Implicit Communication Beats Explicit by Orders of Magnitude

"Although “mutual trust” gives us all a soft, warm feeling, how does it actually help win? Simply, it speeds execution of OODA loops. The reason? For starters, it permits implicit communication among team members, where very little needs to be written down. Obviously, people can communicate this way much faster than through any form of writing—it’s much quicker not to say something than to spell it out in detail. Implicit communication, with enough mutual experience, can provide more information more accurately as well."

"Boyd insisted that we should … emphasize implicit over explicit in order to gain a favorable mismatch in friction and time (i.e., ours lower than any adversary) for superiority in shaping and adapting to circumstances."

"the Chief of the Prussian General Staff in the Franco-Prussian War (1870-71), Field Marshal Helmuth von Moltke, observed in the mid-1800s, the greater risk is the loss of time that comes from always trying to be explicit."

"General Gaedcke commented about his unit in WW II, if he had tried to write everything down, “we would have been too late with every attack we ever attempted.”"