NASA culture worse than industry?

My question is this: Is the culture worse at NASA than other places, or does
NASA have problems that are in other industries, and these other places get
away with it because the problem with their culture doesn't result in a
highly visible catastrophic event.

That's pretty much it. Screw ups at most companies just end up wasting
loads of time and money. Products that had flawed marketing research,
or flawed overall systems architecture would be worked on for months.
Usually lots of attention is focused on lower level details, but any
misgivings on the overall thing would rarely be mentioned. Or only to
non-managers say at off site lunches or such. No real point in telling
the bosses, the project might just get canceled now instead of a year
later. At least you have time to find a new job so you can bail out of
that place before it crashes and burns....

Some problems can crop up if there are many younger guys just out of
college. Things like schedules on projects on things never done before,
vs school projects that have been done thousands of times before. I
eventually figured out that a boss wants a schedule that depends on no
major showstoppers happening. But that nobody gets canned because of a
showstopper that slips the schedule. And it's actually rare that a
project actually gets done on the original optimistic schedule. Other
things that look to be crazy at first (like doing some tasks early on
before you really know if you'll really need them or not) turn out to be
sensible (you have a crew of workers with not much to do until you get
the overall scheme of the project worked out, but it's still a good bet
that whatever form it takes you will still need sub-assembly X, Y and Z,
so you might as well have the idle crewmembers do those. At worse maybe
Y was a waste of time, but so would have having them do nothing would be
a bigger waste of time). This stuff doesn't get taught in engineering
school, it's probably just assumed that you would know it.

At most companies, managers trying to intimidate the engineers to get
something to work is fairly common. But you can't intimidate hardware
into working. Then you get O ring failures on shuttles...

One thing you start to take some comfort in is that you realize that
your competitors are likely equally screwed up.

Another thing is that I would estimate that maybe 5% of everything I
ever worked on actually got used and "saw the light of day". Not that
I'm particularly incompetent, :-) but just that most work just gets
abandoned one way or another.

The cartoon "Dilbert" rings true suprizingly often....

Derek Lyons wrote:
"Danny Dot" wrote:

Let me ask you this: If management made a decision that you thought was
unsafe, would you feel comfortable speak up against the decision? At NASA
most would not. Management would bully the person that spoke up. At least
this is my opinion of the matter.

Ah yes - the engineer puts his 'comfort' and job ahead of the lives
he's been entrusted with. But its all managements fault.

D.

Here are two pages with some information directly pertaining to nasa
culture, and how
recomnedations from the Diaz report to the caib are being implemented
to improve the issues (raised by both the columbia and challenger
tragedy investigatory bodies) inside nasa.

http://www.onenasa.nasa.gov/NEWS/Archives_of_News.htm Release of
Implementation Plan for Diaz Team Report
An Agency-wide team, under the leadership of Mr. Al Diaz, former
Director of the Goddard Space Flight Center, was commissioned to assess
the broader implications of the Columbia Accident Investigation Board's
(CAIB) Report on activities across the agency. The final Diaz Team
Report is entitled "A Renewed Commitment to Excellence: An Assessment
of the NASA Agency-wide Applicability of the Columbia Accident
Investigation Board Report and was released on January 30, 2004
(problematic viewing report in Netscape's older versions).

During the NASA Update conducted on February 9, 2004, the Administrator
indicated that the One NASA Team would be responsible for creation of
the Implementation Plan for the Diaz Team Report. On March 30, 2004,
the One NASA Team, along with members of senior management and their
staff who served as Action Leads, completed the implementation plan -
"The Implementation of the NASA Agency-wide Application of the Columbia
Accident Investigation Board Report: Our Renewed Commitment to
Excellence."
The Implementation Plan was put into effect and many of the Actions of
the plan were completed. A follow-up detailed review of the Actions
was performed and it found that ten of the 24 actions were completed
(see briefing to Operations Management Council). Three were terminated
because their focus had been adopted by other studies. Ten actions
were converted to functional organization activities and one action,
#5, remains pending a briefing by OSMA to the Operations Management
Council. The Deputy Administrator's memo of March 27, 2005 documents
the disposition of the actions."


http://www.onenasa.nasa.gov/NEWS/SMS...mary_Final.pdf
"Safety and Mission Success Week Agency-Wide Summary Executive
Summary
Safety and Mission Success Week was designed to facilitate open
communication, and to engage the entire NASA community in addressing
the CAIB Report. Each Center Director was asked to champion the
week's events and collect feedback from their workforce. After
holding the work unit discussions, Center Directors were asked
facilitate a data rollup into the main ideas from their Center. Data
roll up validated the results of the CAIB and the Diaz Forty Actions.
Data from center roll ups were analyzed by a subset of the One NASA
Team. The "One NASA Data Team" included members from ARC, GSFC,
GRC, and JSC. The team examined the final Center reports and after
completing their three-phase analysis arrived at summary descriptions
of the themes submitted by the Centers as well as the following 12
cross-cutting themes. Each cross cutting theme was a major idea or
theme in at least two Center Reports.

1. NASA should willfully seek out and understand minority opinions.
This includes establishing a process to collect anonymous feedback, and
holding meetings that encourage open discussion.
2. Resources including time, human capital, and cash flow should be
allocated realistically and according to the design standards set forth
at project conception.
3. Strategic planning should be relevant for every employee, include
human capabilities needed for the future, and be the baseline for on
going initiatives.
4. The Agency needs a strategy for leadership development that
includes/supports a specific set of skills for all levels of
management. These skills should then be used for evaluating performance
and making personnel decisions such as promotions and awards.
5. Decisions should be made based on what is best for the Agency, be
placed in context using Agency priorities, guide allocation of
resources, and be fully rationalized and communicated to the workforce.
6. NASA needs a truly independent safety organization as described in
the CAIB report. This organization should serve as a clearinghouse for
any safety related concerns from any employee.
7. NASA needs to clarify the organizational structure of the Agency.
Current matrix system is too complex and is not perceived as a useful
management tool.
8. Safety expertise should exist for every specific discipline within
the Agency.
9. NASA needs an increased value on respect for others. All those
affected by the decision should be part of the decision making process.
Leaders should have the responsibility to provide employees with full
information regarding decisions, including options considered, and
rationale for making final choice.
10. NASA needs more emphasis on the entire lifespan of projects to
avoid being tied up in unnecessary processes, or lengthy approvals that
draw resources away from goal achievement. Appropriate procedures
should be established, and followed from project conception to
completion.
11. NASA should use/design ONE tool to capture expertise and lessons
learned in all areas. The tool should be easily accessible, and
actively used by the workforce.
12. Contractors should not be used to supply core competency expertise.
Building from an inclusive strategic plan the Agency should determine
what capabilities should be kept in house, and what capabilities should
be provided by contractors.

The themes were mapped against the 7 Diaz Team goals outlined in: A
Renewed Commitment to Excellence: An Assessment of the NASA Agency-wide
Applicability of the Columbia Accident Investigation Board Report. This
document is intended to provide a clear picture of the steps taken to
analyze the Safety and Mission Success Week...."


Open sharing of information is crucial to improving everybody's
understanding of the universe around us.
Tom

read the book "Normal Accidents" by Charles Perrow. Very common phenomenon
(esp. in teh industries you mentioned) created by scheduling pressure.

9/11 was a prime example, as was every fatal manned spacecraft accident, as
was the big power blackout a couple years ago, as was the BP accident
recently.

--
Terrell Miller


"Just...take...the...****ing...flower...darlin g"
Terrell's dating style according to OKCupid.com
"Danny Dot" wrote in message
...
Two commissions have written up that NASA culture is a major cause of our
two shuttle accidents. They site that engineers are afraid to speak up as
part of the problem.

My question is this: Is the culture worse at NASA than other places, or
does NASA have problems that are in other industries, and these other
places get away with it because the problem with their culture doesn't
result in a highly visible catastrophic event. Maybe a comparison to oil
refineries and chemical plants would be useful. In these industries,
catastrophic events can happen if the culture allows unsafe practices to
continue to happen.

Danny Dot

Terrell Miller wrote: "read the book "Normal Accidents" by Charles
Perrow. Very common phenomenon (esp. in teh industries you mentioned)
created by scheduling pressure. 9/11 was a prime example, as was every
fatal manned spacecraft accident, as was the big power blackout a
couple years ago, as was the BP accident recently."


Interesting examples you have cited above, each of which is unique, but
interconnect by the use of managing risks, and risk analysis. The
manned space program has many similarities with large corporations when
it comes to the topic management, and specifically managing risks, and
risk analysis, as nasa itself is comprised of many centers, each of
which interacts with vendors uniquely for the purpose of developing new
safe technologies or maintaining current programs safely.

Now with respect to you're example of 9/11 or specifically national
security, a quantitative risk assessment will assist the intelligence
community in managing the massive amounts of data gathered and
categorizing high and low level threats, something recommended by the
9/11 commission

Now back on topic with the nasa and the shuttle, as the purpose of
conducting a full system quantitative risk analysis on the space
shuttle system is to help nasa managers in making their professional
decisions of managing risks and operating the space shuttle safely
within its designed parameters and in compliance with all human space
flight procedures through retirement. Now implementing the
recommendations contained in the diaz report to the caib, in
conjunction with a full quantitative risk assessment of the shuttle
system would provide nasa managers with the communication structure,
information, and technology to manage and understand the technical
input from others up and down the decision making process in operating
the shuttle safely within it's capabilities throughout the fleets
retirement process.

Here are two pages with some information directly pertaining to nasa
culture, and how
Recommendations from the diaz report to the caib are being implemented
to improve issues inside nasa.

http://www.onenasa.nasa.gov/NEWS/Archives_of_News.htm Release of
Implementation Plan for Diaz Team Report
An Agency-wide team, under the leadership of Mr. Al Diaz, former
Director of the Goddard Space Flight Center, was commissioned to assess
the broader implications of the Columbia Accident Investigation Board's
(CAIB) Report on activities across the agency. The final Diaz Team
Report is entitled "A Renewed Commitment to Excellence: An Assessment
of the NASA Agency-wide Applicability of the Columbia Accident
Investigation Board Report and was released on January 30, 2004
(problematic viewing report in Netscape's older versions).

During the NASA Update conducted on February 9, 2004, the Administrator
indicated that the One NASA Team would be responsible for creation of
the Implementation Plan for the Diaz Team Report. On March 30, 2004,
the One NASA Team, along with members of senior management and their
staff who served as Action Leads, completed the implementation plan -
"The Implementation of the NASA Agency-wide Application of the Columbia
Accident Investigation Board Report: Our Renewed Commitment to
Excellence."
The Implementation Plan was put into effect and many of the Actions of
the plan were completed. A follow-up detailed review of the Actions
was performed and it found that ten of the 24 actions were completed
(see briefing to Operations Management Council). Three were terminated
because their focus had been adopted by other studies. Ten actions
were converted to functional organization activities and one action,
#5, remains pending a briefing by OSMA to the Operations Management
Council. The Deputy Administrator's memo of March 27, 2005 documents
the disposition of the actions."


http://www.onenasa.nasa.gov/NEWS/SMS...mary_Final.pdf
"Safety and Mission Success Week Agency-Wide Summary Executive
Summary
Safety and Mission Success Week was designed to facilitate open
communication, and to engage the entire NASA community in addressing
the CAIB Report. Each Center Director was asked to champion the
week's events and collect feedback from their workforce. After
holding the work unit discussions, Center Directors were asked
facilitate a data rollup into the main ideas from their Center. Data
roll up validated the results of the CAIB and the Diaz Forty Actions.
Data from center roll ups were analyzed by a subset of the One NASA
Team. The "One NASA Data Team" included members from ARC, GSFC,
GRC, and JSC. The team examined the final Center reports and after
completing their three-phase analysis arrived at summary descriptions
of the themes submitted by the Centers as well as the following 12
cross-cutting themes. Each cross cutting theme was a major idea or
theme in at least two Center Reports.

1. NASA should willfully seek out and understand minority opinions.
This includes establishing a process to collect anonymous feedback, and
holding meetings that encourage open discussion.
2. Resources including time, human capital, and cash flow should be
allocated realistically and according to the design standards set forth
at project conception.
3. Strategic planning should be relevant for every employee, include
human capabilities needed for the future, and be the baseline for on
going initiatives.
4. The Agency needs a strategy for leadership development that
includes/supports a specific set of skills for all levels of
management. These skills should then be used for evaluating performance
and making personnel decisions such as promotions and awards.
5. Decisions should be made based on what is best for the Agency, be
placed in context using Agency priorities, guide allocation of
resources, and be fully rationalized and communicated to the workforce.
6. NASA needs a truly independent safety organization as described in
the CAIB report. This organization should serve as a clearinghouse for
any safety related concerns from any employee.
7. NASA needs to clarify the organizational structure of the Agency.
Current matrix system is too complex and is not perceived as a useful
management tool.
8. Safety expertise should exist for every specific discipline within
the Agency.
9. NASA needs an increased value on respect for others. All those
affected by the decision should be part of the decision making process.
Leaders should have the responsibility to provide employees with full
information regarding decisions, including options considered, and
rationale for making final choice.
10. NASA needs more emphasis on the entire lifespan of projects to
avoid being tied up in unnecessary processes, or lengthy approvals that
draw resources away from goal achievement. Appropriate procedures
should be established, and followed from project conception to
completion.
11. NASA should use/design ONE tool to capture expertise and lessons
learned in all areas. The tool should be easily accessible, and
actively used by the workforce.
12. Contractors should not be used to supply core competency expertise.
Building from an inclusive strategic plan the Agency should determine
what capabilities should be kept in house, and what capabilities should
be provided by contractors.

The themes were mapped against the 7 Diaz Team goals outlined in: A
Renewed Commitment to Excellence: An Assessment of the NASA Agency-wide
Applicability of the Columbia Accident Investigation Board Report. This
document is intended to provide a clear picture of the steps taken to
analyze the Safety and Mission Success Week...."


Open sharing of information is crucial to improving everybody's
understanding of the universe around us.
Tom

After reading the posts to this thread, maybe something different with NASA
is the time frame for a bad management decision to result in the
catastrophe. At NASA it may be just a few hours. The dissenting engineer
at NASA doesn't have time to get his fellow engineers and low level managers
on his side and let the decision makers realize what his happening. Time
from discovery to failure is longer for most industries than it is for
NASA????

Just a thought on my part.

Danny Dot
www.mobbinggonemad.org

Danny Dot wrote:" After reading the posts to this thread, maybe
something different with NASA is the time frame for a bad management
decision to result in the catastrophe. At NASA it may be just a few
hours. The dissenting engineer at NASA doesn't have time to get his
fellow engineers and low level managers on his side and let the
decision makers realize what his happening. Time from discovery to
failure is longer for most industries than it is for NASA???? Just a
thought on my part."

The purpose of establishing the independent technical authority within
nasa is so that "All programs should have the benefit of an
independent engineering authority to ensure that technical standards
are being met" according to the diaz report to the caib and that a
flights readiness is independently verified. Now implementing the
recommendations contained in the diaz report to the caib, in
conjunction with a full quantitative risk assessment of the shuttle
system would provide nasa managers the communication structure,
information, and technology to manage and understand the technical
input from engineers up and down the decision making process in
determining flight readiness. Providing an independent authority in
backing minority opinions who are opposed to declaring a flight is
ready, should help improve communications and speed up the process for
flight readiness determination as managers will have assistance in
correlating the minority opinion with things such as previously granted
waivers.. The establishment of the independent technical authority is
a definite step in a positive direction for nasa, as they are currently
implementing a partial quantitative risk assessment (qra), but a full
shuttle system qra will assist nasa engineers and managers in operating
the shuttle safely within it's capabilities throughout the fleets
retirement process.

Diaz report to the caib page and pertinent factors
Diaz report to the caib page a-9
Caib report recomnedations
Engineering Authority that is responsible for technical requirements
and all waivers tto them, and will build a disciplined, systematic
approach to identifying, analyzing, and controlling hazards throughout
the life cycle of the Shuttle System. The independent technical
authority does the following as a minimum:
· Develop and maintain technical standards for all Space Shuttle
Program projects and elements
· Be the sole waiver-granting authority for all technical standards
· Conduct trend and risk analysis at the sub-system, system, and
enterprise levels
· Own the failure mode, effects analysis and hazard reporting systems
· Conduct integrated hazard analysis
· Decide what is and is not an anomalous event
· Independently verify launch readiness
· Approve the provisions of the recertification program called for in
Recommendation R9.1-1
The Technical Engineering Authority should be funded directly from NASA
Headquarters, and should have no connection to or responsibility for
schedule or program cost.

Diaz summary discussion
All programs should have the benefit of an independent engineering
authority to ensure that technical standards are being met. No programs
should have the ability to waive technical standards or compromise a
standard without the review and approval of an appropriate engineering
authority. All projects and programs should conduct risk analysis
consistent with Agency policy regarding risk management. All Centers
should have the capability in either their engineering or Safety and
Mission Assurance (SMA) organizations to perform and or review failure
modes and effects analysis, and hazard analysis. For manned and
unmanned flights and launches, Centers should establish flight,
mission, or launch readiness certification processes that include
verification by the independent engineering and SMA organizations.
Independence is defined as both organizational (outside the operations,
project or program structure) as well as financial (funding allocation
decisions made or approved) at the first organizational level that owns
both the operation, project or program and the center engineering and
SMA"


tom