Group Process in the Challenger Launch Decision (A) and (B)

Presented By Group 3: 13. Anant Choudary 16. Sanket Dave Analysis: The Challenger Launch decision on January 28th 1986, proved to be one of the crucial decisions ever made as it lead to one of space science's most talked about disasters. The shuttle exploded within 73 seconds of its launch and triggered one of the biggest failures in both the history of NASA and space science. We analyse the case and ascertain reasons that could have eventually led to this disaster. One of the major constraints for NASA was their budget. Due to the Vietnam war, there was a financial constraint and they were in a position to launch at least 30 flights for them to be able to recover costs and also stay afloat. This was one of the key reasons for NASA to go ahead for the launch of this mission as they felt that another abort or delay in the mission would only result in negative publicity through the media. Also NASA and Thiokol were not on the same side when it came to taking decisions. Both of them were not able to look in the right direction and lacked conformity. This led to communication breakdown which perhaps is a major contributor in effective group decision making. Thiokol from their side were not prepared for the teleconference. This was evident from the way they approached the conference. Neither Robert Boisjoly nor his teammates had concrete evidence as to why the launch should not be given a go ahead at sub 20F temperature. One of the key aspects in group decision process is being prepared with material evidence in order to facilitate the decision making process. Also there was an internal communication failure within Thiokol. Though the criticality ratings of O-Rings was raised in 1982, it was not until 1984 that Boisjoly, an SRB expert came to know of it. With quality time lost, he had very little chance to test the O-Rings under different conditions. There was also lack of ownership for rectification of the critical issue relating to the O-Rings. NASA reviewed the O-Rings case by case rather than doing a complete testing process. Had they gone ahead with a complete test set up, they could have obtained a clear evidence about how the rings would behave during low temperature conditions. This was called "The Russian Roulette". This was a major flaw in the decision making process. There was no proper way in seeking data. This also to an extent led to communication failure between NASA and Thiokol. It is here that the concept of Group think has played a major role in this case. Robert Boisjoly had stated his doubts over the behaviour of O-Rings at lower temperatures. Had he stood firm and tried to convince his team first, Thiokol would have stood by their decision to abort or delay the launch and wait for better conditions. But Boisjoly lost his confidence when was prodded by Larry Mulloy with regards to his findings such as correlation between low temperature and O-Rings behaviour, colour of the soot formed. This resulted in the dilemma of Individual v/s group decision. The group pressure and lack of self confidence resulted in Boisjoly in submitting himself to the group's decision when he actually had a valid alternative. NASA were right in asking questions to Boisjoly, the situation affected him adversely thereby forcing him to conform to the group rather than standing by his opinion which was a valid one. Here the aspect of ethics also was important. NASA wanted to have a successful mission at the earliest, they did not focus on the safety aspects of the mission. Though there was not that much of evidence about the O-Rings' performance, Thiokol's doubts should have made them rethink on their strategy. This could have made them take a decision that would have not resulted in the disaster. For NASA , success at any cost had become their main objective. 14. Siddhartha Reddy 17. Elma Davies 15. Jai Dave 18. Anirudh G

Another flaw in the process was the assumption that the second layer of O-Rings was perfect and would function if the primary layer could not function. This meant that the delay in joint sealing was assumed to be acceptable and hence the probability of a successful mission was high, which clearly was not the case. Thiokol with lack of data were not able to provide new launch criteria which was another glaring error on their part. If Robert Boisjoly had more material evidence and stood his ground in the whole teleconference, he would have been able to convince the other members and prevented the launch of the Challenger 51-L . Case Questions and Answers: 1. How would you characterize the broader context surrounding the January 1986 teleconference? What impact might that have on the groups decision process? On the eve of the Challenger Space Shuttle launch, engineers at Thiokol were sceptical about the launch as the temperature for the launch was in low 20F. The engineers felt that the launch situation was not ideal as the O-Rings that helped in sealing the components could experience erosion, thereby triggering a blow-by. They also had observed erosion when a previous launch at 53F of Flight-15 had taken place. One of the key engineers Roger Boisjoly felt that the launch could prove to be a disaster as they could not forecast how the O-Rings would behave at such low temperatures. Hence Thiokol provided various facts and information to the NASA scientists stationed at MSFC, Alabama, and KSC, Merrit Island. The original date of launch was July 1985, but the mission had already been delayed to accommodate payload, and further delays due to weather and technical reasons and finally scheduled for January 28th 1986. The scientists and NASA management were all set for the launch and did not want any delay. This was because; they had to launch the mission not just for scientific reasons, but for economic, political and scheduling backlogs. NASA also had to launch at least 30 times per year because the program survival depended on routine flights, recovering costs, and making money on commercial payload. Also NASA felt that in the earlier flights (Flight 22 and Flight 17), though there was erosion found in the O-Ring, there was no significant reason to ground or delay the entire mission. Also Thiokol had not provided them with enough evidence and proof to support their claims of possible disaster. They also felt that Thiokol mentioned this problem on the eve of the launch, when they could have done that much earlier. This situation led to a flawed group decision making process. Firstly, there was no strong evidence provided by Thiokol in order to delay the launch. Secondly there was also no support for Roger Boisjoly from within Thiokol, for it was he who raised concerns over the launch temperature. Thirdly and most importantly NASA was in a situation where they had to go ahead with the launch without further delays due to various reasons that ranged from economic to political. All this led to Thiokol being under group pressure, where in they had to surrender themselves to NASA, who were superior in this process since Thiokol did not have any points from their side to substantiate their views. This resulted in the launch of Challenger Flight 51-L, and the disaster that followed.

2. How would you characterize group process in this teleconference? What led to ineffective handling of the situation? In the Challenger space shuttle case, the group involved in the decision making process could not arrive at a solution that was acceptable to all parties involved. Normally in a Group process, decision making becomes meaningful only when we have the resources to aggregate from the parties involved. But here, the resources or evidences provided were few and not satisfactory when it came to convincing the other parties. Moreover in the group decision making, there should be motivating views between the different parties involved which was absent in the current case. Here the conversation was more of a one-to many type, which involved clash of egos. In the end of the group decision process, normally there would be a solution and an acceptance of the same by all the parties involved. But this was absent, since there was only overriding of the individual's views. Here when Boisjoly expressed his doubts over the launch conditions and the effects that could occur, both NASA and Thiokol decided to go ahead with the majority's opinion. This was perhaps why the individual concern or decision of Boisjoly was overridden.

The reasons why the teleconference was handled ineffectively are: There was no proper planning for the discussion, Failure to collect data to show the correlation between the temperature conditions and O-Rings behaviour, Non-acceptance of other members awareness, Internal discussion, during the meeting, which lead to confusions and stoppages in the conversation, There was also no one who could take the responsibility for any decision made. Thiokol themselves were not in a position to stand by their engineer's side during the teleconference which shows that Thiokol themselves did not form a coherent group among themselves prior to the teleconference.

3. What issues face Roger Boisjoly, Bob Lund and Larry Mulloy? How should have they approached the teleconference? Roger Boisjoly: He was the Booster Seal Expert and he was the one who raised the concern about ORing performance at low temperatures. He says that they should rely on their experience base which says that at 53 degrees or less we can expect increased erosion and blow by. He based his judgement on the black soot picture (at 70 degree) but was unable to prove a relation between colour of the soot and O Rings erosion. He could not validate his hypothesis of launching the shuttle at a threshold temperature of 53 degree. Moreover he had already been labelled as being histrionic for his memo he had sent to his boss, Bob Lund. These were the issues that Roger faced during the decision making process. Roger should have researched more into the issue, given that he was an expert in the SRBs. This would have made his analysis even more reliable and could have convinced the NASA management. He should have also taken his Vice President, Joe Kilminster into confidence, as this would have helped in Joe making a firmer judgement about the launch. It was because of the lack of this that Joe decided to go with his team's recommendations without prior knowledge on the severity of the case. If he had a gut feeling about the O-Rings underperforming due to low temperature on the day of launch he should not have gone ahead with the Group decision. Bob Lund: He was the Vice President of the Engineering Division at Thiokol. The issue he faced was about the decision to go ahead with the launch or delay it in order to have a detailed check at the temperature. He was Biosjoly's boss, which also meant that he needed to take into consideration the recommendations of both his sub ordinates and also NASA's decision for the launch. He had already been facing issues with Boisjoly, with respect to the memo that was sent by the latter regarding the attitude of the unofficial task force and the criticality of the matter. Bob could have approached the conference with a lot more confidence in his team. He must have motivated the tem to find out more about the O-Rings' status if the launch temperature was not perfect. This would have pushed Boisjoly and others to collect more information that would have lent an authentic picture to the NASA management of the critical situation they were in had the launch gone as per schedule. Also Bob could have had a few sessions with Boisjoly from which he himself would have got a clear picture of the scale of disaster awaiting them had the launch happened as per schedule. Since he had not been able to discharge the above said functions, he was not in a position to put forth Boisjolys doubts across to the NASA. Larry Mulloy: He was the manager of the SRB at NASA MSFC. He is critically evaluating the situation and acting as the Devil's advocate. Here he questions the validity of the recommendations proposed by Thiokol. He questioned the correlation between the temperature and O-Ring performance. He cites the example of Flight 2 where the outside temperature was 70 F and counters the Thiokol recommendation. He also questions the observation of black soot by Boisjoly and dismisses it on the grounds of lack of evidence. He being from NASA, wants this mission to be launched as scheduled, as it is said that NASA's space shuttle program would be viable only if they have 30 launches per year. According to us, this is one of the reasons he is under pressure to go ahead as per schedule. Although Thiokol did not have a detailed and a comprehensive research supporting their recommendation, Mulloy should have given more time and resources for the research. This was because; the O-Rings were already of a high criticality which meant that a slight deviation could result in catastrophe. Mulloy was also not keen on listening to the concerns raised by Thiokol and was very much for the launch as another delay would prove very costly for NASA's space program that had many restrictions and clauses for itself to remain on its feet.