On 12 November 1990, at CERN in Geneva, Tim Berners-Lee and Robert Cailliau put to their colleagues a “hypertext project” called WorldWideWeb: documents linked to one another, to be browsed with reading programs called browsers. Berners-Lee had written down the original idea in March 1989, and according to the English-language Wikipedia entry his boss described it as “vague, but exciting”. For the first phase the proposal foresaw just three months of work and a small team.
Why can starting small help? In 1984 the psychologist Karl Weick argued in American Psychologist that when social problems are conceived on a massive scale, innovative action is blocked: the limits of our rationality are exceeded and we reach levels of arousal that get in the way of acting. His alternative is the strategy of “small wins”: a series of concrete, complete outcomes of moderate importance that build momentum and make change less frightening.
A few cautions. Weick’s is a theoretical argument about social problems, not an experiment on individuals, and it does not explain why the Web was born and grew: its development had many causes, and the link with “small wins” is ours. I read only the abstract.
What can we do with it? These are our own common-sense ideas, not findings of the study. Take the idea you still find “vague” and write it on a sheet of paper. Then decide the smallest concrete, complete step you can take within three days (the CERN proposal planned its first phase over three months; we start even smaller). When you have done it, acknowledge it and choose the next step.
And you, what is the idea that is still “vague, but exciting” and sits in your drawer? Tell us in the comments: yours may give someone else courage.
Sources
- Weick, K. E. (1984), “Small wins: Redefining the scale of social problems”, American Psychologist 39(1), 40-49. DOI 10.1037/0003-066X.39.1.40
- Berners-Lee, T., Cailliau, R. (12 November 1990), “WorldWideWeb: Proposal for a HyperText Project”, W3C (w3.org/Proposal.html)
- Wikipedia in English, entries “Tim Berners-Lee” and “World Wide Web” (accessed 8 November 2026)
The contents of this blog are for information only and do not replace the advice of a doctor or psychologist.
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