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Hi, Does anyone think that the reorganization at NASA that is being implemented 1 August of this year will have the desired effect of streamlining the agency? Aside from the saftey officers reporting directly to the top brass to avoid middle managment distortion I don't see alot except alot of buzz words.
It's not the structure of NASA that has to change, it's the underlying culture that's risk adverse and tradition laden. I know I'm just offering critisism, but I can't really think of any solutions baring just completely doing away with NASA and adopting a incentive based award system ala X prize.
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I don't think its quite that bad, Nasa is rearranging a good deal of its management around similar methods used in the F-35 fighter jet program (which worked marvelously), and talk of giving O'Keefe the authority to close Nasa field centers ought to bring "oooohs" and "wows".
Nasa is all we've got, they're the only ones who can bring in the money from congress, and now that Shuttle is gone in 2010 and not 2025, there will be alot of money being freed up in only five years or so. I don't know if I would call Nasa risk-averse, but they do need additional motivation to a particular goal.
An "X-Prize to Mars" would never work, because nobody would be willing to invest the money to build a Mars ship without iron clad contract guarantees that they will make money off it.
[i]"The power of accurate observation is often called cynicism by those that do not have it." - George Bernard Shaw[/i]
[i]The glass is at 50% of capacity[/i]
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I think the changes were to improve the safety chain of command and not anything else. NASA's missions are full of necessary risk but NASA should never accept increased risk simply because of implied pressure from the public-like launching Challenger when the temperatures were too low for the solid rocket o-rings to seal.
In my opinion NASA's real problem is a lack of vision. Cheaper, faster, farther is nice and it has returned a real scientific benefit but once the Mars Direct plan came out they should have been all over it.
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