NASA's Technology Program Can't Explain or Coordinate Itself
.@NASASpinoff why don't @NASATechBriefs @NASA_Technology @NASATechgateway coordinate & retweet ALL #NASA tech news? Who's in charge? #NASA
— NASA Watch (@NASAWatch) October 25, 2013
NASA Technology That Can’t Link To Itself, earlier post
Keith’s note: NASA Office of the Chief Technologist has no link to NASA Tech Briefs. NASA Tech Briefs does not link to NASA OCT. In fact, I did a search of the source HTML code on the NASA Techbriefs home page. There are no links to anything at NASA.gov whatsoever. Yet this page features the NASA logo. Baffling.
NASA Engages the Public to Discover New Uses for Out-of-this-World Technologies
“NASA has joined forces with the product development startup Marblar for a pilot program allowing the public to crowdsource product ideas for forty of NASA’s patents. This initiative will allow Marblar’s online community to use a portion of NASA’s diverse portfolio of patented technologies as the basis of new product ideas.”
Keith’s note: There is no mention of this overt technology news item from the other day on NASA’s main Technology page. Given that Congress is already looking for vulnerable accounts with easy money to solve their budget problems next year (paying for SLS, Commercial Crew, Space Science) and the long knives are already out to carve up NASA’s technology budget windfall and use it to solve other problems. If NASA cannot do a better job coordinating its technology portfolio and explain what it does with the technology money it has already gotten, then perhaps that money could be better spent on projects that the agency can explain – and justify.
Keith’s update: @NASA-Technology noted that they have a list that collects all of NASA’s technology Twitter account tweets. Its a start – but NASA still needs to coordinate its various technology efforts much better than it currently does. This list does not include coverage of @innovateDotNASA which is operated by innovate.nasa.gov. And I still find it unfathomable that NASA allows NASA Tech Briefs to continue to utterly ignore NASA – all while using “NASA” in its name and its logo as well.
– Another NASA Technology Data Dump No One Will Know About, earlier post
– NASA Praises a Spinoff That It Has Already Dumped, earlier post
– Bursting The NASA Spinoff Myth, earlier post
– More Stealth NASA Spinoffs, earlier post
This blog post is very confusing to read. Why don’t you give it to the NASA technology program and they will straighten it out. 😉
NASA does have serious internal management issues, problems with the structure, but what NASA needs first is a fixed budget that is adjusted yearly for inflation. Some decree that hereafter, the NASA budget will be fixed at $18B and adjusted for inflation on an annual basis. Secondly, setting the goals and/or agenda for NASA must be taken away from congressional committees and the presidency. Decrees every four years and every year have undermined the manned program. But also, I do not think NASA is capable of being left to decide what to do. A steering committee, a part of NSF, could set the high level objectives. The objectives would be presented to a complimentary group inside NASA that would respond and return modified version back to NSF for approval. The NAS could function as an arbitrator. This could be on a ten year cycle.
The present means of financing and directing NASA is pretty insane. If there is any reason why Charlie breaks down and whimpers at nearly every all-hands meeting is because of the process he must face. (ha ha).
We have grown accustomed to this process as if there is no other way. Present management of NASA is an artifact of the Apollo era and the politics from which it was spawned.
NSF’s top directors are appointed by the President and approved by the Senate. The politicization of NSF could be reduced and minimized by permitting, e.g. 6 year terms for NSF directors and then selection by the president from a short list provided by the NAS. There is a risk that management of NSF is or would be drawn from scientific ranks to too large of a degree. Scientists often do not make good managers but search committees would need to make that a working concern.
Such sweeping changes face the resistance of every congressman and senator backing Greenbelt, Huntsville, the Florida Space Coast, Houston, Pasadena and then those in the back pocket of the big aerospace contractors. What is needed is a organization of Space-related public organizations that mobilize citizens nationwide such as what the Tea Party or Occupy Movement did without violence or parading effigies of Obama in African tribal gear down Pennsylvania Avenue. In all seriousness, with the web as a means of organizing, there is no reason why the enthusiasts of space exploration nationwide and those that would support them could not mobilize.
The present process of presidential and congressional control must end. Given this new means outlined above, NASA would face accountability internally that would, in time, be forced to solve its problems and improve its efficiency.
Rocky,
I love your statement: “The present process of presidential and congressional control must end.” Given the endless undying agendas, ulterior motives and gross incompetencies, I can apply that statement to hundreds of government initiatives.
I agree that the current method of directing NASA’s activities just doesn’t work, but I strongly suspect that simply handing it off to another agency, public or government, would, at best, yield the same results. Even if first rate decisions and directions were handed to NASA, I think the situation would just devolve to implementation problems, like we’ve already been seeing.
NASA is too big and uncontrollable as is. It needs to be functionally organized in a manner that both takes full advantage of hierarchical management and collects related functions and activities under common management. Over the years NASA has become too much of a free-for-all, and this has lead to the empire building that so sorely hurts NASA’s programs. When managers are spending most of their time protecting their programs instead of managing their people, reasonable progress can be neither assessed nor achieved.
The truly amazing thing, to me, is the wonderful successes that NASA has achieved in certain fields over the last 25 years, despite the management difficulties. The planetary sciences, in particular, have given us wonderful results. I have to wonder how much this is helped by the fact that their programs are typically 10’s and 100’s of $millions, instead of 10’s of $billions, and therefore of a more reasonable scope for managers and their teams to handle. This suggests to me that HSF programs are just too damned big, and should be broken down in size and in time.
This is all just my opinion, of course, and I don’t work for NASA. But I’ve seen similar situations elsewhere. If things are as I see them, then the toughest hump to get over in order to fix this situation is that the senior managers, and to some extent the middle managers, have to realize that this is the problem, admit to it, and be completely willing to change it, at whatever personal cost may be involved. It’s all too easy to claim that you’re protecting your people when you’re really protecting your turf.
It’s like quitting any bad habit; first you have to genuinely want to do it. Until that happens, nothing changes.
It is not reasonable to dismiss the need to change how NASA is funded and given goals because problems will just arise internally that altogether result in no improvements. That would be raising a white flag, giving up and permitting the present process to continue. NASA needs a chance to operate under good working conditions from the top, down.
The feudal system that exists at each Center and at HQ is in large part due to the chaos caused by changing high level objectives and shrinking budget. It has caused managers and directors that fight amongst themselves to protect their resources.
We would have had several more missions and missions under development if NASA project management had been better, case in point – JWST, MSL. As long as you have an unstable manned program, funding and management of Science Mission Directorate projects will also be at risk. Why do you think SMD has not been cozy with the Asteroid Initiative. It is because they know the risk it holds for cost overruns involving the manned portion of the Initiative (also the Ion Propulsion vehicle that could run a muck on the manned mission’s coat tails. It would cannibalize the SMD side of the budget.
Also, if NASA had not been a political pawn and operated by congressional committee and presidencies since (& during) Apollo, we could have had more robotic missions of discovery and would be now involved in manned activities such as moon bases or manned missions to Mars.
SMD (Planetary) has explorer and discovery class projects that are less than $500M but most of the projects you would list as missions of great discovery are actually over $1B but less than $5B. So it is not a rationale for leaving the system in status quo. Furthermore, the changes to how NASA is funded and given objectives would ease internal pressures and force management to improve their efficiency otherwise live within their means.
So yes, there is a feudal system operating, many hapless managers blowing $100s millions which adds up to Billions on both sides – manned and robotic. We could try to change how they are funded and objectives are set, however the internal changes are beyond what the public can tackle.
We are lacking a strong administrator that could try to make internal changes because there was no one of worth from Industry interested in the job. And that was because of how clearly the top job has become unattractive – because of how congresses and the presidents manage it. [Salary level is a big problem too] Griffin might have had the muster to change things and did try but he faced the mandate of Constellation with insufficient funds. [Griffin is a wealthy individual, loves NASA and it appears was willing to dismiss having a competitive salary; Bolden and some Center directors have duel incomes – pensions plus their salary] Also, every administrator must be seen as a political ally of a new president otherwise they are gone.
So as I’ve said before, the fish rots from the head, down. We need to end how NASA is managed by Congresses and Presidents, first. This is what the public can tackle. NASA has been a means of pork barrel spending, forever and under the guise of exploration and discovery! NASA is now 1/2 of 1% of the Federal budget but like earmarks, there is need for reform. There are other programs that could use a facelift too, but we talk Space here, not medicine, or some welfare program.
I think we’ve pretty much agreed on this topic, with perhaps one difference in emphasis — I maintain that whether it’s a government agency or a company we’re talking about, when there are so many thousands of people involved, one person can not possibly be responsible for managing them all, in any context.
There must be a functioning managerial hierarchy in place, whereby each “element” (cell, whatever) of the whole must deal effectively with the other elements that it necessarily comes into contact with — those immediately above and below, and those on the same level with whom it must interact. And there can be no discontinuities between interdependent elements.
To me, it’s not unlike a 3D pyramid built from big blocks that are not cemented, glued, or otherwise joined together. It is solely the interactions of each block with the other blocks it contacts that keeps the pyramid as a whole intact. If any one block should fail to do its part sufficiently well, the whole pyramid can come crashing down.
In short, it is up to each “element” to keep its own house in order if the agency/company is to function effectively. Each element’s manager must accept that he or she is responsible for the people in his/her element, and to be able to live up to that responsibility, the hierarchy (and his/her own manager) must give each manager the level of authority necessary to enforce that responsibility, or else the manager’s job becomes impossible.
Above all, every manager must understand that all management is the management of people, whatever your actual title is. You manage a department by managing its people. You manage a program by managing its high-level people. You manage a division by managing its senior managers. All management is management of people. Given the complex interdependencies in programs and industries, it takes only one manager failing to understand this to bring the pyramid crashing down. Whether it fails catastrophically or erodes slowly, the result is the same.
Another thing worth mentioning in passing is the fallacy of the reorganization. Companies, governments, and agencies, including NASA, are all guilty of this waste of time. Having senior people switch jobs, while leaving everything else the same, accomplishes nothing, and usually leads to a period of even worse performance while the new boss is in his learning curve, but also issues instructions (usually not useful ones) from day one so as to be seen as doing something. Musical chairs is a child’s game, not a management strategy.
I firmly believe that NASA’s managers, in many cases, need to undergo a major philosophical change, or, if they can’t, need to be replaced from outside. Anyhow, this diatribe is my take on things, for what it’s worth.
Yes I agree to agree. I do not emphasize the internal management problems of NASA but only have stated that it will take a strong administrator with backing from say, the executive branch, to initiate reform.
I was thinking of this too. I thought there should be a group we can use to pool our voices and influence government better, but I saw the Planetary Society is in the role.
On the NASA Spinoff page is a link to an article, “On making possible travel between London and Sydney in as little as two hours“. In it, Virgin Galactic’s Stephen Attenborough says, “It might be possible to travel between London and Sydney between two and 2.5 hours” by rocketing into space.
Several knowledgeable people have illustrated that it is neither economically viable nor technically feasible to use either orbital or suborbital rockets for point-to-point travel on Earth’s surface. As it turns out, going exactly half way around the planet was the minimum distance that made rocket travel doable (ballistic as opposed to continuously powered flight), and there simply weren’t any routes that made this worth doing. Although it was a staple in older science fiction, point-to-point rocket travel on Earth has never been a real possibility. Even with the newest technologies, I’m guessing the price would be out of this world and such a service would quickly go the way of the Concorde.
Has something changed, or has Attenborough simply not caught up with the facts?
I find the “NASA Engages the Public…” link above positively amusing. If I read this correctly NASA is excited about joining start-up company Marblar in order to develop products by using the intellectual property and patents (too often ignored for decades and) developed by NASA.
Marblar looks largely U.K. based and driven. On the Marblar website they offer up Samsung to develop, manufacture, and market with and share royalties with.
Notice the first statement on the Marblar website says: “NASA is releasing their best technologies to the world – giving anyone the chance to create new products.” The U.S. pays for it, the World gets it free. Truly philanthropic of us!
It all cracks me up.
U.S. Taxpayers shove $17B a year into NASA. Patents and IP are developed, only to be driven by non-U.S. entities Marblar and pointing to Samsung in order to generate value-added, useful results, revenues and profit. (Samsung does make some great stuff.)
Apparently no one in the U.S. will develop NASA patents to produce U.S. economic gains, so why not have intellectual property created and paid for by U.S. taxpayers move to foreign locations so they can secure the economic gains and outcomes for their countries? If the U.S. is lucky they can get a few of the table-scrap royalties, or not. I hope Marblar is dramatically successful.
warning!
on the Marbler website under “terms of service” any idea you submit to them becomes their intellectual property
It would make a lot more sense to increase NASA outreach to industry to ask what industry needs _before_ we spend money on development. that way you know you have an interested commercial user before you even start.
Wait a minute, this sounds like one of those ‘we buy your invention” ads. Is Marbler getting _paid_ by NASA for taking ownership of its patents? What service is NASA getting that we don’t already pay civil servants to do?
Marblers terms of service not withstanding how can Marbler crowd source additional intellectual property?
Marblel states that it decides how much your contribution is “worth” but how does it do that with a Patient or idea it does not own? (NASA)
I have been told by patient attorneys that once you release an idea to the public you no longer own it.
indeed if you look at these business idea competition sites they state that by submitting an idea for a prize is going to cause you trouble with the patient office
Some problems that plague NASA tech development:
1. Expensive missions dictated from above that absorb most of the buget
2. The only customer for technology is the “NASA mission”. No money for things that are useful on Earth. If they happen it is coincidence
3. What support there is for new ideas usually only lasts a year, then the project is dropped, long before full commercial support could possibly be developed.
From 2003 to 2005 the NASA web presence became ever more fractured, at first it was easy to find information and resources and over time it became harder and harder. Now it seems like if you don’t get a list of direct URL’s from someone at NASA you would not really have much means to quickly find useful information that might be actionable, NASA’s main page feels like something designed for a toddler or child, it’s quite spacy yet nearly useless to anyone actually trying to do something. I’m guessing someone decided to make it a “Magazine” layout instead of the porthole to the worlds largest science initiative.
I checked out the first 14 patents made available to Marblar and they all look very specialized, the sort of thing that might be used for one-off programs or very small quantity manufacture, as opposed to mass produced products, which makes the whole thing less significant than we might initially assume.
The one patent that caught my eye was, “Strong and lightweight particle radiation shield.” I read through the links provided and found that this material perhaps has real potential if it performs as advertised. It provides radiation effects mitigation, but in reading the NASA web pages I couldn’t find any measure of how effective it is (other than “better than aluminum”), or any indication that it had been tested in actual use in space. Also, there was nothing quantitative provided relating to secondary radiation from this composite material that I could find.
I will be keeping an eye out f or more information on this composite shielding material (which I can’t find a name for).