These are billed as commandments for counterinsurgency, but they seem more widely applicable than the advice in your typical business book bestseller.

1) Do not confuse short-term tactical imperatives and process with longer-term goals.
2) Focus on dealing with constraints to economic growth -- not humanitarian assistance or the provision of security -- as the essential condition for development.
3) In identifying areas for development spending, reinforce existing success.
4) Understand the difference between asymmetric means and asymmetric ends.
5) Accept the way local systems operate.
6) Policies and the message to the local population have to capitalize on fatigue.
7) Never confuse numbers with effects.
8) Understand the basis of local power beyond numbers.
9) Beware of international consultants bearing high-altitude plans.
10) Integrate but calibrate. Don't try to do everything at once.

I am compelled to reference a cult favorite:

There's a war out there, old friend. A world war. And it's not about who's got the most bullets. It's about who controls the information. What we see and hear, how we work, what we think... it's all about the information!

Which brings us back to an old thread. By way of updating my response, I would point to It's the Context, Stupid, from Paul Saffo in 1994.

Ten Counterinsurgency Commandments | FPRI