This Focused Performance Weblog is a "business management blog" containing links and commentary related primarily to organizational effectiveness with a "Theory of Constraints" perspective. TOC is noted for its applications in Project Management and Multi-Project Management (Critical Chain) and Operations Management (Drum-Buffer-Rope), as well as in Marketing, Strategic Planning and Change Management (TOC Thinking Processes). If you are on an archive page, current postings are found here.
Saturday, December 20, 2003
Project Management in Space -- OK, maybe not "in" space, but definitely on the way to it. Recent discussion of a new space effort towards Mars and of talk of lack of project leaders in NASA led to a thread on the Newgrange discussion list. One recommendation from that conversation came from Vincent Alcalde...
A fantastic book about the Apollo program is Murray and Cox's Apollo: The Race to the Moon. Not about the astronauts, but mainly about the managers (and lead engineers) and how they built America's space program.
This reminded me of one of the best (only?) realistic depictions of PM activity for the screen is Episode 5 of the HBO series From the Earth to the Moon. Each episode of that excellent series focused on a different set of Apollo Program stakeholders. Episode 5 -- "Spider" -- is about the engineering team behind the Lunar Module. Great scenes about creativity, errors, failures, tests, tests, tests, slipped timelines, and ultimate success. Check it out if you get the chance.
View Frank Patrick's profile
