Why are rocket boosters not bigger?
The engineers who designed these solid rocket boosters (SRBs) actually wanted them to be larger.
Larger = more power.
But because SRBs had to be transported from the factory to the launch site by rail, they were constrained by the maximum load the 4-foot 8.5-inch railway gauge could accommodate.
But why is the US rail gauge that width?
Well, it’s because the English railway companies built them.
And their tools and experiences were with 4’8.5″ gauges.
But why is the English rail gauge that width?
Well, that’s because the people that started manufacturing trains and rails came from the wagon tramway industry, who used that guage.
But why was the wagon tramway gauge that width?
Well, that’s because those people used techniques from the road wagons that used to traverse England.
Their spacing matched the road width – specifically the compacted stones that made the ruts solid.
But why were the road ruts that width?
Well, that’s because the original roads were built and used by the Romans, whose war chariots were drawn by two horses.
The average width of two horse’s backsides, then became a standard for where the wheels would run.
So, to recap, we have rocket boosters today whose size is constrained by a 2,000+ year old technical specification for a Roman war chariot.
We don’t tend to think of things like this.
We don’t tend to wonder why things are the way they are.
We often tend to just accept that it’s just how things are done around here.
Yet we can all, probably, agree that having a belief, practice or process that limits our tool’s performance today because of the size of a horse’s ass 2,000 years ago is probably worth challenging.
So, to the point:
How many beliefs, systems, processes, rituals, stories, symbols, and structures do we have in our organisations today just because we’ve always done it that way?
And how many of those support your organisation’s success?
