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NASA Announces New Department
In news as exciting as watching ducks sleep, NASA announced Monday that they're forming a new department for the purpose of analyzing the other programs the agency has.
I only have one question: aren't there already people in place to do all of this work? I'm sure that NASA hasn't been going for over three decades without anyone to do "analysis of how existing space programs are going ..." What are these other people going to do now? If the job was being done poorly enough to warrant a whole new department to be set up, the previous people doing the job won't be involved with this new group, would they?
I love the idea of space exploration, and I support the people and mission that NASA has. But if there were ever an example of priority overload, poor program gating and prioritization, poor program management, and failure to generate return on investment, it's NASA. Much of the blame can be laid at the feet of Congress, but not all. In some ways, I think NASA has been too smart for its own good.
Mike Griffin, the new chief, revealed his plans for commercialization the other day and he talks a good talk. Good luck to him in trying to achieve organizational change. It's a long shot, but he's a nice guy. I hope he makes progress.
I'm just glad that NASA decided to create a "department" instead of a "committee". Departments are much stronger that committees (but not as strong as Tiger Teams, less strong than Action Groups). If it was a "working group" then we know it was a waste of time: these guys are going to have a budget and probably nice offices. (Not that they will have any power at the agency -- from CNN, the "Office of Program Analysis and Evaluation has no authority to hire, fire or pay, but it does have the ear of NASA Administrator Michael Griffin"
I guess they are keeping the ear hostage, in some attempt to gain credibility. If I were them, I would have at least taken a foot, but ears are easy to carry around and hide.
This is exactly what NASA needs to do: create new departments and groups and do lots of analysis and meetings. Griffin should make it a policy that they will continue to analyze and meet around the clock until progress is made.
WTF here? Clear mission, brutal decisions for meeting it, and power to make a change. Bush made progress on the mission (agree or not with his opinions, that's a different story), the other two are still up in the air. Griffin is making the right noises, including admitting that the agency is in deep trouble and goals are not going to be reached as planned.
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