Gus...

Gus...

This week I'm attending a conference in Chicago. This morning's keynote speaker was Mike Mullane, a retired space shuttle astronaut. He gave a great presentation, and he gave away a copy of his autobiography (great marketing stunt) during his speech by asking a US space program trivia question: "Who was the 2nd US Astronaut to fly?" Somebody guessed John Glenn, but I wasn't surprised that that was wrong. So I put up my hand, and he actually called on me and I hollared "Gus Grissom". I have no idea how I knew that, but there really wasn't any doubt in my mind.

So now I have an autographed copy of Riding Rockets. It is funny and well-written. I'm really enjoying it. His speech outlined how NASA created a corrupt culture focused on delivering results and actively ignoring safety and risks in what Mullane called 'Normalized Deviance'. Normalized Deviance is our capacity to do what is wrong because someone says it is ok, or someone creates a culture where it is ok. This mirrors a documentary I watched last night on PBS about the rise and fall of Enron. What a horrifying story!

Yet the truth of the matter is, would I have behaved any differently if I had been a mid-level manager at Enron, or an engineer at NASA? I'd like to think so, but who knows; I have a healthy respect for my shadow. 'There but for the grace of God go I.'

In other news, the 100 most beautiful people (normally I would create a link to a story like this, but I'm sorry, I refuse to link to People Magazine!) list was published today, and, alas, I'm not on it. Nor are any of my friends. Makes me wonder if anyone with a crooked nose every made the list. Or is there a top 100 of anything list that I could be on. Maybe: "Top 100 Self-proclaimed Middle Aged White Guy Bloggers Who are Making Top 100 Lists Tonight".