TED 2006: Burt Rutan, originally uploaded by curiouslee.

Burt Rutan, winner of the first Ansari X-PRIZE in 2004 ($10 million for first privately funded org to launch a manned spacecraft into space twice over two weeks), spoke at the IdeaFestival in Louisville on Saturday night. I’m blogging about it because, while Burt spent a lot of time talking about spacecraft and the history of space travel, he structured the discussion with principals of innovation, specifically “breakthroughs.” Here’s a guy that all entrepreneurs should know. Salient points included:

• Breakthroughs are driven by (1) survival, (2) the avoidance of embarrassment for perceived defeat, and (3) enjoyment

Plenty of VCs will tell you that their greatest success stories came out of the jaws of defeat - hence the difficulty of deciding to turn off the funding spigot. Implicitly, Burt acknowledges that people respond to incentives (both positive and negative). One can’t run an organization with a constant noose around it’s neck, though. Heaping tablespoons of enjoyment and a dash of survival fright should be de rigueur.

• For breakthroughs to happen, “confidence in nonsense is required”

Burt adds that 50% of people should say your goal is impossible - otherwise, raise your bar. Entrepreneurs - take heart if you go down a long fundraising road that some rejections imply an aptly set bar height.

• A manager’s only tasks should be to set a goal and get funding

This one struck a chord - I read manager = VC, since we’re funding innovators that have some traction but rarely have hit that crucial inflection point where the business takes off. It’s important for us to help set the goals, create the incentives, and have deep pockets, but it’s also important to provide perspective. The analogy isn’t perfect, of course, but for an innovator “in the weeds,” some 30,000 foot conceptual discussion of strategy can often lead to ground level insight.

A few other takeaways outside of the entrepreneurship lens:

• Space, Inc. (Burt’s company) flights will be priced to fly 100,000+ people into space over the course of 12 years
• Fatality risk for hopping into a spacecraft (not his) is currently the same as attempting an Everest climb (a little less than 2% chance of fatality)
• Burt believes inter- and intra-continental flights won’t be so important in the not too distant future; we’ll have virtual reality tools that fully simulate people/environments and obviate need for travel. (Incidentally, if anyone knows leading thinkers on this front, I’d love to hear book recommendations.)

Ethan Zuckerman’s got great, in-depth reporting on the talk as well. I agree with Ethan that virtual reality tools would be far more impactful on my life than a sub-orbital space flight, but it’s worth noting that Burt’s taken the first step towards what I suspect will be a rapidly accelerating space exloration agenda by the private sector and that could lead to much bigger things.

“We’re the only species that looks forward to a future that’s different,” Burt says at the beginning of his talk. I’m not entirely sure that’s true (here’s a fascinating book on the complexity of the issue that I look forward to reading), but it’s an enormous privilege nonetheless.