Apollo 13 Summary

Leadership is the process of influencing individuals or a group of individuals by providing purpose, direction with the support of others, and motivating those individuals with the purpose of accomplishing a certain obligation which is helpful to all individual that is involved.

There are many ways to define leadership, but perhaps the most laconic as well as accurate definition is presented in Peter G. Northouse's Leadership: Theory and Practice book (Northouse, 2013, p.5): "Leadership is a process whereby an individual influences a group of individuals to achieve a common goal". Individuals, engaged in leadership, use influence to solve challenges, which the groups under their leadership face, in order to succeed in their common goals.

Even though technology has been developing at an exponential rate since the past 50 years, there are still some technical problems that are encountering human beings when discovering the outside world, and we have not found solutions to these problems yet. As we all know, Apollo 13 which was designed by NASA, was the seventh manned mission to go on the moon in 1970. The trip took 5 days, 22 hours, 54 minutes, and 41 seconds. The trip encountered the biggest problem when one of the oxygen tanks exploded; air was being circulated at a very specific rate, and the tank explosion led to an increase in the amount of Carbon dioxide and a reduction in circulating the air. Despite the explosion, Apollo 13 made it back on our planet after scientists

Apollo 13 was called the successful failure because of the effort to bring the crew back home. It involved three trained to be astronauts to set foot on the moon. The three astronauts are Jim Lovell, Ken Mattingly and Fred Haise but, Charles Dickson exposed the crew to German Measles and Ken Mattingly was not immune to measles and had to be replaced by Jack Swigart who was part of the backup team. Soon after they were practicing to fly the ship and was not very good. 2 days later it was the day of the launch .

The mission became a complete failure after the oxygen tank exploded leaving the crew with a very short oxygen supply and then they had to worry about CO2 poisoning also. But since the mission was a failure, the NASA space program would now have to create more Apollo missions in order to get a better understanding of space and some of the forms that float around in it. During the Apollo 13 mission they encountered many thing that they wouldn't have wanted to encounter. Most of the encounters that were experienced during this mission weren't at all good. The pilots had one major encounter and that was when one of their main oxygen tanks exploded, this was very catastrophic because this happened right before they were about to descend to the moon’s surface. No one can really understand what exactly went through all of those astronauts heads. There is no worse situation than to be stuck in a small cramped area with very little oxygen and thousands of miles between where you are at and your home. That is quite possibly the worst case scenario. This was then worsened by the fact that they then had to ration their food supplies so that it would last them until they were able to get back to

“Houston, we’ve had a problem.” These words were said by Jack Swigert 2 days after the Apollo 13 launch on April 11, 1970. Apollo 13 was the 3rd U.S. manned lunar landing mission of NASA under Project Apollo. Even though the result of Apollo 13 ended in an unsuccessful attempt to land on the moon again, Apollo 13’s failure to complete their mission of landing on the moon helped aid future Apollo missions in being successful.1 James A.”Jim” Lovell Jr. was born on March 25, 1928, in Cleveland Ohio.

The Apollo 1 mission was met with tragedy, when in a rehearsal for launch, a fire started on the launch pad, ultimately resulting in the deaths of the original three Apollo astronauts. After a lengthy investigation, the program was back on track a couple of years later. The first three missions were conducted as trial runs, working out sequences and systems, with a few minor issues, they were deemed successful. The next two missions resulted in lunar landings and research being conducted, along with materials being brought back to earth for further study. The third attempt at a lunar landing was met with near disaster, when an explosion crippled the spacecraft, and NASA actually had one of their finest moments in the saving and safe return of the Astronauts on board. The

Eight year after President Kennedy’s challenge to put humans on the moon, NASA was able to complete the challenge.

Apollo 13, the 1995 motion picture directed by Ron Howard, is the true story of Jim Lovell, Fred Haise, and Jack Swigert, a team of astronauts reassigned to a space flight with diminished preparation time. This routine mission to the moon suddenly becomes a survival mission to safely return home to Earth. The film details the circumstances affecting two separate but cohesive teams. The purpose of this case analysis is to identify the critical events, explain the underlying causes of why these events happened, and draw logical conclusions about the teams¡¯ performances as related to effective teamwork and leadership.

July 16, 1969, three American astronauts Neil Armstrong, Michael Collins and Edwin Aldrin - took their seats in a spaceship "Apollo 11". They had a key task: to land on the moon and return to Earth. Then came the long-awaited moment. At 16 hours 32 minutes’ giant booster "Saturn 5", enveloped in smoke and flames, broke away from the launch platform and rapidly began to move away, taking with them three earthlings. They had to make the most difficult flight, the likes of which has not yet happened.

The basic premise for leadership is the process of influencing other people to follow your lead in order to accomplish a goal. It is about the relationship between the leader and the followers. A good leader tries to motivate people to bring about positive changes revealing a common objective without using coercion or manipulation. Leadership is not about control, but permitting interaction and communication between the leader and the individual followers. With empowering others, leaders build a foundation of collaborative thinking and encourage an atmosphere of personal involvement; a leader can strengthen the respect and loyalty of his or her followers. Leaders can affect this process by applying their own personal characteristics, such

Over the years, a great deal of time, and research has been dedicate to the study of leadership. Even with extensive data on the topic, many still disagree on what leadership really means. Hence, leadership is a word that has many different meanings and different researched theories associated with it. On a basic level, leadership involves having and establishing a clear vision, sharing that vision with followers, respecting followers, and leading an organization with excellence while ensuring that everyone is part of the team. Leadership is also a method by which a leader uses his or her influence towards getting a group of followers to take ownership or buy into a vision.

I believe that leadership is a journey of influence. It’s an act of using strategies, behaviors, and visions to affect other person’s beliefs, attitudes, values and actions, eventually to direct them to attain the goals of our organization. Leadership cannot be without influence, because influence is a key leadership component. I believe that a successful leader will understand what influence tactics would work best for certain situations and different group of people. Sources of influence are all around organizations. As a result, people’s visions and behaviors can be shaped and directed by how leaders communicate and act.

Leadership is an approach for a leader to guide, motivate, supervise, manage, and influence others in different situation to reach a goal. According to the Pettinger (2007), the leadership can be explained in several situations. First, the leaders have the responsible to provide vision and direction to the followers. Second, the leaders shall energise and motivate the followers. Third, the leaders shall set and enforce absolute standards of behaviour, attitude, presentation and performance.

In the textbook Leadership is defined as ‘the process of influencing an organized group toward accomplishing its goals’ (Hughes, Ginnet & Curphy 2015, p. 5). Leadership involves leader, followers, and situation.