A Conversation With: Neal Hammond

H. Neal Hammond was appointed Vice President, Exploration Programs for United Space Alliance in August 2005 after serving as USA’s Vice President and Associate Program Manager for Program Integration. He also previously served as Program Director, Government Programs, for Rockwell Houston Operations and as Director of Systems and Cargo Engineering for Rockwell’s Space Systems Division. In his current role, Hammond is responsible for establishing and maintaining USA’s business strategy for NASA’s Space Exploration Programs and is responsible for interfacing with and actively advocating USA business strategy to NASA’s Exploration Directorate. The USA Update talked to Hammond about his roles and his outlook for USA’s future in NASA’s Exploration programs.

UPDATE: As USA’s Vice President for Exploration, what is your role in positioning USA to play a part in the Exploration program of the future?

HAMMOND: One of my roles is to oversee USA’s Strategic Plan and the strategic planning process. I work with the USA Strategic Planning Council to develop the plan. We are in the process of going through our first major cycle. What I focus on is the long-term road map, where USA is going, and what we will look like in 5 years.

Another role I have is to work with the NASA decision makers in whatever way makes sense that supports our strategy. I spend a lot of time in Washington D.C. attempting to do that. I support our Washington D.C. office, which does a fantastic job managing USA’s government relations. Kate Kronmiller, Meghan Allen, and Samantha Segall do a terrific job representing our interests and are highly respected in the District. I’m there to support our efforts with NASA Headquarters, Congress and any other governmental agencies, as required.

UPDATE: How does your role interface with the Constellation Program Office and the Business Development Office?

HAMMOND: We work very closely together on a daily basis. It is almost a serial process. As I stated earlier, I am looking at the long-term roadmap for USA and our potential role as the future operator for Constellation Systems.

The Business Development Office, under Joe Hammond, is focused on specific pursuits – putting together the resources, capture strategies, and proposal teams that target individual opportunities like Orion, the Crew Exploration Vehicle (CEV), and Ares, the Crew Launch Vehicle (CLV).

Anne Martt is, of course, our Constellation Program Manager. Her responsibility is managing all the work as we bring it in the door. She will be putting together organizations and processes in order to handle those contracts.

I have to say that I feel fortunate to be a part of this team. The Business Development office has done a terrific job in managing the sheer volume and variation of the pursuit opportunities out there and have a big win as part of the Lockheed Orion team. The Constellation Program Office is taking shape quickly and has already made a significant contribution in helping the NASA customer prepare for the upcoming Systems Requirements Review.

UPDATE: What is USA’s long-range strategy?

HAMMOND: Our belief is that the roles we play now for the Shuttle and Station programs – the kinds of functions we perform – are the same functions that are going to be required once we are flying the next generation of vehicles.

You still have to process the vehicles; you still have to launch them. You still have to recover the reusable hardware, and you have to maintain the launch infrastructure, software and control systems to do that.

In Houston, you still have to do mission planning, you have to have some form of flight control, and you still have to train the crews.

Our belief is that USA should be the long-term operator for Constellation. Our focus is how we get from here to there.

UPDATE: How do you interface with the NASA Explorations Directorate?

HAMMOND: As folks might be aware, after Michael Griffin became the Administrator, NASA transformed its organizational structure. Scott “Doc” Horowitz is the associate administrator for the Exploration Systems Mission Directorate (ESMD), and Bill Gerstenmaier, our current customer, whom we have worked with for a long time, is the associate administrator for the Space Operations Mission Directorate. These two organizations work more closely together than they have in the past. As another part of this transformation under Dr. Griffin, a lot of responsibility and accountability that was at headquarters has been moved to the field centers. This is beneficial to USA because our employees at the centers have very good relationships with their NASA counterparts, who essentially depend on USA to accomplish their missions.

Our interface with ESMD doesn’t just occur at headquarters, it occurs at all the field centers as well. It occurs based on many of the relationships that we have had for a long time. That is very helpful to us. We also work closely with NASA headquarters to understand what their thought processes are and offer our experience and skills to assist them in meeting their goals.

UPDATE: What are the opportunities for USA as you see them?

HAMMOND: USA has positioned itself as a major subcontractor to Lockheed Martin in the newly announced CEV, or Orion contract. We are also working as a subcontractor with ATK on the first stage for CLV, or Ares.

Another exciting thing is NASA’s recent approval of the JOFOC, or Justification for Other than Full and Open Competition. This means they want us to start using our existing and follow-on contracts and our workforce to do Constellation work at the centers. JSC’s Mission Operations Directorate has a number of Constellation-related tasks they would like to put us to work on right now. The same is true at KSC in terms of trying to put together the infrastructure and the planning for the first flight tests. At Marshall Space Flight Center, we are working very hard to establish an even broader relationship with the NASA Engineering organization, in addition to the work we already do to support them.

What we bring to the table in all of these areas is our experience as operators for Shuttle, something that is extremely valuable to the developers of the next vehicles. Their interest is in what makes sense in designing the vehicle or the interfaces differently, based on things we have learned over 25 years of Shuttle operations.

The fact that NASA has indicated that they want to do this through our contracts is exciting because it shows that they recognize the value of our workforce being involved in this process from the beginning. This is something that we have been working on for over six months, so it’s really gratifying that it is coming to fruition now.

UPDATE: From your viewpoint, what is USA’s biggest challenge in becoming a key player in Exploration programs?

HAMMOND: I think one of our biggest challenges is going to be rethinking the way we operate as a company. We are used to having one contract with one large customer and one set of processes. In the future, we are probably not going to look like that. We are going to tend to have more contracts that are smaller and more varied types of customers, whether it be different NASA centers, different NASA projects within the Constellation Program, or other prime contractors.

We will probably be a subcontractor more than we are now, and we will need to learn how to do that well. In so doing, we have to evolve our existing systems, whether financial or technical, and make them flexible enough to support different contracts and customers simultaneously. That’s something that the Vision USA activity has focused on, but I think that is still one of our biggest challenges.

UPDATE: From your viewpoint, what is USA’s biggest advantage in becoming a key player in Exploration programs?

HAMMOND: Our biggest advantages are our people and our skills and NASA’s acknowledgement of our workforce and its capabilities.

NASA recognizes that there are many things that they simply can’t do without the folks we have that are working with them on a daily basis.

NASA also recognizes, I believe, that the operator really needs to be involved early during the design and development process this time. I think NASA really “gets it” in terms of the role of the operator and how critical that is during the development process.

UPDATE: What can employees do to ensure USA’s place in capturing a role in the Exploration Program?

HAMMOND: The first and most obvious thing is to continue to perform at the same excellent level that they always do. The first step of the Vision was returning the Shuttle to safe flight, and we’ve accomplished that. Hopefully we continue to fly safely and complete assembly of the International Space Station and operate it successfully. If we can’t do that, all bets are off. Folks need to continue to remain focused on doing the jobs they do safely and effectively every day.

Beyond that, employees need to be understanding and patient. There is going to be a lot of change as we go along. We are working very hard to try and involve USA wherever it makes sense in the Constellation Program. Our leadership team spends a lot of time focused on that. Employees need to be flexible and understand that it will take time for our level of involvement in those programs to be as large as we would like it to be. In the end, I believe, our employees will be excited about the progress we are making and USA’s role in the Vision of Space Exploration.

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