Lessons Learned: An Effective Approach to Avoid Repeating the Same Old Mistakes

Space missions face major challenges when it comes to improving processes and procedures, making it difficult to guarantee a repeat of good experiences while avoiding bad ones. The core activity to achieve these objectives is a robust method to collect, organize, and disseminate lessons learned. The inherent complications of managing lessons include fear of finger pointing, lack of transparency, and poor team awareness, causing the process to weaken over time. For the Satelite de Aplicaciones Cientificas-D/Aquarius mission, a method was implemented allowing any participant in the mission to register quick contributions about suspected anomalies, proposed improvements, or learned lessons into the system. During all project phases, the submitted inputs were periodically classified and refined by a working group and passed on to a board for final analysis and determination. This method allowed for a drastic reduction in the amount of processed items with respect to the quick contributions received. Anomalies...