Space shuttle lessons: Backtracks can create breakthroughs
Peer-Reviewed Publication
Updates every hour. Last Updated: 4-Dec-2025 20:11 ET (5-Dec-2025 01:11 GMT/UTC)
In a new study, Francisco Polidoro Jr., professor of management at Texas McCombs, finds present-day insights in an old innovation story: how NASA developed its space shuttles, which flew from 1981 to 2011. The lessons can inform today's rocketeers and anyone looking for breakthroughs cutting-edge fields, from phones to pharmaceuticals.
Rather than a straightforward sequence, NASA used a meandering knowledge-building process, he finds. That process allowed it to systematically explore rocket features, both individually and together.
“With breakthrough inventions, the number of combinations of possible features quickly explodes, and you just can’t test all of them,” Polidoro says. “It has to be a much more selective search process.”
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A groundbreaking study from New Zealand demonstrates that central bank "forward guidance" significantly strengthens the transmission of monetary policy. Analyzing New Zealand's banking data, the research finds that providing clear communication about the future path of interest rates enhances the pass-through from the official policy rate to bank deposit and lending rates. The results show improved long-term pass-through, especially for time deposits and fixed mortgages, alongside a slight acceleration in short-term adjustments. These findings offer critical evidence for central banks worldwide on the power of communication as a policy tool.
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