As a speaker, Mike Mullane, space shuttle astronaut, author and educator, aims to lift teams into new orbit. He’ll present the closing keynote at the 2024 ARA Conference and Expo, Dec. 3 to 5 in Houston.
Mullane served in the US Air Force and in the Vietnam War flying 134 combat missions. A member of the first shuttle astronaut class, he went to space on three missions.
He applies lessons from his unique career to how they can benefit everyone in business.
“Great things happen with great teamwork,” he says. “The vast majority of people are involved in teams, so they are working toward a common objective, and teamwork and leadership are everything to achieve objectives.”
He explains more on The Scoop podcast:
Mullane highlights how investing in leadership is important.
“One of the key attributes of a great leader is empowering what I refer to as courageous conversations,” he says. “It’s important for leadership to say, ‘I want to see through your eyes. Don’t assume I’m aware of something.’ That’s the power of a team–that all of these perspectives are on the table so we can discuss and pick the best one to move forward.”
The vulnerability Mullane highlights is a predictable surprise.
He says the root of this is normalization of deviance. An example is the Challenger disaster and tragedy in 1986, which was a four year normalization of deviance.
“People are very good at planning, and they say these are red lines we’re not going to step over. But then you come under pressure and you rationalize something you know you shouldn’t do. But probably get away with it. And so you do it, and then the next time you’re in that same circumstance, you’re going to do it again,” he says.
When red lines are crossed, the deviance is normalized and the outcome becomes a predictable surprise.
As for new entrants to a market, Space X’s footprint in the space industry offers an interesting takeaway from Mullane’s perspective.
“When SpaceX come on, there were definitely all of the legacy launch launchers around the world. And SpaceX said there’s a better way to do this; it’s going to save a lot of money, and there’s reusability of these rockets,” he says.
Described as a tsumani of change, SpaceX drove the cost to one-third of what other launchers could do, and lift twice the weight into orbit.
Mullane cautions anyone to not consider what is possible with innovation and alternative ways of offering solutions.
