Challenger Case Study

The challenger Case study portrays many signficant things about effective strategic leadership in an organisation as well as how ineffective strategic leadrship can be very detrimental to that given organisation. The case study illustrates the importance of implementing an effective strategic leadership within an organisation as it can only bring out the best if executed properly. Through instrumental things such as collabration and corporation existing, establishing ethical practices/moral obligations, being democratic and having the ability to negoitiate well with management as well as staff all prove to be very important in helping an organisation posses an effective startegic leadership. The lack of these major tools between Nasa and Morton Thiokol and within these organisations was a reason for the failure of the mission to launch that would eventually end deadly for the seven astranauts.

Other things to conisder about effective strategic leadership inlcudes the importance of communication and the importance of listening to others, the need for managers to be accessible, and maintaining an agenda that everyone agrees with and supports either at senior management level or from your workers. Communication is very important to any organisation as non communication or the wrong communication can be harmful as it was in the Challenger Case study. The need to listen and not just dicate should also be conisdered highly in attaining effective strategic leadrship. Accessibility of managers is also very important as its a form of communication and its a way to reach out to managers and express any worries, concerns, or vital information that might be needed. Lastly having an agenda that everyone knows and follows is crucial for organisations as conflicting agendas or misintepretation can cause conflict or disrupt progress and the fluid movement of things within an organisation.  

The reasons why the mission still proceeded despite warning are down to a list of things. Firstly, the had already been 6 failures in the past to Launch and a few setbacks during the start to lauch the challenger which would tarnish the image of Nasa further more as it was a widely publicised event. Nasa was probably worried about their reputation, image and if the decision was given not to undergo the highly publicised launch at that stage it could be a huge media disaster. Also cost and finance would also be taking into consideration if delayed any more. Another reason was that the engineers at Morton Thiokol didn't provide a solid enough arguement to management and to management at NASA as well as persuade them enough to abort the launch.in addition, the engineers at Morton Thiokol and the managers as well as the mangement at NASA have conflicting views and don't share the same beliefs and attitude which shows a clear lack of communication and understanding. NASA's ambition overclouded their judgement and the priority of civilians saftey first was overlooked and treated secondary from the management at NASA as well as from Joe Kilminster and the 3 managers from Morton Thiokol.

People to blame includes the engineers, the management at Morton Thiokol and NASA who all play an instrumental role each through negelcting and not taking the full responsibilty of ensuring firstly the safety of the seven astranauts before anything. The enginners which includes Roger Boisjoly and his team of engineers could have done alot more to ensure that the rest of the decision makers where aware one hundred percent of the dangers involved with proceeding with the launch. They could have tried harder to persuade them as well as stop them and make them realise the immense danger that was present. Lastly, the Management from Morton Thiokol and management form NASA were very reckless with their decision making and did not conisder saftey as a priority but rather business fisrt.

The are a few things to consider In looking at what the engineers could have done in order to stop the mission. I think first and foremost they could have tried whistleblowing to the media which would have exposed the danger involved with the launch. This might have possibly delayed the launch or completely stop it as well as inform the astranauts, the launch director who was unaware of the dangers mentioned. This in all would have put pressure on the managers at Morton Thiokol and NASA to completely ensure the saftey of the astranauts and would also inform everyone of the danger involved. That final meeting between engineers, management and NASA could have seen more pressure and a powerful, aggressive voice coming from the engineers explaining all the reasons to abort the launch.

In comparing all these case studies together their major things present in all of them. Firstly, the importance of effective communication as well as collabration and corportaion needing to be existent within an organisation as in all four case studies except the Madonna case study we see how the failure to do so has a negative impact. In Order to achieve an effective strategic leadership all three actions have to be carried out and executed from managemnt to staff as well as within management. The Challenger case study differs from the other case studies because it involved the death of people but had underlining issues similar to Carrefour and the NHS Case study that demonstarted a lack of important ingredients needed to bring about progess and success. It also differed as it touched on the issue of ethical practices and moral obligations needing to be taken into consideration from organisations.