JSC Blog on Courage and Dissenting Opinions
“From: Watkins, Vincent D. (JSC-NA111)
Date: Fri, May 1, 2015 at 7:53 AM
Subject: Check Out New JSC S&MA Director’s Blog
To: “JSC-DL-S&MA-ALL-HANDS-(LOC-&-REM)”
Great blog on courage and dissenting opinions. Leave a comment and be a part of the discussion! https://safety.jsc.nasa.gov/“
Keith’s note: Oh well. Too bad no one outside of the NASA JSC firewall you can see this blog (jsc-sma-a02.ndc.nasa.gov 139.169.149.20) about “courage and dissenting opinions”.
Why should a Center’s intranet be publicly accessible?
Why not?
I think there are local matters which need to be discussed within an organization. Center culture is one of them.
Yes, the NASA centers get public money but then so do any number of military organizations and private contractors. NASA, warts and all, is infinitely more open and forthcoming about its activities.
I am conflicted about this issue. I believe that an organization can be a kind of _organism_, just as we biological animals are organizations of quasi-independent living cells.
It seems to me that an organization, rather like a person, or an organism, needs to be able to have “private thoughts”, to “communicate with itself” internally, frankly. Otherwise it is liable to be crippled by the inability to have the honest discussions that are
likely to be needed to “get the job done”, to fulfill its institutional mandate, whatever that may be.
Would we be able to function if all our thoughts and internal musings were absolutely public and open to unrestricted external view? Some degree of privacy seems to be more than a right, but actually a necessity, for effective function and probably even viability.
Of course I also value “transparency” to avoid corruption, loss of organizational focus, or simple incompetence, but I think some kind of balance is needed between these two needs. Otherwise transparency can become destructive.
So I think some limits are often necessary. Perhaps a simple delay in “publication” (for it really is publication you are asking for) could be enough. Keith (as an investigative journalist) and I may be doomed to disagree about this, and I must be open to the possibility that I am off base about it. I’ll be interested to see what others think.
It’s hard to know what the content is – if it contained centre specific information then there may be good reasons to keep it private. I can also understand keeping comments from staff private.
But, if it is such a great blog, it would be good to see a public version published. It might require some “courage and dissenting opinions” to make it happen though 😉
Your point is well-taken in that NASA Centers could talk to one another
more than they do now but it is a big gap between that and this kind of
transparency.
I don’t see anything wrong with Centers wanting to discuss things internally before looking across to other Centers. Standard practice these days is to implement some currently popular theory, completely out of context, and mandate something that worked at Point A to work at Point B – Six Sigma, CMMI, Quality Circles, Empowerment, etc. If the idea is indeed that good, verify it first, then take it to a larger audience.
The original post implied that people outside NASA (at least some fraction of NW readers) should be able to get at that site and there I still disagree. If my shop’s internal forums were suddenly made public, I’d stop posting immediately.
The original memo brags about “courage” discussed in this blog but they are afraid to demonstrate that “courage” publicly?
I took it to mean ‘having the courage’ to do something, such as speaking out on a difficult situation. Few will come forward without some kind of assurance of anonymity.
I am afraid I don’t understand what constitutes a ‘learning organization’ at the higher levels of NASA HQ/Center administrative levels.
It seems like JSC sees a lack of trust between its leadership and those being led. If that’s indeed the case, it will take time to rebuild that trust. There’s also a high chance it will fail as most management initiatives do whether they’re meant in earnest or just pushed as part of someone’s climb up the ladder.
The first step is for people to bring forth their concerns and to feel comfortable about doing so. I don’t think they’ll do that if they know that journalists and the general public will be watching.