Sports Innovation Lab and Booz Allen Release “What We Don’t Know About Women Warriors” Report, Determining Needs of Elite Women Warfighters
New report is the latest output of the Tactical Athlete Leadership Board, an ongoing initiative that unites thought leaders from across sport, academia, and technology.
PRESS RELEASE - BOSTON, May 31, 2023
Sports Innovation Lab, a data-driven fan intelligence company, and Booz Allen Hamilton (NYSE: BAH) today announced the release of “What We Don’t Know About Women Warriors,” a report exploring human performance optimization of women warfighters. The free report calls for investment in individualized training solutions that cater to the unique physiological and psychological attributes of service members and provides direction for innovation. This is the latest output of the Tactical Athlete Leadership Board (TA-LB), formed in 2020 by Sports Innovation Lab and Booz Allen to identify the latest advanced technologies and best practices across human performance to support elite warfighters.
“What We Don’t Know About Women Warriors” confirms the existence of a significant gender- based gap in available applied research on the needs of female and male bodies in active service positions. This gap contributes to an increased risk of injury for women compared to male colleagues and may contribute to inefficient operational outcomes. TA-LB’s new report addresses this discrepancy in available research by offering guidance for female warfighter optimization around training and testing standards, injury prevention and rehabilitation, supplementation and nutrition, equipment, and human performance technology.
“An equitable approach to human performance technology is within the best interest of all sectors of business,” said Josh Walker, Sports Innovation Lab’s Co-founder and President. “Together with Booz Allen - and built upon our years of human performance work in professional sports - we have identified areas of opportunity where increased research and innovation specific to the needs of the female body can lead to improved performance and health outcomes of women on the frontlines.”
Maryrose Blank, Lead Associate and Cognitive Performance Expert at Booz Allen, explained: “There has long been a gap in our understanding of the unique physiological and psychological attributes of women warfighters, despite how critical they are to our tactical operational success. This report helps to close that knowledge gap and optimize the experience of the female warfighter, not only as it pertains to reducing risk of injury through better training, testing, and equipment, but also by creating a stronger sense of awareness and attention to well-being and performance optimization. This combination will be essential for building a holistic approach towards accelerated readiness, recovery, and resilience across formations.”
Per Booz Allen, the U.S. military can respond to an escalating threat landscape by advancing human performance technology and research that synchronizes the human body with mission goals. In order to adequately support a diverse warfighting base, it’s recommended to develop personalized, data-centric training solutions using the latest in analytics technologies - thus holistically improving the readiness, abilities, and lives of all U.S. military service members. “What We Don’t Know About Women Warriors” provides guidance on developing these programs and specifically improving the experience of female warfighters, aiding the United States in providing the highest caliber of support for its service members.
“There’s a strong growing market around the optimization of human performance, aided by technologies designed to provide the necessary data and analysis for users to thrive – but gender-bias and other blind spots can make relying on these datasets a challenge,” said Munjeet Singh, senior vice president and leader of Booz Allen’s Bright Labs incubator. “As we see the DoD invest more in the research and development of human performance optimization technology, taking into account the physical and mental differences between male and female warfighters will prove vital to developing a unified military force that operates at peak levels.”
This is the first public report jointly issued by Sports Innovation Lab and Booz Allen through its TA-LB initiative. Since launching the TA-LB in 2020, the two organizations have explored and discussed numerous topics associated with warfighter performance optimization, including: cognitive offloading and performance, virtual human simulation, technology specifications and security standards, and the scalable deployment of human performance technology. Utilizing extensive vertical knowledge and relationships, the TA-LB brings together thought-leaders from across sport, academia, and technology to explore performance technologies that can help sustain the Tactical Athlete of today and prepare for the needs of the Tactical Athlete of tomorrow. Booz Allen’s global team of experts has long worked with the military to build training and solutions based on analysis and data, facilitating the TA-LB for further industry-leading research, events and thought leadership.
Building on this success, Booz Allen and the TA-LB will prioritize the following actions for 2023- 2024 to support the success of women warfighters and advance the field of human performance optimization:
Identify and highlight additional areas for improvement
Capture and promulgate best practices
Provide recommendations on topics for further scientific research
Lead the discussion through panels at summits and symposiums
ABOUT SPORTS INNOVATION LAB AND BOOZ ALLEN HAMILTON
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Sports Innovation Lab is a fan intelligence and market research company that helps the world's leading sports organizations acquire the fan of the future - the Fluid Fan™ - and maximize their value. We collect and analyze observational data on what fans buy, watch, and how they behave, then provide analysis and strategic interpretation of that data to world-class clients such as the NFL, NHL, FIFA, Google, Facebook, Coca-Cola, Visa, and PUMA.
Follow Sports Innovation Lab online at sportsilab.com and mostinnovative.com. You can also stay up to date with the latest Sports Innovation Lab research and developments by following us on social media Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn and YouTube.
MEDIA CONTACT
Anthony Baldini; Athlete Strategies
anthony@athletestrategies.com
Amanda Allison-Martini; Booz Allen Hamilton
Allison_Amanda@bah.com
