3M

3M implemented a rule around 1948 that would echo across a century of innovation. 15%, engineers could spend 15% of their work time on whatever projects they wanted. No permission, no review. The rule was radical. It meant accepting that one day a week, engineers worked on something that might fail. It was ruthless. 3M understood that breakthroughs rarely emerged from assigned work. They emerged from obsession, from people solving problems nobody else noticed. The 15% rule gave the company access to 10,000 mines, thinking about the future when competitors demanded focus on quarterly targets.