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4 Shuttle Orbiter Production Change Impact Assessment Process ‐ A Collaborative Team Effort
Author(s) -
Hines James E.,
Weeks Donald P.,
McCallister Timothy P.,
Ouellette Fred A.
Publication year - 1999
Publication title -
incose international symposium
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
ISSN - 2334-5837
DOI - 10.1002/j.2334-5837.1999.tb00262.x
Subject(s) - space shuttle , orbiter , aeronautics , engineering , consolidation (business) , restructuring , process (computing) , operations management , business , computer science , aerospace engineering , finance , operating system
The present Space Shuttle program is one in transition ‐ both from the government agency and the contractor level. NASA is restructuring the management of the Space Shuttle Program by turning over the reins of the day‐to‐day operations to a prime contractor, United Space Alliance (USA) ‐ a joint venture partnership with Boeing and Lockheed Martin as major subcontractors. This move is intended to save millions of dollars in costs by eliminating duplicate resources, streamlining operations, and reducing nonessential program requirements. Most separate shuttle related contracts have been consolidated into one Shuttle Program. While this consolidation effort is taking place, NASA, USA, Boeing are working closely together to provide the American public a Space Shuttle Program that continues to be technically viable, safe, and now more cost effective. Central to organizational consolidation is the way people think and do their work. Changes have been made emphasizing working together as teams and improving the processes they use. A critical process, that was changed, is the Orbiter modifications and upgrades change process. This process covers all changes to the Orbiter hardware, which fix flight to flight anomalies (modifications) as well as make upgrades, which increase safety, meet upcoming manifests, improve supportability and reduce costs. This paper deals specifically with process improvements made to the change control process methodology and implementation procedures (known as the change impact assessment process) by NASA, USA and Boeing to be more proactive and cost effective.