Learning from history: Low-cost project innovation in the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration

Beginning in 1992, officials in the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) undertook a concerted effort to conduct a series of low-cost space exploration missions. Initially, the approach worked well. The effort fell into disfavor after a succession of mission failures between 1999 and 2002. Following those failures, NASA officials returned to a more traditional systems management approach for the next set of projects in the low-cost line. Based on an analysis of thirty-one projects with launch dates between 1992 and 2008, this article provides a history of NASA's experience with low-cost innovation. It suggests that both the initial team-based approach and the systems management approach have merit so long as managers pay close attention to the requirements each approach imposes. Analysis further suggests that the troubled projects suffered from a misapplication of management techniques developed for the team-based approach.