When it came to building the tunnel under the English Channel connecting England with France (later called the "Chunnel"), the French had the perfect word for it: bicephele, two-headed. There were two mammoth firms built from scratch to complete the project: one charged with finance and operation, the other responsible for building it. Each of these companies was also two-headed: equally French and British.

No one was allowed to take charge. Leadership, more times than not, was reduced to the management of conflict. Said a high-ranking executive, "The project…created a lot of tension because it [was] not geared to solving problems; it [was] geared to placing blame." The English yelled at the French, and the French yelled at the English. Said another executive, "There were nervous breakdowns galore."

The problems were primarily from a lack of shared standards. The two countries had a different word for everything. The French had their accounting system, so did the English. The French ran on 380 volts, and the British ran on 420. Instruction manuals were bilingual. There were even two different standards used to measure sea level.

"When you have people coming from two different nations," said one of the engineers, "each believes that only their regulations are right."