Space Shuttle Challenger Disaster
From Dr. Maier’s research presented about the space shuttle Challenger disaster and the Columbia space accident, resonated to this professional context if find it interesting and informative. It teaches about many things relating to organizational and management course. The report outlines and further explains the major factor or aspects in organizational and management course that should be taken keenly and adopted into our work environment. He shows the factors that contributed to the space shuttle Challenger disaster and the Columbia space shuttle accident that all resulted from the organization and management of the Marshall Space Flight Center, MSFC. Taking the lessons, therefore, looks at appropriate
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Leaders create a culture and its, therefore, their responsibility to change it appropriately for the better of the organization and in line with its mission. In the report, Lucas a director in Marshal space flight center has created a dangerous culture in the organization, and he is not ready to see it change. He is the source of problems facing the organization that leads to catastrophic accidents like the space shuttle Challenger disaster. He has built a federal management and does not listen to …show more content…
This is because the organizations culture triumphs its structure. As a result people, we start to behave in the way we talk and act. Lucas has created fear among the employees in MSFC, and they always submitted to his decision that was very dangerous. All those who tried to oppose him were fire. For example, the apocalypse narrates that when he decide to launch a space exploration everybody accepted despite their unpreparedness. This resulted to a decision-making the gap between NASA and MSFC. He did not involve the expertise in decision-making and most cases this led to catastrophic accidents like the Columbia space accident where the management dismissed fears and concerns raised by one of the
While seated in the Oval Office of the White house, January 28, 1986 President Ronald Reagan delivers his speech The Challenger Disaster; hours after the space shuttle The Challenger explodes while in take off. Thousands witnessed this horrifying event live in person and on television. This mission was very unique allowing the first civilian to ever be allowed in space during a mission. She was aboard The Challenger as an observer in the NASA Teacher in Space Program. Ironically, nineteen years before this disaster, three astronauts were tragically lost in an accident on the ground. President Reagan remembers those astronauts that were lost not only the day of the disaster, but also those who were lost nineteen years before. He conducts this speech not only to mourn the death of The Challenger astronauts, but for the families and those who were impacted from this event. He especially calls out to the schoolchildren of America who were watching this event live as the shuttle took off. As the President of the United States, Reagan earned the nickname "The Great Communicator" due to his ability to convey his beliefs concerning economic and domestic policies to the public. This speech is just one example of how well Reagan spoke to the American public on a personal level and profoundly influenced the nations confidence in itself after this tragic event.
Organizational transformation happens when leaders are able to impact the culture in a positive manner, and he or she can lead an organization through changes, all while remaining encouraging and ethical. Northouse (2013) defines leadership as a process whereby an individual influences a group of individuals to achieve a common goal. Leadership ethics is about who leaders are, their character, what they do, and their actions and behaviors (Ethical Leadership, 2016). This case study is about leaders at a Texas plant, and how their leadership style, communication, and ethics affected the organization.
“Leadership and Self-Deception: Getting out of the Box” by The Arbinger Institute is about the culture of a company, Zagrum, and how the culture has contributed to it’s success. The concept that Zagrum relies on is ridding the company of “people problems” as a result from “being in the box”. The book talks about being in the box and what it means, how you get in the box, and how you get out of the box.
NASA has faced many tragedies during their time; but one can question if two of the tragedies were preventable by changing some critical decisions made by the organization. The investigation board looking at the decisions made for the space shuttle tragedies of the Columbia and Challenger noted that the “loss resulted as much from organizational as from technical failures” (Bolman & Deal, 2008, p. 191). The two space shuttle tragedies were about twenty years apart, they both had technical failures but politics also played a factor in to these two tragedies.
Lack of authority and direction at NASA: The agency did not have a permanent administrator for almost four months and there was a high turnover rate among the high level management employees.
The Challenger disaster of 1986 was a shock felt around the country. During liftoff, the shuttle exploded, creating a fireball in the sky. The seven astronauts on board were killed and the shuttle was obliterated. Immediately after the catastrophe, blame was spread to various people who were in charge of creating the shuttle and the parts of the shuttle itself. The Presidential Commission was decisive in blaming the disaster on a faulty O-ring, used to connect the pieces of the craft. On the other hand, Harry Collins and Trevor Pinch, in The Golem at Large, believe that blame cannot be isolated to any person or reason of failure. The authors prove that there are too many factors to decide concretely as to why the Challenger exploded. Collins and Pinch do believe that it was the organizational culture of NASA and Morton Thiokol that allowed the disaster. While NASA and Thiokol were deciding whether to launch, there was not a concrete reason to postpone the mission.
“Without change there is no innovation, creativity, or incentive for improvement. Those who initiate change will have a better opportunity to manage the change that is inevitable.” William Pollard’s, a 20th century physicist, words show us the power of being proactive, and igniting change to strengthen a company’s productive climate (Sellers, Boone, Harper, 2011). Acme Airlines flight attendants lacked incentive to improve the quality of their work, as a result of distrustful management and overall frustration within the company. Acme took successful steps to rebuild their FA program into a more relationship oriented work environment. Through an understanding of effective leadership, we will use the
At this time, he set the tone for importance of effective communication which also set the tone and importance of effective communication for the success of the mission. He set his expectations and the seriousness of the issue for the team. He deliberately and consciously, empowered the teams to come up with the best solutions and then used those recommendations to make the best decisions when trying to save the space craft. He made it very clear how each person’s expertise was crucial for all of the others’
Two tragic incidents, the Challenger Space Shuttle crash of 1986, and the Three Mile Island near meltdown of 1979, have greatly devastated our nation. Both these disasters involved failures of communication among ordinary professional people, working in largely bureaucratic companies. Two memos called the “Smoking Gun Memos,” authored by R. M. Boisjoly, of Morton Thiokol, and D. F. Hallman, of Babcook and Wilcox, will always be associated these two incidents. Unfortunately, neither of these memos were successful in preventing the accidents of the Challenger and the Three Mile Island near meltdown.
(2014) is “the way in which leaders interact, make decisions, and influence others in the organization” (p 237). The culture needs to foster cooperation from all areas of an organization, while providing the ability for adaptation and growth. Not all organizations culture will be the same, there is not a correct one that can blanket all organizations to cozy success. (3) Talent Systems. Human capital drives all organizations, the right people need to be in the right jobs with the correct opportunities for growth and advancement. There must be a constant search for strategic thinkers and leaders able to step up with called upon. The authors mention “Talent Sustainability” (p. 248), there must be enough qualified employees ready to move up so the organization will not stall while searching for others to replace others due to attrition, or other opportunists. (4) Organizational Design, must take a number of variables into account while providing structure to an organization. Hughes et al. (2014) state “the design of the organization is a trade-off between options, each with advantages and disadvantages” (p 253). The correct design can help clear the hierarchy of an organization and the proper channels for
Before we look at the images of managing change that were present in the NASA case study let us review a few of the key events in this case study. The case study for this assignment looks at Challenger and Columbia NASA space shuttle disasters and the commission findings on the disasters/recommendations. Now with a short review of the case study what image(s) of change are present in the case study? From the case study the changes introduced are images of managing. These changes are both management of control and shaping. As NASA recovered from the 1986 Challenger disaster, it used the classic Fayol characterization of management such as planning, organizing, commanding, coordinating and controlling to correct from the top-down the issues that had caused the Challenger disaster (Palmer Dunford, Akin, pg.24, 2009). NASA approached the changes that need to be enacted as a result of the Challenger and also the Columbia disasters from the change image of a director. NASA ...
Rosen, R. H. (1997). Learning to lead. In F. Hesselbein, M. Goldsmith & R. Beckhard (Eds.), The Organization of the Future. The Drucker Foundation Future Series (p. 306). New York, NY: Jossey-Bass Inc Schein, E. H. (2010). Organizational culture and leadership. (4th ed., p. 13). San Francisco: Johan Wiley & Sons, Inc.
Leaders have influence the organizational climate and can change the command culture. However to accomplish that they have to first understand the existing organizational culture within which they are operating. Culture is the behavior characteristic of a particular group. In an organizational setting, leaders have to be mindful of this cultural factors in the context that is sensitive to the different backgrounds of team members to best leverage their talent. There are three levels of culture. First level is the Artifacts. This is the surface level. It includes all phenomena that one sees, hears, and feels when one encounters a new group with unfamiliar culture. Second level is the espoused values. These reflect the original values. Third level is the basic underlying assumptions. These are what were once hypothesis, supported only by a hunch or a value, come gradually to be treated as reality. Climate, in the other hand, is a prevailing trend of public opinion or attitude in a given organization at a given time.
...l man who enables others to think and do in his way (role model) and his employees work him for unconditional loyalty (e.g. his PA), also, adopt a fair system of rewards and punishments; however, as a leader sometimes he just needs some transformational styles which respect and communicate with followers equally rather than forced them to shut up rudely. As for organizational culture, the article obtains further understanding that some factors attribute to detect cultures existed in an organisation, communication system, for example. As a result, it can be identified that his culture not only can be classified as power but task. Moreover, due to the changeable outside environment, compounded and flexible cultures seems to be a better way for an organisation’s sustainable development. Therefore, leadership is tightly related to organizational culture.
Since the leadership agreed that they want a decrease in collaborate and a small growth in both create and control this portion of the paper contains recommendations to make this culture change.