What’s Your Moonshot? Here’s What Leaders Can Learn From Apollo 11

What’s Your Moonshot? Here’s What Leaders Can Learn From Apollo 11

WHERE WERE YOU DURING THE LANDING?  If you were alive and over the age of 8, you probably remember where you were on July 20, 1969, when we held our collective breath, along with an estimated 650 million people worldwide, as our Apollo 11 crew approached the moon.

 THE FINAL 12 MINUTES:  While we have focused on Armstrong and Aldrin as heroes, an astounding 400,000 people backed them up as engineers, control commanders, Navy SEALS and on and on. I highly recommend that you revisit the final heart-stopping 12 minutes before the landing by listening to NPR’s replay of the recording between the crew and Mission Control back in Houston.

ERRORS AT THE END:  Here’s what I didn’t know or remember: the landing almost didn’t happen. There was a series of last-minute glitches, including a loss of radio contact, and a mysterious alarm from the on-board computer. The device startled the crew by flashing error codes that the team had never seen. There was also a question of whether they would run out of fuel. And, the Apollo 11 spacecraft was traveling too quickly and in danger of overshooting the planned landing site.

The mysterious computer code – 1202 – caused a scramble back in Houston as the Mission Control Center tried to determine what it meant. A young engineer finally offered that the same code had flashed during a dress rehearsal, leading him to abort the whole simulation – for which he was later reprimanded. The code simply meant that the computer was overloaded but not ready to fail, so they blasted on.

EVERYONE STAYED ON COURSE:  We all know how this story ends. Yet what impressed me was the steely calm of the crew and the Mission Control Center through all these final upsets. At least based on the recording, no one panicked, blamed or blubbered, they simply did their jobs and pushed on, accomplishing one of the greatest feats of human engineering and cooperation in history.

What can leaders learn from this mission?

What Should You Do?

Set concrete visions and missions. Kennedy didn’t hesitate to set an audacious goal of putting a man [sic] on the moon by the end of the decade, inspiring a focused and jet-fueled team that flew through their jobs. In contrast, I’m always concerned when leaders set abstract goals – “to be a world-class company”, fo r example – encouraging nothing but yawns and lackadaisical efforts from their crew.

Train for mishaps. Both the crew and Houston Mission Control had gamed out countless scenarios before the actual flight. When error codes started flashing, I’m sure that hearts started racing, but everyone knew what to do. Fumbles are foreseeable; it’s not just working to hang onto the ball that’s important, but learning to recover from the inevitable blunders.

Keep calm and carry on. These famous words attributed to Winston Churchill were actually from a World War II poster that was never issued during the War but which has now come to be indelibly associated with his spirit and leadership. The phrase offers a useful mantra. If you can keep breathing, and inspiring your team to do the same, the results will inevitably be more successful than endless upsets.

Learn cooperation and conflict management. If either the crew or the Mission Control Center staff wanted to fight and be right more than they wanted to accomplish the landing, no one would have ever walked on the moon.

For more tips about leading through storms, visit:

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