Qualche giorno fa ho intercettato in una delle mie newsletter del cuore un articolo della BBC in cui si racconta una storia di innovazione ribelle andata a buon fine.
In the 1980s, a group of young engineers at Nasa’s Johnson Space Center in Houston realised that the 1960s Apollo-era mission control set-up would struggle to handle the more complex challenges of flying the space shuttle.
The engineers’ concerns fell on deaf ears; Nasa knew and trusted the Apollo-era systems, which had successfully sent humans to the moon. Undeterred, the renegade group – who subsequently called themselves ‘the pirates’ – began to code new software for the mission control sub-systems in their free time, using borrowed equipment from Nasa suppliers. Their system was based on commercially available personal workstations linked through a Unix network, in what the pirates felt was a more resilient and adaptive set-up. After several months, they physically brought their system into mission control to test it – but they were asked to leave by the flight controllers.
‘Positive deviants’: Why rebellious workers spark great ideas
Sono partita scettica nella lettura, non mi convinceva l’idea che l’innovazione dovesse essere per forza ribelle.
Anzi – ho pensato – l’innovazione che rimane nel perimetro delle regole è più difficile ma più rapida da far digerire. E quindi migliore.
Alla fine della lettura mi sono però ricreduta: in fondo quello che intende la BBC non rientra nella mia personalissima definizione di ribellione, ma forse da iconoclasta certificata non faccio testo.
Rebels may have a bad reputation, but in the right environment, and with the right motivations, they can achieve amazing things.
‘Positive deviants’: Why rebellious workers spark great ideas
Da leggere.