Collaborative Culture Drives Performance

I love the American story of the “Space Race” of the 1960s. We can glean several key leadership lessons from this historic period of time as both the United States and the Soviet Union raced to put a human being on the moon.

As this so-called “space race” began, the Soviet Union had a string of firsts; they put the first satellite in space before NASA was even created. They put the first dog in space, launched the first probe to land on the moon, and then successfully launched the first human being into space. During this time, NASA toiled under its own programs, and disastrously failed to launch a rocket only a few feet before crashing. It was clear to many people in NASA that when President Kennedy gave his famous “We Choose to go to the Moon” speech, that America was not prepared to achieve this key performance objective.

So how did things change? What revitalized this fledgling space program from a series of catastrophic errors to a program that successfully outpaced its competitor and not only landed but safely returned a team of US astronauts from the surface of the moon? The turnaround began in 1963, when engineer George Mueller was named the director of the Office of Manned Space Flight. One of the most fascinating things about Mueller was that he was not an aerospace or aeronautical engineer, nor did his background have anything to do with rockets. He was an electrical engineer and as such he had a profound knowledge of systems and processes.

One of the first things Mueller did was consolidate different departments, each uniquely involved in the process of putting an individual in space: The Manned Spacecraft, Flight, and Launch Operations offices. One of his other key achievements was a complete reorganization of the direct reporting chain of each project, so that each program now had a manger and direct report and then he made each manager aware of how each project contributed to the overall success of the program. In a systematic and science based approach to outcomes, Mueller created a reporting chain that had a clear vision, clear objectives, and clear accountability for outcomes. How novel!

One of his most revolutionary practices was the mass sharing of information across NASA – in a word he enhanced the access and dissemination of information into an expanded network of people. Long before the Internet and email, the ability to rapidly share information was quite difficult. Mueller used a radio sharing system that allowed individual managers and engineers to share information with one another anytime a significant event occurred and rapid change was required. In short, George Mueller was able to transform NASA into a dynamic collaborative culture that had over 300,000 participants, 200 universities and 20,000 contractors. In less than 6 years he transformed a fledgling space program into one that was able to put the first “man” on the moon. That’s quite an influential thing to do. George Mueller knew that a culture of collaboration – shared vision, common goals, and mutual support among team members – is the secret sauce to performance outcomes… and still is today!