AYC Security is pleased to announce that renowned leadership and defense consultant Damian O'Connell has joined the AYC Security team. Mr. O'Connell will be working in the AYC Consulting Division, offering workshops and courses to companies, law enforcement agencies, and military units to improve their decision-making and leadership abilities.
Damien O’Connell is a military historian and world-recognized facilitator of decision games. From May 2020 to June 2023, he served as a Non-Resident Fellow with Marine Corps University’s Brute Krulak Center for Innovation and Future Warfare.
From 2012-2016, Mr. O'Connell led the efforts of Marine Corps University’s Case Method Project to institutionalize the case method at The Basic School (TBS), the Marine Corps’ school for newly commissioned and appointed officers. His duties at TBS included developing decision-forcing cases (DFCs), regularly teaching DFCs to students and staff, and conducting workshops for students and staff on DFC development and facilitation. He also served as the project’s lead for all work with the Infantry Officer Course, the Schools of Infantry, and the Fleet Marine Force.
From 2017 to 2021, as a Senior Learning and Development Consultant at Cognitive Performance Group, Mr. O'Connell co-facilitated and later led the Innovative Instruction Workshop, a highly sought workshop sponsored by the Marine Corps’ Training and Education Command (TECOM). He was a founding member of the facilitator team, took part in each of the program’s 34 workshops, and worked with learning professionals from every corner of TECOM.
As the Senior Consultant at DAO Consulting, Mr. O'Connell has successfully facilitated educational events and workshops for Green Cell Consulting; Southwest Traders; Vet Voice Foundation; the US Marine Corps’ Plans, Policies, and Operations Department; The Basic School; Wounded Warrior Battalion-East; Advanced Infantry Training Battalion-East; 8th Engineer Support Battalion; 2nd Light Armored Reconnaissance Battalion; 1st Battalion, 2nd Marines; 1st Battalion, 8th Marines; 1st Battalion, 6th Marines; 2nd Battalion, 2nd Marines; 2nd Battalion, 8th Marines; 2nd Battalion, 11th Marines; Combat Logistics Battalion 15; 2nd Landing Support Battalion; Expeditionary Operations Training Group (I MEF); Recruiting Station New York; Recruiting Station Boston; Naval Service Training Command; the Midshipmen Battalion (Virginia Military Institute) the Capital Battalion (Washington, DC, NROTC); the Red Stick Battalion (Southern University and Louisiana State University NROTC); the Baltic Defence College; the Latvian NCO Instructor School; and the Latvian Training and Doctrine Command.
Mr. O'Connell has presented or taught multiple times at the Royal Norwegian Naval Academy, the Swedish Defence University, the Finnish National Defence University, the Estonian National Defence College, the Baltic Defense College, the US Naval Academy, the FBI National Academy, and elsewhere. He has also facilitated workshops for Avion Express, Microsoft, and the Weill Medical College of Cornell University.
Mr. O'Connell has published with Proceedings, War Room, Marine Corps Gazette, The Landing, The Maneuverist, and the Journal on Baltic Security. He has presented at the International Conference on Naturalistic Decision Making, the Society for Military History’s Annual Conference, and the wargaming conference Connections USA (Virtual). He hosts Controversy and Clarity, a podcast of the Warfighting Society, an organization he founded in 2017 and runs. Controversy and Clarity has been referenced by Task and Purpose and the Texas National Security Review.
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