Abstract
Recent years of deployment on international operations have on one hand contributed to the Danish Defence including the Army with great experience in planning operations and on the other hand, challenged the military planning process. In this context the Danish planning process for planning land operations has been challanged and more innovative thinking is required. This Master’s thesis aims at investigating how the military staff is able to innovate within the framework of the Danish land warfare planning process. The methodology is based on empirical data obtained through field observations of two military staffs during their planning processes. The thesis utilizes Lotte Darsø’s innovation theory as its theoretical framework focusing on group composition, communication, and knowledge dynamics. Based on the results of the analysis, the main conclusion is that the staff has opportunities for innovation in the military planning process. The results indicate that the staff members are convergent at the beginning of the planning process and that the staff's external members are key players in keeping the planning as divergent as possible. The results also indicate that the staff in general should use divergent questions during planning to challenge existing knowledge and expert data. To that end, the military staff may benefit from appointing a staff member to ask “foolish” questions during the planning in order to stimulate the staff members in a more divergent direction. Finally, the analysis’ results show, that the military staff increases the possibility of innovation, by "framing" the situation and the problem collectively when discussing essential task elements as part of the pre-meeting with as many branch heads and specialists as possible participating. The results and findings are both seen as a contribution to the ongoing revision of ‘Feltreglement III’ and applicable as guides to military staff practices.