24 Project Management Principles from NASA Team

We break down NASA’s internal code of honor.

 

In 2014, NASA published 100 principles that project managers should follow in their work. These are the people responsible for the American space program – under their management work the best specialists from around the world. The key principles of work on projects were developed by Jerry Madden, Deputy Director of NASA’s Aeronautical Projects Department, and his colleague Rod Stewart.We have selected and translated the most important of them.

About project managers

#1. Be honest with whoever you deal with. The space industry is smaller than you might think – you’ll be surprised how often you’ll run into list of oman cell phone numbers the same people. It’s better to have respect for each other than to hold a grudge.

#2. Angry and upset people can be project managers. Procrastinators and lazy people can’t.

#3. A project manager may not know exactly how to perform a specific task, but he or she must be aware of what actions will lead to achieving the set goal.

#4. Not all successful managers are skilled and vice versa. Luck plays a big role in both success and failure. However, it smiles much more often on competent and hardworking people.

#5 Beware of project managers who are also systems engineers and CFOs. These people usually have no fear and, by taking on too much, only hurt projects.

#6. Most managers succeed because of the skills and strengths of their team.

#7. Most problems occur in the early stages of a project. A good plan is half the battle. Experience shows that the vast majority of problems could have been avoided if more time had been spent on problem areas at the very beginning.

About teamwork

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#8 You can’t keep track of everything. But you can keep track of people – your team needs to know that you won’t accept poor work.

#9. The human factor – this is the main cause of failures in project management. To minimize their risk, you should get to know your co-workers better and determine their strengths and weaknesses. This will help to effectively use the personality of each of them in work and ensure that it does not adversely affect the achievement of common goals.

#10. Keep an eye on workaholics – if they go in the wrong direction, they can hurt a project even in the short term. It’s easy to overload them with tasks and burn them out prematurely. Make sure they take enough days off and that their workload doesn’t exceed the norm by more than 25%.

#11. Being involved is key to success. Managers who only supervise and do not participate in the work of others will never know what is going on.

#12. Incompetent employees are most likely not to want to brag about their work.

#13. Never ask your managers to make a decision if you can do it yourself.

About reports

#14. External audits always come at the worst digital accessibility: brazil has only 1% of websites with accessibility possible time. You need to keep your system up to date – both business and technical. Lack of up-to-date information can be grounds for dismissal.

#15. Meetings should be limited to six people. Meetings with more people are good for announcements, not discussions.

#16. The less your superiors are involved in the project, the more reports they will need. In such a situation, they should be prepared as professionally as possible: simplicity and clarity never hurt anyone.

#17. Discussions about the need for reports take more time than the reports themselves. However, if preparing them takes too much time or interferes with daily work, you should let your manager know.

About contractors

#18. Being honest with your business partners is fine, but friendly relationships can compromise your objectivity.

#19. If you have a weak manager on the other side – find another partner to work with.

About engineers and scientists

#20. Engineers are born optimists – they are the last to know about budget overruns. Even when financial difficulties are obvious business leads engineers don’t worry about them.

#21. Most scientists are rational until you limit their scope to experiments. Research is part of scientific work – those doing it can compromise if they know you are being honest with them.

About failures

#22. It is a grave mistake to deny new technologies. It would be worse to forget that computers only imitate the thought process.

#23. Don’t jump to conclusions. Find out exactly what the problem was – misjudging the situation will only lead to another failure.

#24 Don’t be afraid of failure – you won’t succeed without it. Work on your ability to bounce back quickly – part of that is knowing who can help you do that.

 

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