NRC Seeks Input on NASA Priorities
Seeking Inputs on NASA’s Plans, Programs and Priorities, open.NASA
“In the FY2012 appropriations bill that funds NASA, Congress requested an independent study of NASA’s strategic direction. The study is being conducted by a committee of the National Research Council. The study statement of task directs the committee to “recommend how NASA could establish and effectively communicate a common, unifying vision for NASA’s strategic direction that encompasses NASA’s varied missions.” Strategic direction can be thought of as the steps NASA needs to take over time to accomplish its vision and mission.”
Nice idea from open.NASA to ask folks to recommend how NASA could establish a unified vision and strategic direction. Pretty scary to think of spending $17B a year without direction.
That said, it seems a bit silly to think anyone could provide the necessary solution in 300 words or less. Just to introduce their own request took 342 words. With a limitation like this and they might as well just ask for a robust and comprehensive NASA vision and mission solution all bound within a 140 character tweet.
It wasn’t all that long ago that certain Congress members were ridiculing NASA for doing endless studies. Now Congress wants a “cover-everything” study that smacks of start from scratch mode. I suspect that they’re hoping somebody will write something professional sounding that seems to actually justify SLS and Orion, since they’ve yet to do so themselves.
There are a lot of people at NASA — at every level — who have the knowledge and experience to contribute a great deal by way of this open.NASA “study.” I sure hope they will take the opportunity to do so. If nothing else, it would have to be more constructive, and more satisfying, than simply anonymously posting on blogs. Here’s your chance people. Go for it.
Steve
Judging by the way NASA broadcasted the Curiosity landing, it appears they have prejudged the intellectual level of the viewers as that of fourth graders in their presentations,I found this annoying to say the least.Now they want another study to determine the direction for NASA and justification for its programs.All they need to do is consult the very people that they employ from the scientist to the engineers for this “study”. All this proves is that the very people in charge don’t know how to manage,plan a ,supposeably, public orientated,financed program. All this proves is that NASA needs new leadership that can inspire the public and rekindle their interest.
Exactly how was NASA TV’s broadcast of Curiosity’s landing aimed at the level of “fourth graders?” I think your judgement of their broadcast is in the minority.
Some of the comments here are a little surprising.
The suggestion that we should just ask NASA employees for their views on this is somewhat laughable. Firstly, in that NASA employees have had oodles of time to come up with strong rationale for what they do. Congress is asking for this more broadly based study because they’re evidently not too impressed with the rationale that NASA’s been coming up with.
Secondly, Congress specifically is asking for an “independent” study. I guess such an independent study should welcome inputs from decidedly non-independent folks, but they might be taken with a grain of salt. So NASA employees are expected to comment independently on the NASA budget, and whether it should be increased? Oh, that’s hilarious! Let me also speculate that JSC employees will advance lots of human space flight rationale, and Goddard employees will advance primarily science rationale, and Marshall employees will advance lots of propulsion rationale. So, what’s new?
But most importantly, Congress is asking for suggestions about a strategic direction for the agency. That’s not a plan of where to go, or how to get there. It’s most certainly not why we need an SLS or an Orion. It’s a way to interpret the agency charter in a way that is most digestable to the taxpayer. So you ask the people who are digging in their pockets, and not the people who are stuffing their pockets. In particular, I suspect they’re not specifically after words that are “professional sounding”. They’re probably after words that convey purpose, value, and excitement. Ideally, they also sound sensible.
As to 300 words, well, let’s just say that if you can’t communicate an important part of a strategic vision in 300 words, then they probably don’t want to hear any more from you. Because the American public isn’t going to listen to more than 300 words. I think one can be assured that if the committee finds your 300 words fascinating, they’ll call you in for some more details.
Helen,
I follow what you’re saying and it makes sense to me, but I think we’re maybe at cross purposes here because we’re thinking in terms of two different groups. There is a group of people, either from NRC or hired by NRC (or, more likely a combination, I would think) who are being tasked with creating this study (as I understand it). But this same group of people is not going to sit in a room together and create the material that will form the basis of the study and its recommendations — that material has to come from other people, otherwise this study will be of no more value than if you and I sat in a room and created it (that’s not intended as a reflection on either of us).
Of necessity, I would say that the second group must be subject matter experts — experts in all of the relevant subjects — and include people with first-hand knowledge of what NASA has done, in the past, is doing now, and has considered for the future. Without this knowledge, I don’t see how any group could meaningfully consider the scope of strategic plans for NASA, let alone any details.
People with strong opinions, personal agendas and political connections being involved to some extent is probably unavoidable, but hopefully the people tasked with doing this study will be intelligent enough to ensure that it is as impartial as they can possibly make it, because: 1) it will be worse than useless if it isn’t impartial; and 2) if it isn’t impartial, that fact will show up very quickly and those who commissioned it will be duty-bound to reject it (unless this whole thing is a set-up, in which case we’re SOL no matter how you weight it).
When faced with a legal issue, you consult a lawyer; for a water leak, you call a plumber. When you need to know the viability and risks involved in designing and implementing various kinds of space programs, I say you should turn to the scientists and engineers (and their teams) who have the knowledge and experience in doing space programs. You do not act based on the input of these people alone, any more than you would act on the input of a program manager alone, but their input must be sought and listened to, for they are the only people who know (if anyone does for a given case) what can be done and what can’t, what needs to be done differently than before, what the relative risks associated with alternatives are, what kind and level of return can reasonably be expected, etc.
And, if you’re smart, you don’t stop there. Programs are managed by a hierarchy, for well-understood reasons. But, knowledge does not exist as a hierarchy; it is distributed fairly evenly throughout an organization, existing where it is needed. Therefore, if you desire the best study, plan, whatever, you must consult at all levels of the organization, wherever the relevant knowledge resides. On every shop floor there is an older guy who’s been there since time began and is the recognized in-house expert. Got a problem, ask old Charlie, he’s probably seen it before, or something like it. A smart design engineer knows that before you unleashed a new product design on production, arrange to spend half an hour with Charlie, and he’ll show you six ways to make it better, or cheaper, or more reliable, or easy to service…
If NRC, or anybody else, is going to do a study that’s worth anything, they will need to include input from as many as the “old Charlies” as they can get to, from throughout NASA and the various contractors, and not just for raw input but for review at various stages. I’m fairly certain that this won’t happen; the people doing this study will not seek out and consult the true experts in the various science and engineering fields, and this “study” will be of no more value than all those that came before it. But if some key ideas, talking points, and eye openers can make it in to the process by way of the open.NASA avenue, straight from the horses’ mouths, so to speak, then maybe this will turn out better than it otherwise would. This is why I encourage NASA (and contractor) people to speak up. Hopefully someone conscious will be filtering the input, separating out the wheat.
As for NASA people not being willing or able to think strategically or independently, I certainly may be wrong, but I think you underestimate them. On average, I suspect they’re no less capable of thinking independently and strategically than you or I. And if they recognize this as the opportunity that it is, I think they’ll take the time to give it their best — best for NASA, not just themselves.
Steve
This is a generally sensible response, but I think you don’t have it quite right. The way these independent committees work is that although their membership consists of a dozen or so select smart leaders, the budget for the committee often includes money for technical, engineering, and costing support as needed. That is, as you say, these folks don’t sit around a table making stuff up. The output of the committee then goes out for rigorous anonymous (to the committee) independent review.
You certainly aren’t going to engage the kind of focused and skilled support you need by advertising publicly for 300 word comments. The public that this outreach effort is aimed at is NOT that support team.
In no way do I underestimate NASA people. I certainly said nothing of the kind. But legally, if you’re going to provide independent advice to an agency, you don’t base it on advice from people in the agency. It’s just that simple. People who work for NASA get vastly more opportunities to influence agency policy than the public outreach targets here. This committee is certainly getting briefed by senior NASA officials, just to make sure that everyone is on the same page.
Now, I will say that what this committee is about is at a level that I think transcends detailed technology and engineering. A lot of it is coming up with a unifying vision for the agency, and the extent to which agency goals address national priorities. Please see the statement of task, as given on the ASEB website. As a matter of fact, it’s efforts like these that NASA isn’t very good at. Identifying national priorities and establishing unifying visions just aren’t their job, which is more about seeing the trees than the forest.
No, I think getting advice from “as many of the old Charlie’s as they can get to” is not a sensible review strategy simply because it’s unconstrained. I can imagine that Charlie #45 might feel beholden to submit a five hundred page white paper, and Charlie #73 might submit a few hundred pages that undermines what #45 was trying to say. Charlie #23 might be passionate about one fuel pump technology. Your twenty Charlies may not be as good, to me, as my five Charlies. But this public input mechanism is a way of just making sure that the committee isn’t overlooking something important that people want to bring to their attention, in a very constrained way. The idea that this committee won’t consult outside experts is just nonsensical. You can go and look at their meeting agendas, and see all the outside experts they invited to present. Don’t make stuff up.
You’re right, 2100 is more than sufficient.
I just did an open letter response on my blog. If Keith is ok with it I will post the link in the morning…
What exactly are NASA senior execs paid for anyway? Why not let the NASA tribes vote every year on what they wold like to do and save the gov a couple billion bucks.