Rattus rattus

From Chapter 2: The Mythical Man-Month

Excerpt
What are the alternatives facing the manager?...The...only alternatives are to trim [the task] formally and carefully, to reschedule, or to watch the task get silently trimmed by hasty design and incomplete testing(page 24)

Scenographia Systematis Copernicani
(The Copernican System, 1660 engraving)

From A Distant Mirror¹

Excerpt
Doctors struggling with the evidence could not break away from the terms of astrology, to which they believed all human physiology was subject. (page 107)

Brooks is recounting the unenviable remedies available to a development manager after a late milestone is missed. Nearly every experienced software development manager has had to negotiate these options.

Couple things worth noting: Brooks' remedies go from bad to worse and they are not mutually exclusive, but they are exhaustive. So, as a rule, the most damaging effect, "hasty design and incomplete testing," is typically part of the package.

The recent news abounds with a shining existence proof of Brooks' Law at work: Healthcare.gov. As of this writing, the Administration is pulling out all the stops and bringing in the 'best and brightest' to help resolve the problems. But, according to Brook's Law, there will months of delays and handwringing, but, in the end, the remedies will be those plainly called out 40 years ago by the good Dr. Brooks.

Bear this in mind: the challenge of building Healthcare.gov pales in comparison to building a high reliability, autonomous, affordable, flight-ground space system. After all, the architecture for web-based data systems, like Healthcare.gov, are well understood. I don't mean to trivialize the intellectual challenge of architecting a large system, but we have several decades of experience building variants of the client/server architecture. By comparison, we do not, as yet, have a proven, nevertheless viable, approach for building a affordable, high reliability, autonomous, flight-ground space system.

If I learned anything during my years managing software efforts, it's just this: when you miss a milestone late in the schedule, it's too late. The fix must happen much earlier in the lifecycle. But what exactly should be fixed? What are the root causes of missing a late milestone?

"Ah..." you say, simple enough? Not at all. Determining a true root causes is not so simple. No matter how urgent the need for a deep understanding, the bias of accepted fact will cloud our observations. Not even when the stakes are high. Not even when the survival or the human race hangs in the balance.

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In October of 1347, a Genoese trading vessel pulled in the harbor of the Sicilian port of Messina. The ship was carrying a cargo from the Black Sea. The crew was dying with large black swellings around the armpits and groin; they were dying of the plague. This was the start of the European pandemic called the Black Death.

Victims of the disease suffered terribly. Most died within three to five days of showing the first symptoms. In some cases the sick went to bed healthy and died in their sleep--they were the most fortunate. While the suffering lasted, there was little to ameliorate the agony. The treatments included blood letting and exotic medicines like powders made from stag horns, gold, pearls and emeralds. None helped.

Prevention was everywhere an urgent priority. Based on a millennia of medical know-how going back to Hippocrates (460-377 BCE) and Galen (130-201 CE), medical experts understood that the disease was spread by corrupt air, or miasma. As the pestilence spread, physicians prescribed burning incense, smoking tobacco or carrying posies as way to purify the air and stave off the disease. But the scourge spread was unabated.

As the situation grew more critical, Phillip IV,² King of France, sent an urgent request to the medical faculty at the University of Paris for a report. The University of Paris was the leading academic institution of the day; these men were the best and the brightest. The subsequent report confirmed that the disease was spread by a miasma and, according the medical theories of the day, identified an astral alignment as the event that triggered the miasma. They were very specific. The miasma was caused by the "conjunction of Saturn, Jupiter and Mars in the 40th degree of Aquarius said to have occurred on March 20, 1345."^3. The report from the University of Paris was copied and circulated. It became the accepted scientific explanation across the Christian and Muslim worlds.

But, the ordinary person, being devout Christian, was skeptical of the scientists. Most felt they were suffering from the wrath of God caused by the indulgences of the church and the sins of society. Popular movements sprung up to appease their maker. At first there were penitent processions. When those proved insufficient, there was a scramble to obtain sacred relics, by stealing if needed. Soon, marauding mobs of flagellants traveled from town to town fomenting a hysterical and desperate religious fervor. All this was accompanied by vicious pogroms against Jews, Muslims and any group who might be responsible for the Devine wrath. Still the pestilence spread.

The Black Death would ravage Europe for nearly 50 years. By the end of the 14th century, it is estimated that 40-50 percent of Europe's population died from plague. That wasn't the end of it.

In the winter of 1664 a comet appeared in the heavens portending another disaster. An epidemic broke out in London in the fall of 1564. By the following September, the London death rate was over 7,000 per week. By that time, there had been some scientific advances and physicians had come to believe the disease was transmitted by animals as well as miasma. During the height of the epidemic, the Mayor of London ordered that great bonfires be lit to cleanse the air and that all cats, dogs and pigeons be killed. Killing the cats would prove to an error that worsened the epidemic.

---

Plague pandemics continued for another 500 years. In time it was learned that the disease was spread by fleas and rats--Rattus rattus, the common black rat. The microbe was initially spread by flea or rat bite in the form of the bubonic plague. Once a person was infected the disease would spread in a highly contagious respiratory infection called pneumonic plaque.

The actual plague bacterium was finally isolated in 1894.⁴ The first plague vaccine was tested in 1897. The identification of the bacillus and development of the vaccine was possible only after a series of hard-won, 19th century scientific breakthroughs. Development of the vaccine required identification of the bacillus. Identification of the bacillus was possible because, in 1870, contagious diseases were linked to bacteria.⁵ Bacteria became a respectable candidate for contagion only after the theory of Spontaneous generation was dismissed and Germ Theory became widely accepted as the mostly likely means of contagion.⁶ Each breakthrough was resisted by the establishment of the day.

---

The history of plague prevention seems like a particularly compelling example. Here we have a dire need for a means of prevention. The survival of all that's near and dear is at stake and yet there is a glaring inability to put aside assumptions and examine the observable evidence that might have led to the discovery of the actual means of contagion.⁷

Shaking off assumptions is a fundamentally hard. History is rife with tragic examples like those made by the physicians of the 14th century. It's our nature. We are reassured in the knowledge that we know how to and do the right thing. We are inclined to interpreted our observations so they our accepted views. The result is an undeserved and complacent confidence that fills the mind with a false sense of reality.

So it is with large-scale software projects. I've often heard (and sometimes asserted) the claim that '...if only [thus-and-such] had been done the work, the project would have succeeded." Frankly these claims make me uneasy. They ring of naiveté or arrogance. They fail to acknowledge our history of failures. We still see the same botched commitments, that Brooks described 40 years ago. In the simplest terms, there's a failure to recognize that the development approach for large software system is not a settled matter.

The lessons of history suggest that, if we want a different result, we should be aggressive in challenging our assumptions. In other words, if we hope to build large-scale, software-intensive space systems, we need to question our approaches to budgeting, scheduling, requirement collection, design, and testing. No doubt this is a project for a generation or two.

But, What the heck? Why not start now?

Here's a list of claims I frequently overheard during my years at NASA. For the most part, they were frustrated utterances of assumed immutable facts of life as a NASA developer. See if they don't start the gears turning about why software projects have faltered for the same reasons they did when Brooks managed the IBM 360 project in the mid 60's.

• Projects overrun because the NASA business model encourages under bidding and the promise of unrealistic expectations.
• Sponsors and upper management should not be exposed to development details even when those details drive cost and schedule.
• Development methods that work on small projects scale up to meet the needs of large projects.
• Software development and software maintenance are fundamentally the same activity and can be funded and managed the same.
• Additional process obligations may be levied on teams without impacting cost and schedule because "they have to do that anyway."
• Processes can be successfully deployed without tool support or field testing.
• Reviews success depends on signaling a message of smooth sailing.
• The ORG chart (and not the system function) drives system architecture.

Each assertion stirs a debate in my mind on the whys and wherefores. I'm quite sure there's a rat in each, but I'm not sure just where. I plan to kick around a few suggestions in subsequent posts.

Closing note:
It was never proved that astral events weren't a cause of contagion. As a measure of modest caution, I checked the internet to see if there was a upcoming conjunction of Jupiter, Saturn and Mars in Aquarius anytime soon. I'm glad to report there's only two conjunctions of Jupiter and Saturn in the next sixty years and neither are in Aquarius. I suppose that's one less thing to worry about.

^1. Tuchman, B.W., "A Distant Mirror, The Calamitous 14th Century." Alfred A. Knopf. 1978.
^2. Phillip IV was known as the Fortunate. First of the House of Valois. 1328-1350
^3. Tuchman, p. 107
^4. This discovery occurring during an outbreak in Hong Kong that killed 50-100 thousand people. The plague bacillus, Yersinia pestis, was identified separately by two scientists, Alexandre Yersin and Kitasato Shibasaburō. The discoveries happened within days of each other. There been a long running controversy because Kitasato was slow to receive the credit he deserved.
^5. Robert Koch was the first to link a microbe (anthrax) with a contagious disease and proved the germ theory.
^6. Spontaneous generation postulated that some life, like fleas, could arise from inanimate matter. The theory was eventually disproved by Luis Pateur by his "swan neck flasks" experiment.
^7. On occasion, the actual cause was reported, but mostly ignored. For example, in 1498, a renown Physician reported the disease was "communicated by means of air breathed out and in." (Tuchman, p.106)

The pinch of Trimble's boots

A digression triggered by "Risk Avoidance and other Eggistential Consequences"

If you read the "About me" page, you know that I'm retired. I may not be all that astute, but I couldn't help but notice I'd become older than most of my colleagues. Not just that, but the baton of authority was getting passed to some of those I used to manage. That was a really big hint. I knew that if I wanted want to try something different, time had come to be alert for the next junction on the trail.

Perhaps that is why I'm drawn to the episode between Issac Trimble and Richard Ewell at Gettysburg.

Major General Issac Trimble (1802-1888)
One oldest Rebel officers and was known for his lack of tact...

Issac Trimble was a relatively minor figure in the Civil War. He was 60 when the armies met at Gettysburg. There were older generals in the Confederacy¹, but he was older than any of the corps commanders or, for that matter, General Lee. He was 15 years older than Richard Ewell when they had their famous chat north of town near the Adams County Alms House.
Trimble graduated from Graduate of West Point in 1822. He was 17th of 42. Only one other of his classmates joined the Confederacy. He had served in the US Army for 10 years before retiring in 1832. He eventually moved to Maryland and was the construction engineer for several railroad lines. By the time the War started, he was Superintendent of several east coast railroads. No doubt he was accustomed to exercising his will over his younger subordinates.

Trimble joined the Confederate Army in May of 1861. Later that summer, he was promoted to Brigadier General. The following summer, he campaigned with Stonewall Jackson as part of Ewell's Division. During this period, Trimble and Ewell must have become well acquainted. Both men served with distinction.² In August, during the 2nd battle of Bull Run, both Trimble and Ewell were seriously wounded. Ewell lost a leg. Trimble would be incapacitated for nine months.

Lieutenant General
Richard Ewell (1817-1872)

Richard Ewell graduated West Point in 1840 (13 of 41).³. By most accounts, Ewell was odd-looking, nervous and eccentric. He believed he was afflicted by a mysterious disease and lived off a steady diet of frumenty. He had a high pitched voice, a quick wit and a reputation for exceptionally profane language.

He joined the Confederate Army in 1861 a few weeks after the attack on Fort Sumter. Nine months later Stonewall Jackson appointed Ewell division commander and promoted him to Major General. He performed well under Jackson until he was wounded at 2nd Bull Run.

Ewell's recuperation took nine months. He returned to duty under Jackson in May '63. When Jackson died of wounds received at Chancellorsville, Lee promoted Ewell to Lieutenant General with command the 2nd Corps.⁴ Until this point, Ewell had proved his ability carry out orders, but he'd never exercised independent field command.

Meanwhile, Trimble had been promoted to Major General in January 1863. However, he was also slow to recover and his division was assigned to another Major General.⁵. In June, Trimble felt he was fit for duty and, despite the lack of orders, rode to join Lee as he marched towards Gettysburg.

Within days of arriving, Trimble's famous lack of tact caused a disruption in Lee's headquarters. Lee had crossed the Potomac; distractions could not be tolerated. Lee promptly ordered Trimble to join Ewell, his old commander, as "supernumerary," i.e. an officer without a command or any official role. He arrived in Ewell's camp on June 30th. The Battle of Gettysburg would start 2 days later. On the first day of the battle, he roamed the battlefield free to form his own ideas of how the battle should be fought. When he saw the heights south of town were unoccupied, Trimble galloped to Ewell so that Lieutenant General would immediately issue the order to advance. (see my the "Ewell at Gettysburg" section of the previous post). But Trimble's advice was ignored and Ewell missed his historical moment.

Surely Trimble must have fixed on that moment. It must have been clear as the day is long that Lee might have won he battle if only Ewell had pursued the obvious course. Why did the leadership select an unproven man like Ewell for independent command? Why not officers with more experience who would listen and lead?

Trimble would have known the difference between effective and ineffective leadership. He was 15 years Ewell's senior. He had managed the building of railroads. He was accustomed to exercising independent judgment. He was a leader in his own right. How frustrating it must have been to see history turn on a decision Trimble knew, with certainty, to be wrong.

In the end, it was better for the country that Ewell's judgment failed him, but when I read about the Trimble/Ewell incident, I reminded of shockingly poor decisions made by younger colleagues who had obtained positions of authority. In the heat of schedule and deadline pressure, there little more frustrating than a decision based on inexperience, faulty reasoning and flawed judgment. Even now I wince when I think of the wasted development funds. That's why avoidable, costly errors like the one made by Ewell are evocative.

Of course, we learn by mistakes. I certainly made decisions that caused dismay among my elders. Each new generation must make its own mistakes, and each passing generation must feel the pinch of avoidable misfortune due to lost wisdom. Are do they?

The NASA workforce is aging; a generational change is underway. The generation that developed Voyager, Mariner, Galileo and Cassini are retiring. But before heading out the door, they established a library of mandatory rules, practices, processes and guidelines that were intended to avoid the mistakes of the past. There are now hundreds of volumes and thousands of pages of requirements for spacecraft developers.

While the development of these documents was well intentioned, the result is a text book case of unintended consequences. Here's a few that come to mind:

• The volumes of rules mandate a lot of unnecessary work. Developers are now overwhelmed with process minutia. An effective manager needs to be a "process lawyer" in order to protect a team from distractions.
• A compliance industry has evolved to ensure process compliance.
• Technical authority was passed from those who do the technical work to those who are expert in the rules and oversee compliance.
• Rule compliance now consumes a significant part of every development budget
• The next generation is being trained in a culture of compliance that has encoded current practice and stymies innovation.

In effect, engineering judgment is reduced to simple checklist compliance.

This yoke of compliance does more harm that good. Rules cannot replace the complex analysis and decision process that works best when experience informs intuition. Imagine if the army had established rules for Ewell that would have prevented his lapse of judgment by replacing judgment with written procedure? Does anyone think that would be a better way to run a command? Is there a more likely recipe for disaster?

When taken to the logical extreme, we're faced with the horns of a dilemma. On one hand we are destined to repeat the errors of the previous generation. On the other, we're destined to sacrifice creativity and innovation to rigid compliance.

Clearly prudence is needed. Currently the scale is tipped toward rigidity. That seems natural given the Agency's aging workforce. What's alarming is that many of the next generation have embraced the culture of compliance. I say, "let the next generation make mistakes, even costly ones," so long as those are not the mistakes of compliance. That is the path for genuine progress.

Denoument
Two days after the exchange between Trimble and Ewell, Trimble commanded a division in Pickett's charge. Trimble was seriously wounded. Since he was too weak to travel back across the Potomac with Lee, Trimble was left to Gettysburg and tended to by a Union family. When he recovered, Trimble was transferred to a union prison for the rest of the war.

Ewell continued to commanded the 2nd Corps until the following May at the Battle of Spotsylvania where Ewell had a famous encounter with Lee. The battle was going badly for the Confederates. Lee happened upon Ewell when corps commander had lost control of his troops and was shouting profanities to restore order. Lee rode up to Ewell and famously said, "How can you expect to control these men when you have lost control of yourself."

Shortly after, Ewell fell from his horse and became too incapacitated to command the 2nd Corps. He was then relieved of his command and ordered to arrange the defenses around Richmond. That is where he served out the war.

^1. There were several older Confederate generals including David Emanuel Twiggs (71), William Smith (67) Samuel Cooper(66). These men were a hardy lot.
^2. However, Stonewall was to disparage Trimble as "I do not regard him as a good disciplinarian.' It should be noted that Jackson was fanatical about both discipline and religion.
^3. His classmates included William T. Sherman and George Thomas; both played significant roles in the Union victories in the western campaigns. Eight of Ewell's other classmates served in the Confederate army, but none were prominent.
^4. The hierarchy high command derives from the Cromwell's "New Model Army" which was organized during the English Civil Wars. A 'Captain-General' held the top spot. The second rank was called 'Lieutenant-General." The third rank was called 'Sargent-Major General.' Over the years sergeant was dropped and the rank was simply called 'Major General.' Hence a Lieutenant General out ranks a Major General.
^5. Major General Allegheny Johnson.

A textbook case

Perhaps you've seen the news about problems with the roll out of Healthcare.gov, the government's Affordable Care Act (ACA) website.

Developing software in a politically charge environment often leads to a pathological gap between actual progress and plan. This must be especially troubling when critics are confuting software development problems, that have plagued the profession for 40 years, with problems with the ACA itself.

The work is being lead by a Canadian company with experience implementing a healthcare website for the Canadian system.¹ The article includes hints at the lethal combo of serious requirement creep and inflexible delivery date. What's a development manager to do with a company's reputation riding on the line?

Today the following showed up in an article published by Reuters. (see As Obamacare tech woes mounted, contractor payments soared)

How and why the system failed, and how long it will take to fix, remains unclear. But evidence of a last-minute surge in spending suggests the needs of the project were growing well beyond the initial expectations of the contractor and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. (emphasis added)

It's a textbook case. I can't help but wonder if anyone on the team was waving "The Mythical Man-Month" in the air in a plea for sanity.

^1. Apparently the company missed deadlines on the Canadian project and the contract was cancelled. (see Meet CGI Federal, the company behind the botched launch of HealthCare.gov

Risk Avoidance and other Eggistential Consequences

From Chapter 2: The Mythical Man-Month 

Omelet served at Sunrise High Sierra Camp in the summer of 2007

Excerpt
An omelet, promised in two minutes, may appear to be progressing nicely. But when it has not set in two minutes, the [Antoine's] customer has two choices—
wait or eat it raw. (Page 21)

From "The Last Lion, William Spencer Churchill, Visions of Glory, 1874-1932"¹

Excerpt
"We simply couldn't have failed...and because we didn't try, another million lives were thrown away and the war went on for another three years. (Commodore Roger Keyes, British Royal Navy. Page 542)"

From "Lee's Lieutenants, A Study in Command, Volume III"²

Excerpt
Our Corps Commander was simply waiting for orders when every moment of time could not have been balanced with gold.
(Captain James Power Smith, CSA, reporting on a meeting of Confederate Generals. About 4:00p, Day 1. Battle of Gettysburg, Page 94)

Brooks' observation that an omelet takes time to set implies a challenge question: Why would the omelet still be raw when the chef promised it would be done? Brooks might explain with a quote from Yogi Berra, "It's tough to make predictions, especially about the future."

Brook's suggests a remedy: provide managers with better schedule estimation tools. The hope is that a calculus of schedule estimation would produce accurate schedules just like an egg timer produces 'just right' eggs. With better estimation tools, managers could "stiffen their backbones," defend realistic schedules and dispense with those "patron-appeasing," "gutless estimations" that lead to disasters.

I'm skeptical.³ By way of a brief refresher, NASA is a very large, hardware-centric, government-sponsored, bureaucracy responsible for high-profile demonstrations of an administration's commitment to tomorrow. The more space drama, the better. That changes the rules. So long as the government forks over funds, there is no real schedule disaster. The rules for projects living off government funding are quite different than those that depend on profit.

With that in mind, here are a few alternative suggestions for why the omelet would be raw at eating time:

• The customer expected Antoine's to provide the same service as McDonald's because he considers the omelets equivalent.
• The chef spent the majority of the allotted cooking time asking all his colleagues if they approve of his cooking oil.
• Obtaining collegial consensus about cooking oil always takes longer than anticipated.
• The chef is willing to serve a raw egg because he knows that if the omelet is sent back, he'll have plenty of time to set things straight later.
• The chef knows the customer simply craves the moral superiority that comes from eating at Antoine's. The omelet could be slimy as a Louisiana lagoon or as chewy as a tire. Doesn't matter; why worry?

In each instance, the outcome depends on how the chef spends his time. So it is with software projects.

While I worked at NASA, we were always on a tight schedule. Nevertheless, we spend huge blocks of budget and schedule on content-starved reviews that necessitated plenty of handwringing but seldom resulted in a decision of consequence. I can't recall an instance where a bold decision was made to grab an opportunity. So while we sat around conference tables listening to monotonous PowerPoint talks, grand displays of reviewer intellect and solemn rehearsals of managerial discretion, opportunities sped past us like stripes on the interstate. It was apostasy to suggest we were wasting our resources and that we could have done better.

I have a (somewhat perverse) interest in lost opportunities that changed the course of history. The catalog of military history is ripe with these stories. A couple of mostly-forgotten examples come to mind: The British catastrophe at the Gallipoli and a lost opportunity at Gettysburg.

Making of Gallipoli

The failure of British leadership at Gallipoli unfolded with the inevitability of a Shakespearean tragedy.⁴

On the Ides of March, 1915, Rear Admiral John De Roebeck assumed command of the Allied Fleet in the Mediterranean. His assignment was to force the Dardanelles, cross the Sea of Marmara and take Istanbul. If successful, the Turkish regime would collapse and expose the Kaiser's armies to a devastating attack that would end the war.

On March 18, a De Robeck ordered the attack. The fleet sailed unopposed into the Dardanelles and proceeded to decimate Turkish defenses. Just as the ships were entering the Sea of Marmara, the French battleship Bouvet hit a mine. Moments later three more battleships hit mines. Fearing that the Turks were floating mines towards his fleet, De Robeck ordered a general retreat.

The Turks had done no such thing. The De Robeck's ships has merely strayed to close to the south shore and stumbled into a haphazardly prepared minefield. In fact, the Turks were beaten. The government was preparing to abandon Istanbul; the country's gold and art treasures had already been removed.

But the British were cautious. The top brass decided that the naval effort was inadequate and needed to be supplemented by an infantry assault of the Gallipoli peninsula. What followed was an ill-fated invasion that was caused by a failure of British leadership that Liddle Hart described as "a chain of errors in execution almost unrivalled in British history."

General Ian Hamilton was given command of an Allied expeditionary force ordered to capture Gallipoli. He sailed ahead of the troops to begin planning with De Robeck. Shortly after arriving, Hamilton conducted a cursory survey of the Gallipolian terrain and concluded that three weeks would be needed to prepare for the assault. One delay led to another. The British would not land until April 25th, a 5-week delay. In that interval, the Turks, with help from the Germans, prepared a strong defense. The subsequent British-led invasion lasted nearly 8 months. Allied casualties amounted to nearly 200,000 with over 50,000 killed in action. Turk casualties were comparable.

If only De Robeck had ordered a follow-up attack on March 19th, there would have been no debacle at Gallipoli and a German surrender might have come in short order. Instead, the war would continue for another 3 years.

Ewell at Gettysburg

The Battle at Gettysburg was the turning point in the Civil War. The Confederates might have won Gettysburg if Lieutenant General Richard Ewell⁵, the Commander 2nd Corps, had taken the initiative.

On July 1, 1863, the Union and Confederate Armies collided at Gettysburg. About 4:00 pm, Ewell's Corps drove the Federals south through the town onto Cemetery Ridge. The Yankees were vulnerable as they scrambled to consolidate their hold on those heights. A moment of victory was at hand.

A brigade commander, Brigadier General John Gordon saw there was a magnificent opportunity to rout the Yankees. Gordon approached Ewell to obtain the order to charge the enemy. No orders were forthcoming. Ewell was frozen. "Inwardly, something had happened to the will Richard Ewell."⁶

A short time later, Brigadier General Isaac Trimble rode up. Trimble recognized that the Federals had not yet occupied the heights at either Culp's Hill or Cemetery Hill. Trimble was one oldest Rebel officers and was known for his lack of tact. According to tradition, Trimble said to Ewell, "We've had a grand success; are you not going to follow it up and push our advantage?"⁷ Ewell replied that he needed further orders from General Lee. Trimble persisted, "...give me a Brigade and I will engage to take that hill." Ewell responded with silence. In an act of insubordination Trimble then said, "give me a good regiment and I will do it." When Ewell still refused to answer, Trimble gave up.

By next day the Federals had dug in on both Cemetery Hill and Culp's Hill. The Confederates would stage a day-long series of intense attacks, but they never secured those heights. Ewell's failure to act had allowed the Yankees to secure Cemetery Ridge where, two days later, they would beat back Pickett's charge and defeat Lee's Army.

A senior manager once told me, "We are a risk adverse institution. We do not break the rules." Another senior manager repeatedly scolded me that "Things happen slowly here. We change by evolution, not revolution." From a bureaucratic perspective, this advice was impeccable--after all "Failure is not an option."

Being a reader of history, I was painfully aware of the implications of indecisive or overly cautious leadership. While the over caution that characterizes NASA management does not cost the tens of thousands of lives, it does result in the waste of tens, if not hundreds, of millions of dollars. If "commercial" contractors like SpaceX or Orbital have an advantage over NASA it's simply that they are willing to take reasonable risks.

Excessive caution was the bane of most of my forward-thinking colleagues who saw the few available opportunities awarded tasks that were the innovative equivalent of putting new paint on an old car. But that's not the worst of it. I believe the true concern was best captured by a frustrated system engineer with the following epigram: "The trouble with evolutionary change is that relies on extinction."

^1. Manchester, W. "The Last Lion, William Spencer Churchill, Visions of Glory, 1874-1932. Laurel Trade Paperback. 1983.
^2. Freeman, D.S., "Lee's Lieutenants, A Study in Command, Volume III". Scribner and Sons. 1944.
^3. See my previous post, In the beginning... there is the estimate.
^4. Churchill's role in the Dardanelles has stirred plenty of controversy among historians. Manchester lays the disaster at the feet of De Robeck and Hamilton. On the other hand, Correlli Barnett in Engage the Enemy More Closely: The Royal Navy in the Second World War (Norton & Co. 1991), lays most of responsibility on Churchill and points to a similar 1940 disaster in Norway. Both accounts are extremely well researched and convincing.
^5. Ewell had replaced Stonewall Jackson who died from wounds received at the Battle of Chancellorsville in May.
^6. Freeman. p.92.
^7. Freeman. p.94.