When the loop closes: incestuous amplification, cognitive security, and the strategic collapse of sensemaking

Strategic clarity depends on orientation, not certainty

In a world saturated by noise, narrative spin, and institutional echo chambers, the greatest threat to strategy is not what we don’t know. It’s how tightly we cling to what we think we do.

Most organisations will never notice the moment their strategy disconnects from reality. The numbers still look good. The meetings still run on time. The strategy still reads well on a slide. But somewhere, unnoticed, the feedback loop closes.

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The organisation stops observing and starts affirming. It reinforces its existing story. This isn’t just stagnation. It’s a distortion. And it leads to collapse.

This is what John Boyd described as incestuous amplification.

When orientation becomes dogma

At the heart of Boyd’s OODA loop is orientation. The lens through which we make sense of the world. It shapes how we observe, what we prioritise, and how we act.

But when orientation becomes dogma, the system corrupts itself.

Incestuous amplification occurs when observations are shaped to confirm existing beliefs. When contradiction is treated as noise. When novelty is excluded. When internal narratives become self-reinforcing.

The loop feeds on itself. The organisation filters out what doesn’t fit, marginalises dissent, and privileges harmony. The closed system feels coherent but drifts from reality.

This isn’t just poor decision-making. It’s strategic self-deception.

And it’s very hard to see from the inside.

The medium is the message

Marshall McLuhan’s insight that the medium is the message helps explain why incestuous amplification is so persistent.

The form of communication shapes the content of perception. It’s not just what we see. It’s how we’re set up to see it.

In organisations, the mediums are the dashboards, rituals, performance frameworks, reviews, and reports. These are not neutral. They shape attention. They filter what gets surfaced and what gets buried.

McLuhan warned that media extend parts of ourselves and then numb us to their effects. He called it auto-amputation. A kind of organisational blindness to our own feedback structures.

The organisation stops seeing the world as it is. It sees only what its systems allow it to see. And when those systems are built to confirm internal narratives, the distortion becomes systemic.

As McLuhan put it, the content of any medium is the juicy piece of meat used to distract the watchdog of the mind.

Cognitive security: the strategic imperative

This is more than a conceptual problem. It is a live vulnerability.

Modern cognitive warfare does not rely on hacking networks. It targets orientation. It introduces narrative overload, contradictory messaging, and ambiguity. The goal is not to destroy, but to disorient. To make meaningful action impossible.

From the outside, it is weaponised confusion. From the inside, it is incestuous amplification.

Both erode cognitive security. That is, the integrity of how an individual or organisation makes sense of its environment.

Cognitive security is the practice of protecting and maintaining the integrity of one’s orientation—how individuals and organisations perceive, make sense of, and act in the world. It involves active resistance to manipulation by false, biased, or distorted narratives, especially those designed to mislead, distract, or destabilise decision-making. - Mike Jones

Protecting cognitive security requires systems that remain open to contradiction, embrace constructive tension, and recognise that clarity without dissent is often a warning, not an achievement. The key takeaway is that a robust strategy depends on continual, honest engagement with inconvenient or challenging information.

What leadership must do

Strategy is not about getting it right; It is about staying connected with reality.

That means:

• Designing strategic processes that expect to be wrong

• Encouraging real dissent, not just safe challenge

• Testing mental models against weak signals, not just internal data

• Observing mismatches as valuable, not problematic

• Moving from control to coherence by supporting adaptability rather than enforcing alignment

Boyd called for a leadership culture that fosters initiative, variety, and continuous reorientation. He understood that mismatches, not metrics, are the real drivers of learning.

McLuhan reminds us to question the form, not just the message. Regularly audit your organisational systems to ensure they invite ambiguity and diverse input. Schedule periodic reviews to challenge assumptions and broaden the types of feedback considered. If you build systems that exclude ambiguity, you guarantee that surprise will arrive unprepared.

The cognitive warfare lens reminds us that losing orientation is not a theoretical risk. It is a strategic failure.

Closing the loop

Incestuous amplification is the slow death of strategy. It feels like progress. It sounds like consensus. It looks like alignment. But it ends in paralysis.

If your organisation cannot protect its orientation, if it cannot keep its loop open, then no amount of planning will save it.

By the time you become aware of a closed loop, recovery may already be difficult. Staying vigilant and continually testing assumptions is the surest way to protect your organisation’s ability to make sense and act effectively.