Series on Knowing What You Don’t Know: The Hidden Variable in Project Success
Part 1 – Blind Spots and Icebergs — Why Projects Fail Despite Smart People
Pharmaceutical R&D projects are rarely derailed by poor science—they’re undone by blind spots. These aren’t always technical gaps, but often unknown knowns: pieces of critical knowledge that exist within the organisation but are overlooked, buried in silos, or politically inconvenient.
A historical analogy helps: the Titanic. Officially “unsinkable,” the ship’s leadership ignored critical assumptions—such as the limits of its bulkhead design—because the dominant narrative that the ship was unsinkable discouraged questioning. This mirrors pharmaceutical projects where political or commercial pressures can lead teams to dismiss cautionary voices or avoid confronting uncomfortable truths.
Key insight: Even if all technical risks are logged, if assumptions go unchallenged—especially those that are culturally reinforced—the project can sail full-speed into disaster.
Takeaway: Begin not with checklists, but with provocations. Ask: What would have to be true for this project to fail catastrophically? Then interrogate even the sacred cows.
By Mike Florence, Volker Moeckel, Stephen Bingham