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The merit of improvisation over command and control as an organizational approach is the subject of much debate in the management and emergency literatures. The purpose of this paper is to examine tactics employed by the two leading protagonists at the Battle of Stalingrad – Field Marshall Friedrich Paulus on the German side and General Vasily Chuikov on the side of Russia – and seek to identify the reasons for Chuikov's victory over Paulus and draw lessons from this for practicing managers.

The research project examined over a dozen publicly available texts on the battle, in the light of the crisis management and strategy literatures.

The paper shows how Chuikov improvised to meet the demands of the situation, relaxed the command and control structure of the Russian 62nd Army and developed a collective mind among Russian troops and that this triple approach played a significant role in his victory over Paulus.

The case provides support for the view that improvisation is important in crisis response and can be applied within a hierarchical command and control structure. The paper puts forward a framework for managers to respond to crisis based on two continua: mode of response (improvised or planned) and means of control (via the hierarchy or via rules embedded in a collective mind).

To propose a new military academic area called the “Science of Military Command and Control” which will demand an entirely new way of thinking regarding decision‐making command and control and use of modern technology.

Defines basic terms and concepts of the discipline and a meta‐theory consisting of General Systems Theory and its related areas is presented.

Three main perspectives are recommended where the first is General Systems Theory, the second is the Cybernetics Regulatory Paradigm and the third is Communication and Information Theory. The components of military command and control system were analysed and a general model for information system development recommended.

Current thinking in favour of a “network‐defense” that is based on information and communication technology has changed the traditional perspective. New thinking and research development is required. New research using scientific approach is needed.

Shows that the old and exact strategies for Swedish defence has totally changed. New military academic area is proposed and a general model outlined.

Proposes a new way of thinking which will affect future military planning. A cybernetic/systemic methodology provides solutions.

The health service response to COVID-19 provided a unique opportunity to build our understanding of the leadership styles in use in managing a crisis event. Existing literature emphasises command and control leadership; however, there has been less emphasis on relational approaches and the behaviours necessary to ensure the agility of the response and minimise the risk of relational disturbances. The purpose of this paper is to understand leadership styles in use, as part of a health service response to COVID-19.

This paper draws on data from semi-structured interviews with 27 executives and senior leaders from a tertiary health service in Australia. The data were analysed using thematic analysis. Notes and examples were coded according to deductively derived criteria around leadership styles and competencies from the literature, while remaining open to emergent themes.

Health system leaders described examples of both command and control and relational leadership behaviours. This dually provided the discipline (command and control) and agility (relational) required of the crisis response. While some leaders experienced discomfort in enacting these dual behaviours, this discomfort related to discordance with leadership preferences rather than conflict between the styles. Both leadership approaches were considered necessary to effectively manage the health system response.

Crisis management literature has typically focused on defining and measuring the effectiveness of behaviours reflective of a command and control leadership response. Very few studies have considered the relational aspects of crisis management, nor the dual approaches of command and control, and relational leadership.

Incidents requiring command and control require all personnel from firefighters (FFs) to the incident commander (IC) to make continuous decisions often with limited information and under acute time-pressure. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to explore the stress reactivity of specific roles during the command and control of an immersive, computer-based incident.

Experienced firefighting personnel undergoing incident command training participated in this study. Participants completed measures of state anxiety and stress immediately before and after taking part in a computer-based simulation of a large-scale incident run in real time. During the simulation personnel assumed one of four roles: IC, sector commander, entry control officer (ECO), and command support officer. Following the simulation personnel then completed measures of perceived workload.

No significant changes in state anxiety were observed, but levels of stress and perceived workload were related to task roles. Specifically, ICs reported the greatest levels of mental and temporal demands and stress when compared with ECOs.

Limitations include the lack of environmental factors (such as rain, darkness, and noise), a relatively small sample size, and the use of self-reported questionnaires.

The application of immersive training environments as a method of developing FFs experience of incident command roles and skills pertinent to high-acuity, low-frequency events.

The paper represents one of the first attempts to identify the self-reported anxiety, stress, and perceived workload of specific role demands during the command and control of simulated incidents.

This study proposes targeted modernization of the Department of Defense (DoD's) Joint Forces Ammunition Logistics information system by implementing the optimized innovative information technology open architecture design and integrating Radio Frequency Identification Device data technologies and real-time optimization and control mechanisms as the critical technology components of the solution. The innovative information technology, which pursues the focused logistics, will be deployed in 36 months at the estimated cost of $568 million in constant dollars. We estimate that the Systems, Applications, Products (SAP)-based enterprise integration solution that the Army currently pursues will cost another $1.5 billion through the year 2014; however, it is unlikely to deliver the intended technical capabilities.

In the nineteenth century, the comparative method was seen as essential, if not fundamental, to growth and production of knowledge in the human sciences. However, over time the categories that formed the basis of nineteenth century comparative research (civilized: savage for example) were discredited. And so, in time, was the comparative method itself.

In this study I revisit the Cuban missile crisis of 1962, in order to gain additional perspective on the relationship between organizational decision making and crisis outcomes. This exercise is an historical “counterfactual” or “what if” excursion, using recently declassified documents and simulated exchange calculations, from which I hope to draw three principal benefits. First, the study may shed some additional light on why Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev was willing to take such a dangerous gamble. Second, our counterfactual crisis suggests that the risk of inadvertent war, so much written about in connection with Cuba, 1962, was less important than the risk of a deliberate, but miscalculated, escalation. Third, the balance of command and control vulnerability might have mattered more to crisis‐ridden US leaders than the balance of strategic nuclear forces. If so, it helps to explain the apparent reluctance of US leaders to employ highly coercive forms of nuclear brinkmanship.