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Stry Lee Case Summary

Decent Essays

MBE: Launch!
“To the moon, Alice” or in this case Mars. Gentry Lee, senior systems engineer at Jet Propulsion Laboratories (JPL) faced a very difficult decision whether to recommend launching or delay the launch of the Mars Biological Explorer (MBE). According to Lee’s biography at Caltech and the case study, “he is the chief engineer for the Planetary Flight Systems Directorate at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, and had engineering oversight responsibility for the twin rover missions to Mars that landed in January 2004, the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) in 2006, and the Deep Impact and Stardust missions. He was also the chief engineer for the Galileo project from 1977–1988 and director of science analysis and mission planning during …show more content…

Why? Using a frame’s analysis will help us understand.
Frames are, as defined by Bolman and Deal, a “set of ideas you carry in your head” from which a mental map is made (2003, p. 12). The frames give you a lens through which to analyze problems or in our case, the JPL organization. Bolman and Deal recognize four frames when addressing organizations: structural, human resources, cultural/symbolic, and political. As complexity grows, organizations require more sophisticated – and more costly – coordination strategies (mechanisms). Through framing and reframing, one can determine the attributes and deficiencies of leadership and organizations. Ultimately why Lee will recommend launching.
The first frame, Structure, “determines where formal power and authority are located” …show more content…

243). It is important to note that this frame is not necessarily about why the launch did not happen but the ramifications of not launching. Lee’s quote of, “the only thing worse than a delay is a mission that fails” could be taken two ways.” First, delay the mission and fail…you have escaped nothing and only delayed the inevitable. Second, do not delay and fail, neither offer any sense of accomplishment. I am sure, as with the rest of the JPL team that Lee wanted to execute a safe mission that is risk free. This is space exploration, launching into space, there will be risks and the team did the best they could mitigate them to acceptable levels. The JPL team, NASA and the U.S.A. needed a victory. NASA was coming off several tragic failures that cost several crewmembers their lives. The space program is not as exciting as it once was and its stature was fading. In the symbolic frame, we need that unifying theme or shared beliefs and launching the MBE was the answer. Sure, Lee and his team could wait and risk going over budget and complete termination of the project, but what they could not live with was another two years of, “we should have launched”. In essence, the MBE represented America and the JPL employees knew this…they mitigated risk and accounted for everything….America was going to Mars.

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