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The Spallation Neutron Source collaboration between six Department of Energy laboratories was a unique arrangement in its mission to build a large science facility, with equally distributed responsibility for design, construction, project management and budget. The Oak Ridge National Laboratory, with no previous experience in large accelerator construction, was selected as the project site, the team was recruited worldwide, and the management team was exchanged several times during the construction period. The constraints of such a collaboration, a new team having to work together on a complex project, facing demanding scientific and technical challenges, is a cocktail that can easily lead to failure, but also to success, as proven. Was it luck or good management that decided the fate of the project? Can the weakness of such a situation simultaneously become its strength? In hindsight, it is interesting to reflect on how it was done and what became of some of the key players. Certainly this experience in many ways provided the author with a key to face a much larger challenge, namely the management of an international science project shared between seven Countries, called ITER. A project that takes the concepts tried at SNS to another extreme. Comparisons will be provided and some of the unique features will be discussed.
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