Expert answer:Leadership Articles

Expert answer:Your overview should identify and discuss the major theme or topic; the author(s)’ method of inquiry, if relevant; discuss the main findings and conclusions; and, present your assessment of the above.This may include a critique of the authors(s)’ approach, comparison to other relevant work, or discussion of the significance of the conclusions, or any other aspect of the reading. It is not recommended to attempt all of these in your assessment. Compare and contrast the authors’ views on a shared themeYour overview should be approximately 750 words (3‐4 pages, double‐spaced).Make sure to do the overview based off of both! articles!
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W. Henry Lambright
Syracuse University
Administrative
Profile
Leadership and Change at NASA: Sean O’Keefe as
Administrator
S
ean O’Keefe was administrator of the National
Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA)
from December 2001 to February 2005, a little
more than three years.1 During that time, however, he
achieved what Doig and Hargrove (1987) set as a key
requirement for effective entrepreneurial leadership—
the establishment of a new mission for his agency. His
prime legacy to NASA was the presidential decision
that the agency return to the moon and then eventually
go to Mars. Called the Vision for Space Exploration,
the decision was broader than the Moon-Mars
initiative and entailed an ongoing quest to explore
space through robotic and human flight. Moon-Mars
was the focus, particularly the moon, but the key
word in the decision was “exploration.”
W. Henry Lambright is a professor of
public administration and political science
in the Maxwell School at Syracuse
University. He is the author or editor of
seven books and more than 250 articles,
papers, and reports. His books include a
biography, Powering Apollo: James E. Webb
of NASA (Johns Hopkins University Press,
1995). His current research focuses on
leadership and change at NASA since the
end of the Cold War.
E-mail: whlambri@maxwell.syr.edu
Getting NASA’s manned space program out of Earth’s
orbit and back to the moon and its original exploration
mission had been a goal of space enthusiasts since the
end of the Apollo era. That O’Keefe steered this
ambition into decision, and did so in so brief a tenure,
was not only notable but also an unexpected
accomplishment.
O’Keefe did not come to NASA as a space enthusiast.
Sean O’Keefe was administrator of NASA a little more
He was a generalist administrator whose expertise was
than three years. In that eventful and turbulent period,
financial management. He was sent to NASA primarily
he dealt with numerous issues. Appointed to cope
to mitigate the International Space Station’s $4.8
with a huge cost overrun on the International Space
billion overrun problem. He specifically rejected
Station, he was soon engulfed in the Columbia shuttle
destination-driven goals (i.e., Moon-Mars) in favor of
accident and its investigation. Subsequently, he engiscience-driven objectives in his first year (O’Keefe 2002).
neered a presidential decision that
NASA return to the moon and
Yet, in late 2003 and throughout
Getting NASA’s manned
go eventually to Mars. He also
2004, he promoted the Vision for
sought to terminate the immensely
Space Exploration and thus the
space program out of the
popular Hubble Space Telescope.
Moon-Mars goal, and he reorgaEarth’s orbit and back to the
The Moon-Mars decision was
nized and reprioritized NASA to
moon and its original
O’Keefe’s most important achieveimplement the new mission. What
exploration mission had been a caused this change? And why did
ment, as that involving Hubble
goal of space enthusiasts
was his most controversial action.
he also, at the same time, make a
since the end of the
This essay tracks O’Keefe’s role at
decision to terminate the imNASA as a case study in leadership
mensely popular Hubble Space
Apollo era.
and change.
Telescope? Wasn’t Hubble NASA’s
230
Public Administration Review • March | April 2008
prime example of a science-driven mission? Wasn’t it
involved in exploration of the space frontier, albeit
through non-manned means?
Behind the decisions to launch a new mission and to
end an old one—two huge technological choices—was
the Columbia space shuttle disaster of February 2003.
That accident, which took seven astronauts’ lives and
resulted in a major investigation, seared O’Keefe to
the core. Yet he dealt with the crisis and its aftermath
with a rare blend of strength and compassion. Columbia hurt, but it also opened a window of opportunity
for change. O’Keefe skillfully guided a presidential
decision process to determine NASA’s post-Columbia
future. Not so skillfully, he dealt with Hubble.
In his first year, O’Keefe was widely seen as an incremental manager, competent but not a bold innovator.
His critics called him a “bean counter,” and he did not
reject that characterization. In his third year, he led
NASA in what was potentially transformative change.
He was praised by space enthusiasts for the MoonMars decision and condemned by many of the same
people for trying to kill Hubble. In between his first
and third years, the Columbia disaster struck. That
event defined O’Keefe’s time at NASA and his
approach to subsequent decisions.
Approach
Our focus is on the NASA administrator in relation to
policy innovation. Policy innovation can be conceived
as moving through six stages: (1) agenda setting, (2)
adoption, (3) early implementation, (4) execution, (5)
evaluation and modification, and (6) later implementation to completion. Termination of the change
process can occur at any point (deLeon 1999).
The model suggests incremental change. However,
innovation in policy can be abrupt and discontinuous rather than gradual and evolutionary. Events can
disrupt or, as some scholars say, “punctuate” a
particular “equilibrium” of interests that control a
policy. New actors can come into the fray. An occasion for discontinuous change opens. If there is an
able policy entrepreneur present to take advantage of
the fluid situation, he or she can redirect and enlarge
policy in a substantial way (True, Jones, and
Baumgartner 1999). Transformational change
becomes possible.
Many administrators seek to introduce policy change
and move it forward. Whether they are effective depends on many factors, only some of which they can
control. Change, especially major change, requires the
use of executive power. Leaders can use power deftly
or clumsily. They can avoid or invite struggle. Influencing policy change requires skill in the right context
of organization and times. It necessitates having allies
with political clout. It also requires an element of luck
(Doig and Hargrove 1987). Top administrators make
controversial decisions and engage in contests with
other political forces. As O’Keefe’s experience shows,
they win some and lose others.
Background and Style
O’Keefe was 45 years old at the time of his appointment to NASA. Born in Monterey, California, he was
the son of a naval officer who was also a nuclear
submariner under the legendary Hyman Rickover. He
received his bachelor’s degree from Loyola University
in New Orleans and then attended the Maxwell
School of Syracuse University, where he earned a
master of public administration degree in 1978.
Awarded a Presidential Management Internship, he
began his Washington career as a budget analyst for
the U.S. Department of Defense. During the 1980s,
he served on the staff of the Senate Appropriations
Committee. There, he got to know a number of influential lawmakers, including Dick Cheney, Republican
congressman from Wyoming. When George H. W.
Bush became president in 1989, he appointed Cheney
his secretary of defense. Cheney selected O’Keefe to
serve as comptroller and chief financial officer of the
Defense Department. When the U.S. Navy suffered a
sexual harassment scandal (Tailhook) in 1992, Cheney
sent O’Keefe to the navy as its secretary to fix the
mess (Vistica 1995).
O’Keefe left Washington when the Bill Clinton
administration took office in 1993. He worked first
for Pennsylvania State University and then moved to
an endowed chair at the Maxwell School, running the
school’s National Security Program. When George W.
Bush became president in 2001, with Cheney as his
vice president, O’Keefe returned to Washington as
deputy director of the Office of Management and
Budget (OMB). There, he addressed a $4.8 billion
overrun on the International Space Station that the
Bush administration had inherited from its predecessor.
He negotiated a series of cuts and delays in various
hardware components, along with an independent
review of NASA’s space station financial woes. In line
with the independent panel’s finding, he identified an
explicit phase of construction during which NASA
would restore its financial credibility (NASA 2001).
This was called “U.S. Core Complete.” It would be
the period of approximately three years between the
existing configuration (essentially a U.S.–Russian
station “core”) and later assembly, when other international partner modules would be linked. The United
States would be launching certain components during
U.S. Core Complete that would make subsequent
international partner assembly possible. It was a time
when NASA could get its financial house in order and
get the station back on track. If NASA could not deal
with its money and scheduling problems, the implicit
threat was that the space station program would be
halted in its smaller-scale form.
Administrative Profile 231
When NASA administrator Dan Goldin left the
agency in November 2001, President Bush, on
Cheney’s recommendation, named O’Keefe to replace
him. It was a surprise choice but generally well received
by NASA watchers. O’Keefe had helped put NASA on
“probation” to fix the station’s overrun, and now he
would be the “probation officer,” supervising the reforms. No expert on space policy, O’Keefe was viewed
askance by some scientists and engineers inside and
outside the agency who wanted someone more technically astute and who visibly shared their enthusiasm for
space. But all agreed that he brought something that
NASA desperately needed: strong links to the Bush
administration (Sietzen and Cowing 2004, 52).
What O’Keefe also provided was a well-honed management style. Intelligent, hardworking, steady, and
nonideological, O’Keefe had developed experience as
a generalist vis-à-vis specialists (i.e., the military) in
the Defense Department. With his budgetary background, he cast a skeptical eye on technical proposals
from program officials in the Department of Defense.
Like the military services, NASA had historically
emphasized technical excellence and subordinated cost
considerations in promoting technical programs,
particularly in human spaceflight. But O’Keefe
believed that costs counted equally, and NASA needed to
balance costs with the rewards of technology. Also, he
urged NASA professionals to justify their programs in
terms of broader benefits than that NASA should go
into space “because it’s there,” or “manifest destiny,” or
“it’s in our DNA.” His predecessor, Goldin, had felt
those values in his soul and expressed them, but not
O’Keefe (Lambright 2007). He wanted more tangible
rationales.
O’Keefe emphasized process in decision making. He
especially linked policy and budget. The annual budget process created deadlines and pushed managers to
consider programs, priorities, options, costs, and
justifications. More than a budgeteer, O’Keefe
thought beyond policy decisions to consider how to
get them sold to political masters and then executed.
O’Keefe believed that “management” was a legitimate
field and that he could manage NASA even though he
was not a longtime spaceman. A fast learner, he listened to and questioned subordinates. He brought a
team-player approach to administrative leadership
rather than coming across as a one-man show.
He preferred to work behind the scenes and was comfortable with politics inside the beltway. He knew
Congress well and could deal one on one in private with
lawmakers. He had former mentors and supporters in
Congress, but there were also lawmakers (and media
people) who chafed at his rhetorical style. He could
speak in long, complex sentences that seemed to critics a form of “bureaucratese” intended to obscure
rather than answer questions directly.
232
Public Administration Review • March | April 2008
Like any leader, O’Keefe had his strengths and weaknesses, his supporters and detractors. To admirers, he
was determined; to critics, he was stubborn. But few
questioned his genuine devotion to public service. He
took the practice (and theory) of public administration seriously. He wanted to do well at NASA. Many
Washington insiders believed that if he succeeded at
NASA, he might become defense secretary if President
Bush won a second term and Donald Rumsfeld did
not stay on at the Pentagon.
Setting an Agenda
O’Keefe arrived at NASA at the beginning of January
2002. He encountered a myriad of briefings at
NASA’s headquarters and in its various field centers.
He soon began to mold his executive team. He chose
Fred Gregory, then NASA associate administrator for
space flight, for the deputy administrator slot.
Gregory was a former U.S. Air Force flier and NASA
astronaut. He chose Bill Readdy, who had worked as
deputy to Gregory and who at one time had been a
naval aviator and NASA astronaut, to take Gregory’s
position. He brought over from the OMB key officials
with whom he had worked, notably Steve Isakowitz,
the OMB’s top budget examiner for NASA. He
appointed Isakowitz NASA comptroller. He also made
Paul Pastorek, a lawyer and man he had known since
college, NASA’s general counsel. Pastorek would be
his closest confidante.
Some observers worried that O’Keefe, being nontechnical, needed to have more high-powered, highly
credentialed scientists and engineers in his inner
circle. Others pointed out that he relied on associate
administrators at the program level for technical
expertise, as well as the chief scientist position. He
valued loyalty along with competence, but it was more
a personal than a partisan form of loyalty.
O’Keefe initially focused on change in the human
space flight program. He pulled power up to headquarters from Johnson Space Center in Houston.
He put his appointees in key posts at Johnson Space
Center, which was most responsible for the shuttle
and International Space Station. He personally negotiated with international partners (Europe, Japan,
Canada, and Russia) in the space station program. He
directly dealt with influential lawmakers. He sought
to recast the manned space program financially while
rebuilding the space station’s credibility.
Consolidating his power and speaking of “one NASA” as
a rhetorical strategy to overcome field center feudalism,
he increasingly gave thought to communicating a broad
“vision” for the agency and its many constituencies.
He believed that NASA needed a common vision to
help pull its disparate components closer together. The
vision would be also a statement of his own agenda
for NASA. After three months in office, he felt ready to
convey his philosophy. On April 12, he went to his
alma mater, the Maxwell School of Syracuse University,
and delivered a highly publicized and anticipated
address on the direction in which he wished to take
the agency (O’Keefe 2002). Saying that NASA’s role
was “to improve life here, to extend life to there, and
to find life beyond,” he declared that NASA “must
be driven by the science, not by destination.” This
was, he emphasized, “the big change” he intended to
make. He rejected calls from space enthusiasts that
NASA seek a bold mission back to the moon and
on to Mars. “We will go,” he avowed, “where the
science dictates that we go, not because it’s close
or popular.”
study station utilization issues. The panel advised him
that good science required fully completing the station so that it would go from its present complement
of three astronauts to at least six. With a larger and
fully functional station, more astronauts could be
aboard doing science rather than mere maintenance
(Morring 2002b).
There was much more in his speech, including the
revival of the educator in space program, his plan to
launch a teacher into space, and a general emphasis on
NASA’s educational and inspirational role. But the
most critical policy change, as he acknowledged, was
the explicit call for NASA to be science driven rather
than destination driven. Space enthusiasts who heard
or read the address were extremely unhappy. Tom
DeLay, a Republican from Texas, the influential majority leader in the House, and a strident space advocate, sharply criticized O’Keefe’s speech and called his
vision “tepid, anemic” (Weiner 2002; Morring 2002a,
24). Other legislators, aware of the budget realities in
a post-9/11 world, praised O’Keefe’s cautious and, in
their view, realistic approach.
The centerpiece for policy adoption was the OSP.
O’Keefe and his associates expected to outline the
OSP proposal more fully in early February 2003, as
part of NASA’s presidential budget proposal for the
new fiscal year. That immediate future of NASA and
its international partners was linked to finishing the
space station and putting it to the maximum scientific
use. O’Keefe and his associates were optimistic about
the era ahead (Pastorek 2003). It was not spectacular,
but it was technically and financially feasible, or so it
seemed to its architects.
The big problem with finishing and using the International Space Station was the space shuttle. It was
getting old and was limited in the number of flights it
could provide. Under O’Keefe’s policy, technology
was to enable science. Hence, in November, he
revealed a new technology development program for
adoption. Called the Integrated Space Transportation
If becoming “science driven” was the first element in
Plan, his program had three aspects. First, beginning
his vision, then “technology as enabler” was the
in the current year, NASA would launch a major
second. He wanted to take
effort to upgrade the shuttle to
NASA back to its roots as a
make it viable until 2020. Secresearch and development agency
He wanted to take NASA back ond, beginning in the next year,
and to develop technology that
NASA would initiate a major
to its roots as a research and
would allow NASA to advance,
development project, the Orbital
development agency and
step by step, “to great achieveSpace Plane (OSP). This would
develop technology that would be an “interim” transportation
ments.” In a special initiative, he
called for going beyond solar and allow NASA to advance, step by system. Its purpose was to
step, “to great achievements.”
chemical propulsion to a highsupplement, and thus help prepriority nuclear propulsion
serve, the shuttle. It could take
program that would enable
astronauts to and from the
deeper and longer robotic spaceflight missions with
International Space Station and serve as a possible
much greater science payoffs. Nuclear propulsion had
rescue vehicle. It would use expendable rockets and
been downplayed under O’Keefe’s predecessor.
thus not be a true shuttle replacement. That would
O’Keefe, familiar with nuclear propelled submarines
come much later and constitute the third aspect
from his navy days (and father), had no such
of the Integrated Space Transportation Plan (CAIB
reticence.
2003, 116).
Pursuing Adoption
In the months that followed, O’Keefe could see the
costs of the space station becoming increasingly
“manageable.” He concluded that it would be possible
to go beyond U.S. Core Complete to add international partner modules for a finished space station. In
line with his policy of emphasizing science requirements, he had an advisory panel of leading researchers
Suspending Policy: Columbia
On February 1, 2003, just a few days before O’Keefe
could officially detail NASA’s proposed OSP development program and other plans, disaster struck. As it
came into the atmosphere in preparation for landing,
the Columbia space shuttle disintegrated, killing all
seven astronauts aboard. Waiting at Cape Canaveral,
O’Keefe was at first in a state of shock. Then, steeling
himself, he ordered NASA to put its contingency plan
for a shuttle disaster into effect. This was a plan he
had seen his first day on the job and never expected to
employ (O’Keefe 2004a).
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