Security Planning Excellence: Applying a Structured Mission Plan to Executive Protection Operations

What Are Troop Leading Procedures?

Troop Leading Procedures represent the Army’s systematic approach to mission planning at the tactical level. As defined in Army Doctrine Publication (ADP) 5-0, TLPs are “a dynamic process used by small-unit leaders to analyze a mission, develop a plan, and prepare for an operation.” These procedures have evolved over more than a century of military operations, refined through combat experience from WWI through modern irregular conflicts.

The TLP framework consists of eight sequential steps that guide leaders from mission receipt through execution. The underlying principles – rapid planning, clear communication, detailed preparation, and continuous supervision – translate directly to executive protection environments where time is often limited and planning mistakes can be catastrophic.

The Eight Steps of Traditional TLPs

1. Receive the Mission: Understanding the task and intent from higher authority.
2. Issue a Warning Order: Alerting subordinates to begin preparations.
3. Make a Tentative Plan: Conducting initial mission analysis using available information.
4. Initiate Movement: Starting necessary planning and preparations.
5. Conduct Reconnaissance: Gathering intelligence about the operational environment.
6. Complete the Plan: Refining the plan based on reconnaissance findings.
7. Issue the Order: Communicating the complete plan to all team members.
8. Supervise and Refine: Conducting rehearsals and pre-mission checks.

Importantly, some steps may run parallel to one another rather than following a rigid sequence, allowing leaders to maximize efficiency when time is constrained.

Why Executive Protection Needs a Structured Mission Planning Framework

Executive protection operations are inherently complex and dynamic. As we’ve previously discussed in our analysis of leadership foundations and planning for executive protection, protection details face numerous challenges:

• Rapidly changing timelines and personnel requirements.
• Incomplete or inaccurate mission information.
• Uncontrollable external variables (weather, crime, traffic).
• Multiple stakeholders with competing priorities.
• Limited preparation time before mission execution.

Without a systematic planning process, these challenges can overwhelm even experienced protection teams. TLPs provide the structure needed to manage complexity while maintaining the flexibility required in dynamic operational environments.

The military learned this lesson through painful experience. As ADP 5-0 notes, flawed planning contributed to historical failures like the Prussian Schlieffen Plan, teaching modern forces that “flawless planning will not trump poor strategy and execution.” Similarly, executive protection teams that over-plan without maintaining flexibility or under-plan without sufficient rigor both increase risk to their principals.

Adapting the Eight TLPs for Executive Protection Operations

Step 1: Receive and Analyze the Mission (EP Detail)

Military Application: Commanders receive missions via operations orders (OPORDs) or warning orders, immediately conducting mission analysis using the METT-TC framework (Mission, Enemy, Time, Terrain, Troops, Civilian considerations).

Executive Protection Adaptation:

• Receive client requirements from direct communications, security assessments, or advance team reports.
• Conduct a rapid analysis using a modified framework:
  • Mission: What is the principal’s objective? (business meeting, travel, public appearance).
  • Threats and Hazards: What are the specific threat profiles? (harassment, kidnapping, terrorism, insider threats).
  • Environment: What are the venue, route, and geographic considerations?
  • Resources: What personnel, vehicles, and equipment are available?
  • Timeline: When does the mission start, and how much preparation time exists?
  • Stakeholders: Who else is involved? (venue security, local law enforcement, other protective details)

Key Learning for Executive Protection: Use no more than one-third of available time for your planning; reserve two-thirds for subordinate preparation and rehearsals. This “1/3-2/3 rule” ensures that individual agents have adequate time to prepare for their specific roles.

Step 2: Issue a Warning Order (Notify Team/Partners)

Military Application: Leaders issue WARNOs within a short amount of time after receiving the mission, providing subordinates maximum time to begin preparations even before the complete plan exists.

Executive Protection Adaptation:

• Notify the protection team and/or local partners.
• Provide available information, such as:
  • Principal information (considering Operational Security).
  • Mission location, date, and estimated duration.
  • Initial team composition and roles.
  • Critical preparation tasks.
  • Timeline for the full briefing.

Key Learning for Executive Protection: Do not delay issuance and do not withhold information – Operational Security (OPSEC) considerations do need to be recognized, however – or wait for more information. Even partial information allows team members to begin individual preparations, equipment checks, and mental rehearsals.

Step 3: Develop a Tentative Plan

Military Application: Leaders create initial courses of action based on mission analysis, anticipating how the operation will unfold.

Executive Protection Adaptation:

• Map the principal’s movements from start to finish.
• Identify critical decision points where threats increase or options narrow (the risks).
• Develop contingency plans for likely disruptions:
  • Medical emergencies.
  • Route blockages or delays.
  • Threats at different locations.
  • Changes to the principal’s schedule.
• Assign primary roles (detail leader, advance, close protection, driver, etc.).
• Identify information gap requiring intelligence support.

Key Learning for Executive Protection: As emphasized in our previous discussion of planning foundations for executive protection, effective protection plans should be “simple (but not simplistic) and flexible”. The tentative plan establishes the framework while acknowledging that details will evolve.

Step 4: Initiate Necessary Movement and Preparations

Military Application: The unit/team may need to deploy personnel and equipment from their current location to assembly areas, staging positions, or operational sites in preparation for mission execution. This step could occur at any time during the troop-leading procedure. 

Executive Protection Adaptation:

• Deploy advance team members to conduct site surveys.
• Position resources (vehicles, equipment, staging areas).
• Initiate coordination with external stakeholders:
  • Venue security management.
  • Local law enforcement.
  • Medical facilities.
  • Transportation providers.
• Begin administrative preparation (credentials, parking, access permissions).

Key Learning for Executive Protection: This step runs concurrently with reconnaissance and plan completion. Don’t wait for the perfect plan – begin executing preparatory tasks that you know will be required regardless of plan refinements.

Step 5: Conduct Reconnaissance (Advance Work)

Military Application: Leaders personally inspect the operational area to “confirm or deny information” and identify factors that will affect the mission.

Executive Protection Adaptation:

• Conduct comprehensive site surveys:
  • Primary, alternate, and back-of-house entrances/exits.
  • Emergency evacuation routes.
  • Staging areas.
  • Safe rooms.
  • Medical facilities and safe havens.
  • Vulnerabilities.
• Perform route reconnaissance:
  • Primary and alternate routes.
  • Chokepoints and areas amenable to surveillance detection.
  • Traffic patterns at mission times.
  • Hospital locations along route.
• Coordinate with local resources:
  • Venue security protocols.
  • Law enforcement procedures and capabilities.
  • On-site security and other close protection teams.

The Army emphasizes that “personal recons of an area of responsibility may not always be an option,” requiring leaders to conduct “map/imagery recon” using available intelligence. Executive protection teams can leverage Google Street View, satellite imagery, and coordination calls for their digital advance when site visits aren’t feasible.

Step 6: Complete the Plan

Military Application: Leaders refine the tentative plan based on reconnaissance findings, coordinate with adjacent units, and finalize all operational details.

Executive Protection Adaptation:

• Validate or adjust the tentative plan based on the digital and physical advance work.
• Finalize the executive protection team structure and individual assignments.
• Confirm the security logistics:
  • Vehicle assignments and communications equipment.
  • Emergency medical equipment and procedures.
  • Credentials and access arrangements.
• Complete coordination with all external parties.
• Develop the operations order/mission/detail brief for the team, and one for the client if applicable.
• Identify rehearsal and pre-mission check/inspection requirements.

Key Learning for Executive Protection: The reconnaissance step should reveal any flaws in the tentative plan. ADP 5-0 notes that reconnaissance “results validate the course of action,” allowing leaders to refine overlays, resource allocations, and coordination requirements.

Step 7: Issue the Complete Operations Order (Executive Protection Mission or Detail Brief)

Military Application: Leaders conduct formal briefings using the five-paragraph OPORD format, ideally with visual aids like terrain models or sand tables.

Executive Protection Adaptation:

• Conduct a comprehensive executive protection detail briefing covering:
  • Situation: Threat/hazard assessment, venue characteristics, external factors.
  • Mission: Clear statement of the protection objective and detail leader’s intent.
  • Execution: Detailed concept of operations including:
    • Phases of the mission (advance, arrival, on-site, departure, return).
    • Individual and team responsibilities for each phase.
    • Formation and positioning requirements.
    • Communication protocols.
    • Actions at critical decision points.
  • Sustainment: Logistics, equipment, medical resources.
  • Command and Signal:  Chain of command, radio frequencies, brevity codes.
• Use visual aids:
  • Maps with routes and decision points marked.
  • Venue diagrams showing formations and positions.
  • Photos from advance.
  • Timeline graphics.
• Conduct confirmation and Agent In Charge (AIC) briefs: After the formal briefing, ask each team member to explain their specific role and responsibilities, ensuring complete understanding.

Key Learning for Executive Protection: The mission/detail brief – or overall plan – is only effective if the most junior person listening actually understands their role and responsibility within this entire operation. Take time to verify comprehension rather than assuming it.

Step 8: Supervise, Rehearse, and Refine.

Military Application: This step “keys in on the strength of the unit’s standard operating procedures (SOP), rehearsals, and the [Non-Commissioned Officer’s] NCO’s role of check, check, and check again”. Pre-combat checks and inspections (PCCs/PCIs) verify readiness.

Executive Protection Adaptation:

• Conduct mission rehearsals:
  • Walk-throughs of formations and movements.
  • Communications checks.
  • Contingency drills (medical emergency, threat response, evacuation).
  • Driver familiarization with routes.
• Perform pre-mission inspections:
  • Communications equipment functionality.
  • Vehicle readiness (fuel, emergency equipment, cleanliness).
  • Personal equipment (credentials, medical gear, defensive tools).
  • Documentation (contact lists, hospital addresses, safe havens).
• Verify coordination:
  • Confirm venue access and security coordination.
  • Test communications with external parties.
  • Validate timing with the principal’s schedule.
• Conduct after-action reviews following mission completion to refine procedures for future operations.

Key Learning for Executive Protection: Simply put – There is no substitute for rehearsals. Rehearsals provide confidence, foundation, and ‘muscle memory’ to instinctively transition to an alternate Course of Action (COA) or contingency and still find success when plans inevitably encounter friction.

Use Lessons Learned the Hard Way to Improve Executive Protection Details

The U.S. Army’s Troop Leading Procedures represent over a century of lessons learned through combat operations in every environment – from the battlefields of Europe to the jungles of East Asia and South America. This systematic approach to mission planning, refined through experience and tragedy, offers executive protection professionals a proven framework for managing the complexity and uncertainty inherent in protection operations.

The fact of the matter is that executive protection details succeed or fail based on the quality of planning, preparation, and execution – the same factors that determine military mission outcomes. By adapting TLPs to the executive protection context, security professionals can leverage military best practices to enhance their operational effectiveness, reduce risk to principals, and build more capable protection teams.

At Convoy Group, we understand that excellence in executive protection requires more than reactive security measures – it demands proactive planning grounded in proven methodologies. Whether you’re developing a proprietary protection program or seeking experienced security partners, the systematic approach embodied in Troop Leading Procedures provides the foundation for mission success in even the most challenging operational environments.