In recent years NATO armed forces and partner states have placed significant emphasis on implementing lessons learned processes that aim to improve adaptation and support innovation. Actual results have been mixed, however, with much more attention given to collection than to prioritised analysis, remedial action and dissemination.

To discuss these issues, the Military Innovation Network (MIN), a research project at the Department of War Studies and the School of Security Studies has invited Professor Tom Dyson and Dr John Tull, from Greenwich University, to reflect on factors that impede effective learning and shows ways in which those obstacles can be reduced. The event will be chaired by Dr Raphael Lima, from the Department of War Studies at King's College London.

The discussion draws on the findings of an ESRC-funded research study on military learning undertaken in cooperation with the armed forces of Estonia, the Netherlands, Portugal, and Ukraine. Based on over 220 interviews with military officers, it examines the performance of lessons-learned processes in combat operations and training exercises, with a focus on the practices employed and how they shape opportunities for improvement. The project’s findings raise implications for the governance of organisational learning processes within armed forces and for the academic literature on military innovation and learning.

Panelists:

Professor Tom Dyson is a Professor of International Relations at the Department of Politics, International Relations and Philosophy, Royal Holloway College, which was ranked by the most recent Research Excellence Framework as the number one UK Politics Department for research output. He has researched military change and defence policy for over two decades, with a focus on working closely with military practitioners to deliver research which meets practitioner needs. Tom has led several major research projects in cooperation with NATO member-state/partner-state militaries, including the British, Dutch, Estonian, German, Portuguese, and Ukrainian armed forces. He has received research grants from a number of UK and international funding bodies, including the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, UK Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC), Gerda Henkel Foundation, and the German Academic Exchange Service.  

Dr John Tull is a Lecturer (Asst. Professor) at the Greenwich Business School in the University for Greenwich, London where he teaches innovation management to undergraduate and postgraduate students. He has worked with Tom for 4 years in researching Lessons Learned in the military, first as a Postdoctoral Fellow at Royal Holloway and through a continuing collaboration today. John's postdoctoral and ongoing research with Tom focuses on military learning in NATO member and partner militaries (specifically: Netherlands, Portugal, Estonia, Ukraine), with extensive interview and workshop engagement with personnel supplemented by completing the NATO Lessons Learned Staff Officer Course in Sweden during March 2023.  

Chair:

Dr Raphael Lima is a Lecturer in War Studies Education at the Department of War Studies and the Project Lead of the Military Innovation Network (MIN).