Below are the first 10 and last 10 pages of uncorrected machine-read text (when available) of this chapter, followed by the top 30 algorithmically extracted key phrases from the chapter as a whole.
Intended to provide our own search engines and external engines with highly rich, chapter-representative searchable text on the opening pages of each chapter.
Because it is UNCORRECTED material, please consider the following text as a useful but insufficient proxy for the authoritative book pages.
Do not use for reproduction, copying, pasting, or reading; exclusively for search engines.
OCR for page 53
5
Management Issues Relevant to Design
The committee's statement of task focussed on the
identification of engineering issues related to the design and
operation of the Space Station. However, during its
deliberations the committee discussed a number of management
concerns that the members felt could have a substantial impact
on the technical program's likelihood of success.
The management challenge posed by the Space Station program
is the greatest ever faced by NASA, including those of Apollo,
the Shuttle, and Shuttle recovery. Unlike the Apollo and
Shuttle missions, however, the challenges related to the Space
Station are not largely driven by technological considerations
and difficulties.
Among the challenges of the Space Station program are the
following:
1. the complexity of the program itself,
2. coordination of the domestic and international
interfaces,
3. preparation for a program that is in all practical
respects a permanent one,
4. reconciliation of the diverse user communities, and
5. overcoming the strong internal NASA culture.
The first four challenges are difficult and serious, and
NASA management appears to fully recognize that significant
attention must be devoted to them on a continuing long-term
basis. The challenge of the~internal NASA cultures itself,
however, has many features that make tile first four challenges
more difficult to surmount. More important from the
committee's perspective, this internal ~culture" intrinsically
53
OCR for page 54
54
has enormous potential direct and indirect impacts on design
issues and their resolution. Subsequent paragraphs outline
those of the committee's observations and concerns about the
challenge of the internal culture that are relevant to the
Space Station program, followed by the enumeration of some
additional management concerns related to design activities
that were raised by the committee during the workshop.
IMPACT OF THE INTERNAL NASA CULTURE ON THE
SPACE STATION PROGRAM
Background
NASA has historically divided itself into three
disciplines: (1) aeronautics, (2) manned spaceflight, and
(3) unmanned spaceflight. Whether sanctioned or encouraged by
senior management, the divisions were and are real.
The core of the Ames, Langley, and Lewis Research Centers'
activities has been aeronautics, and no attempt at
diversification or appending space-oriented work to these
centers is going to change their basic character. Thus,
Langley can undertake advanced manned spaceflight work, Ames
can address life support systems, and Lewis can be assigned the
Space Station's photovoltaic power system, but these are
intrinsically appendages to each centers' basic interests.
More important, the line management of the centers reports
through the Center Directors to the Office of Aeronautics and
Space Technology (OAST) at NASA Headquarters. This reality
does not indicate that the centers will do their tasks poorly,
only that Space Station activities are not mainline, do not
report to the management of the Space Station program directly,
and may not command the highest priority at those centers.
The core of the activities at the Goddard Space Flight
Center and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory has been in the space
and earth sciences, with the former institution focussed more
on near-Earth activities and the latter more on the planets.
Goddard and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory report to the Office
of Space Science and Applications (OSSA), an office at the same
level as CAST. Both have responsibilities in the Space Station
program, but each institution has other missions as its
principal orientation. As with the aforementioned research
OCR for page 55
ss
centers, the Space Station activities are not central, do not
directly report to the management of the Space Station program,
and may not command the highest priority at these two
institutions.
Finally, the lead NASA centers for manned spaceflight
(Iohnson, Kennedy, and Marshall) have been heavily involved in
the restoration of the Shuttle to flight (and its continued
operation), and report to the Office of Space Flight (OSF).
These centers do, however, see the Station as mainline to their
principal mission, even though they do not directly report to
the Office of Space Station.
Although NASA has a good deal of experience with matrix
management, the Space Station program carries the degree of
matrix support to a new level. As noted above, none of the
centers report directly to the Office of Space Station, and
each center has major, demanding, relatively near-term programs
that it must support. The difficulties for Space Station
management can be considerable.
There is an additional complication. The Space Station
program Is managed at the same level in NASA as OAST, OSF, and
OSSA. It is also dependent on still another coequal NASA
organization for its communications: the Office of Space
Operations.
Thus, while directly commanding none of the line manpower
resources of the agency, the Office of Space Station relies on
one coequal office for its launches, another for its supporting
technology, a third for its payloads, and a fourth for its
communications. Not to be forgotten are three foreign entities
who are responsible for major modules or systems as well.
ImDect of Management Complexities on the Space Station
Technical Program
As a result of all of the above constraints, the Space
Station management structure has generated layer upon layer of
institutional and interface documents of staggering
complexity. Direct management paths are few and extend only
from one institutional barrier to another. Diffusion of power
and responsibility is extreme. The likelihood of swift,
effective action is small for any substantive matter. A
missing ingredient is the cohesive attribute of strong and
creative technical leadership providing management and
oversight that permeates to all levels--leadership, which in
industry, is associated with a chief engineer and his or her
staff.
OCR for page 56
56
Whether the issue is communications, launches, payload, or
manpower resources, the leader of the Space Station program can
only negotiate with equals; failing that, the Administrator or
Deputy Administrator must adjudicate and become the de facto
project manager.
The committee attributes part of the shortfall of key
manpower at the Level II Space Station Program Office to the
management structure and foresees that increasing tensions will
mark the program if clearer lines of authority do not emerge in
the future.
IMPACT OF PROGRAM INSTABILITIES ON THE SPACE
STATION TECHNICAL PROGRAM
Budgetary uncertainties, certain congressional directives,
and operational limitations of the existing post-Challenger
Shuttle have produced program instabilities that may have
increased design complexity and reduced design conservatism.
The Space Station program has been subjected to
considerable schedule and programmatic turbulence due to annual
budgetary uncertainties. The current schedule and budget
profile may not be achievable if current budgetary
instabilities persist. It is difficult to conduct an orderly
development program for a system as complex as the Space
Station when the amount of resources that can be allocated to
development by the program management is largely unpredictable
from year to year.
As was mentioned earlier, some of the congressional
directives to the Space Station program appear to the committee
to have increased the complexity of the development process
without any compelling technical justification. An example is
the removal of the life sciences centrifuge from the U.S.
laboratory module to a node. While the committee is somewhat
skeptical of the measure's desirability in the absence of a
demonstrable technical need, its main concern is that it is
very destabilizing to an already constrained program to have
additional requirements arbitrarily imposed. If the discipline
of the design process is to be maintained, proposals for
additional requirements must go through established program
review mechanisms so that their impacts can be properly
assessed before the additional requirements are accepted.
Finally, the 1987 NRC Committee on the Space Station noted
that From the inception of the Space Station program, the
OCR for page 57
57
Shuttle has been the sole means of space transportation
contemplated for Station deployment and support. This has
resulted in a Space Station design constrained by the Shuttle
cargo bay dimensions and the Shuttles weight lifting
capacity. These constraints have increased the difficulty of
satisfying user requirements in a number of ways.... The
deployment process and the operational concept also have been
influenced by the lack of other means of space transportation.
For example, use of the Shuttle will require substantial levels
of extravehicular activity and on-orbit outfitting of the
laboratory and habitation modules. The constraints imposed by
the Shuttle have become more restrictive as Shuttle
capabilities have been reduced, first by shortfalls from
original specifications and later by modifications required
after the Challenger accident. (Resort of the Committee on the
SDace Station of the National Research Council, p. 19, 1987~.
The workshop committee agrees with the above observations
and believes that management of the Space Station program will
continue to be complicated by sole reliance on the Shuttle for
the deployment and support of the Space Station. If nothing
else, maintenance of the planned assembly schedule for the
Station will be dependent on maintaining a predictable Shuttle
launch rate and manifest through the late 1990s.
MANAGEMENT OF FREE-FLYING PLATFORMS
The committee concurs with the 1987 NRC Committee on the
Space Station's observation that there is no significant
scientific or operational relationship between the U.S. polar
platform and potential U.S. co-orbiting platform and the Space
Station manned base development. The retention of the
platforms within the Space Station program further complicates
a very difficult management task conducted under severe
manpower constraints.
Both of the platforms may be justifiable on their own
merits, but to carry these programs in the Space Station
Program Office just because they have some commonality with
Space Station components is not an effective use of the
available Space Station program management talent. Platform
development should be transferred to the Office of Space
Science and Applications.
OCR for page 58
58
ASSOCIATE CONTRACTOR RELATIONSHIPS
The Space Station development program faces the prospect of
bogging down in organizational, managerial, and technical
debates unless an accepted and authoritative contractual
hierarchy is established with the contractors through their
respective offices. - It is of concern to the committee that a
disciplined and contractually binding process for integration
is not evident; one needs to be established early in the
program.
The initiative taken by the Office of Space Station
formally to establish associate contractor relationships is
commendable. However, the problem of contractor relationships
would be a difficult one even if all contractors were reporting
to the same contractual authority. In the Space Station
program, each associate contractor reports to a different NASA
contractual authority and when disagreements arise, the
companies each respond to their appropriate contracting
officer. Unless the Level II Program Office can somehow gain
some direct contracting authority, it will always be looking to
the NASA centers to resolve associate contractor differences.
If it is not possible to go to a hierarchial contract
arrangement, an alternative approach might be to delegate
interface control authority to the Program Support Contractor
and incorporate this delegation of authority into the four
associate contracts. Such a step would in no way reduce the
significance of the current Level II initiative to develop good
working relationships between the four major associate
contractors, but hopefully would further strengthen the
management structure.
TECHNICAL MANAGEMENT PROCESS
The complexity of the Space Station program demands an
innovative management style that encourages streamlined action
on specific design/technical issues while preserving the
hierarchial structure necessary for a disciplined management
process.
The present organization appears to be a top heavy, highly
programmed, and time consuming management structure with no
provision for getting through or around it easily or in a
timely way; no technical oversight that can readily cross
bounds; extremely long action times in case of unexpected
OCR for page 59
59
events or emergencies; and one that is not design oriented.
There is a need for streamlined paths of technical authority
akin to those traditionally provided chief engineers in
industry. There should also be adequate provision for someone
who worries only about the technical and safety issues,
resolutions, and so on, and can cross bounds as if they were
not there--that is, a technical conscience or technical
ombudsman. Further, the committee is concerned that the
program has no adequate provision for short-cutting the
technical decision-making process in special cases.
SYSTEM SPECIFICATION
A Space Station system specification is needed to
contractually define the system. Although requirements are
being actively defined, the framework for a system
specification needs to be developed as early as possible so
that responsibilities and accountabilities can be established.
In the early phases of the Apollo program, considerable
emphasis and effort were placed on development of a system
specification and its associated specification tree. While the
Space Station program has been developing requirements, the
committee noted no apparent emphasis on developing a system
specification to manage the program through allocation of the
specification tree segments to specific NASA organizations. A
system specification developed by an organization such as the
Space Station Program Support Contractor would be not only a
vehicle for contract compliance but also a basis to effect
change discipline and change control.
The committee's concern is that until a system
specification is developed, refined, and accepted as a living
contractual document, there will be confusion and uncontrolled
change in space station systems, resulting in cost and schedule
problems.
INTEGRATION AND VERIFICATION MANAGEMENT PLAN
Lack of a strong, crisp integration and verification
management plan and architecture can cause unnecessary redesign
or design compromises in the Space Station program. While
there is considerable work underway in this area, there does
not appear to be a management plan and architecture for
integration and verification in place.
OCR for page 60
60
The most obvious evidence for this conclusion is the
inability by NASA to define Kennedy Space Center's verification
role during the launch preparation process. The planned level
of activity as briefed to the workshop committee has ranged
from simple installation in the orbiter bay to total
reverification of factory preshipment testing.
COMMUNICATIONS AND DATA SYSTEMS
The communications and data systems for the Station pass
through elements that are developed by up to four separate NASA
offices. These offices are independently managed and
budgeted. Each can be affected by its own management
decisions, OMB's budgetary actions, or the technical,
management, or budgetary decisions of Congress. Thus, the
Office of Space Station directs the development of the Space
Station and its ground control centers. The Office of Space
Operations is responsible for the TDRSS, its ground stations,
and the communication links to the control centers. The Office
of Space Flight operates the Space Shuttle and its
communication links to the Station during rendezvous and
docking. The Office of Space Science and Applications is
responsible for many of the instruments that will be placed on
the Station, data processing for its instruments, and the links
connecting its facilities to those of investigators.
While there is no reason to believe that any of the above
offices would act irresponsibly, it nevertheless is true that
all elements must work properly with one another for the
maximum utility of the Space Station to be realized. At
present there is little evidence that NASA is providing
adequate oversight, and the potential for errors exists
(notably those of omission) even in well-intentioned, skilled
organizations.
The absence of an information system functional manager at
NASA headquarters could allow significant budgeting and
scheduling inconsistencies that could inhibit the Space Station
Information System from coming on line in a timely and cohesive
way.
The committee believes that NASA should create a focal
point for communications and data systems with the authority
and responsibility to oversee all communication links to and
from the Space Station. This responsibility should extend from
data source to destination without regard to NASA's
organizational divisions.
Representative terms from entire chapter:
station program
