Manila, 4 August 2021 — How innovation breakthroughs depend on collaboration.

Story

It happened in 2020. This week I have been reviewing two health stories that came out at the time that the Covid-19 pandemic struck with full force. One of them you surely know about, the other one maybe not. Both of them are about remedies that are nothing less than breakthroughs: they can transform the way you and I live. The first story is about messenger RNA or mRNA technology and the second is about increasing our health by the way we breathe.

Paradoxically, both stories bring to light a history of stunning failures in science, with some of the brightest and most persistent researchers ending up being ridiculed with their careers upended and their reputations sullied. The turns and twists in the stories show how wrongfooted we are when we blindly idolize science, technology, and systems and we fail to see, understand, and respect the people behind the innovations for the work they do, with all their strengths and weaknesses.

When we take time to reflect, there is a lot to learn from the two stories. So before diving deeper into the specifics, here are three lessons for leaders that I took away from them. The first is to Team Up by reaching out to others, to network, connect, and engage, allowing for collaboration to letting your innovation multiply. The second is to Look Up and find a greater purpose to drive you and your colleagues in the work. And the third is to Never Give Up on your work and your colleagues as you face obstacles, setbacks, and challenges.

Challenge

Where can you discover the challenges to learn from in the two stories? To learn about the mRNA story, listen to the engaging podcast episode Don’t Shoot the Messenger: the Pioneers of mRNA on The Economist radio. And for the compelling story on a better way to breathe for your health, read it in James Nestor’s well-written book Breath: The New Science of a Lost Art. You can whet your appetite with a short interview here.

In the stories, you will find out how the deployment of mRNA vaccines depended on Drew Weissman, a physician-scientist at the University of Pennsylvania, reaching out to ask for help from Pieter Cullis, a researcher at the University of British Columbia, on how to slip an mRNA vaccine into lipid nanoparticles in the hope that this would trigger an immune response in cells without causing adverse effects. And you will discover how reaching out to numerous researchers helped James Nestor to connect the work of pioneering scientists over several centuries and piece together a surprising pathway to better health.

What you will also see is that success happened because these trailblazers engaged in a number of effective leadership practices, especially networking, connecting, and engaging with others. So whether you’re a scientist, a project champion, or an enabling leader, the lesson is to reach out to collaborate with others in order to influence positive change. Doing so can make the difference between your good idea staying in your head or on the shelf, and seeing it implemented and coming to fruition in a process of innovation.

Question

After reading the stories, some obvious questions might come to mind. First, if you are willing to protect your health with an mRNA vaccine such as those currently offered by Pfizer BioNTech and Moderna. If yes, you’re about to become a part of a truly remarkable story of innovation.

Second — and this is available to anyone who is willing to put in the work — is if you’re willing to learn and practice breathing in a better way all through your day, that is, more slowly and through your nose. That will make you an influencer for more people to live healthier lives.

However, what I really want to ask you this week is how you are doing in your leadership practice, especially with the three lessons to Team Up (networking), Look Up (purpose), and Never Give Up (persistence) on the positive change you want to influence? It’s these practices that can lead you to achieve innovation breakthroughs in your work.