and empower the red team leader. The end user needs to provide the red team

leader with guidance, clear objectives and terms of reference, where necessary. The red team leader

should be allowed to run the team, employing the techniques that the leader feels are appropriate to

the task. This may involve endowing the red team with a degree of latitude to explore the problem on

a broad base and spend time thinking in areas not originally specified. (Development Concepts and

Doctrine Centre 2013, 2-1-2–3)

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Getting red teaming right requires the right choice of a red team. The red team needs to

consist of specialists who know the organisation inside-out; they also need to have

knowledge beyond the organisational boundaries so that they can truly target the

organisation’s thinking as a knowledgeable and competent adversary. The red team should

have a breadth of expertise, but should not be bigger than 8-10 people, and should not be

emotionally or structurally attached to the problem in question.

Setting up red teaming is crucial to the success of problem solving. All parties involved

(Blue and Red teams) need to be briefed about the purpose of red teaming as an exercise

not to undermine people, their passion or their competence, but to help them make more

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