As a research manager, much of my role is to act as a therapist for researchers contemplating the abyss of possibilities. I often set boundaries to the research agenda, not because where the boundaries exactly lie matters, but their mere existence helps lower the stress of the unknown.
This is why you have to be ruthless about eliminating every other risk from the equation: first and foremost, make sure you trust — and have earned the trust of — your collaborators before engaging in joint research. Most failures aren’t technical, they’re human
At the same time, sitting in the seat right next to you, your engineer peers are actually building things that will endure, solving well-defined problems, and exercising the same level of creativity and mastery over their subject matter. Building things that have to work — and are expected to work — takes another kind of bravery and dedication to getting to the finish line, and a healthy dose of self-criticism which is equally difficult to subject oneself to, especially one that can’t be waved away with a ‘never mind, it’s just research …’
