NASA’s Former Head of Science on What It Takes to Manage Complex, High-Risk Projects

As the head of science at NASA, Thomas Zurbuchen managed an $8.6 billion dollar budget. A typical Monday, for him, might have involved hitting an asteroid with a space craft or trying to launch a rocket.

Zurbuchen left that role in 2022, but he’s still the longest continually serving head of science in NASA’s history. He and his team accomplished a lot in that time.

In this episode, he shares what he learned about leading extremely technical, complex, and expensive projects with a high risk of failure. You’ll learn how to manage your time, how to balance high-level strategy work with overseeing operations, and how to manage failure in a way that encourages learning and innovation.

Key episode topics include: leadership, teams, talent management, innovation, NASA, managing risk, collaboration, engineering, project management, government.

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• Listen to the original HBR IdeaCast episode: NASA’s Science Head on Leading Space Missions with Risk of Spectacular Failure (2022)
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