The Tiger Team Story

Bringing insights and experiences from SpaceX to the next generation of STEM talent

March 30, 2017: I nervously paced around my neighbor’s desk at SpaceX in Los Angeles, huddled around 3 computer monitors with our 10 closest teammates.  T-minus 5 minutes until liftoff of F9-032 on booster 1021.2 flying a multi-million dollar satellite from a paying customer to outer space.  Normally, we watch our rockets launch from outside mission control with the entire SpaceX team, but this was a special launch- the first time in history that a rocket would be reused after landing back on earth from the edge of space.  The weight of history, the risks, and the amount of effort we had poured in together had knit together bonds like a family amongst this group of engineers.  If something were to go wrong, we would at least be there with our family.  If it were to go right, the first person we would hug would be our neighbor, teammate, and closest friend.  We weren’t a group of co-workers, we were a Tiger Team - a small group of problem solvers working together in a focused direction to achieve something that had never been done before.  To ensure the success of the never-been-done-before mission, we had to invent entirely new methodologies, test the rocket well beyond its previously known capabilities (and destroy many parts along the way), and question every assumption we had about how rocket science is done.  20 minutes later we celebrated with a joy that one only experiences a few times in their life- the mission was a success and we celebrated it with those who had poured just as much into it as we did.  This is what work should feel like- a true vocation filled with vitality, endless learning, and collaboration.  Why doesn’t education feel the same way?  How do you teach something that’s never been done before?
Flashback to 2012 - my freshman year at Vanderbilt University.  I entered as a Biomedical Engineer because I had some experience volunteering in medicine and my counselors in high school suggested engineering given my scores on personality tests as well as math and science tests.  I had barely wanted to go to college, after hearing dropout successes like Elon Musk and Steve Jobs talking about the frivolity of college and the merits of entrepreneurship.  I wasn’t sure what college was going to do for me, but also wasn’t sure if I was really sure if I was cut from the same cloth as Musk and Jobs.  A few weeks into my college experience I walked past a small team at a display stand with a large rocket on display.  They were the Vanderbilt Aerospace Team and they said they compete in a NASA rocket competition every year.  Immediately I knew this is what I wanted to do in college. I sent emails to the professor and the president of the club pleading to let me join, but they said that it was for mechanical engineering seniors only.  It was only when my like-minded friend convinced me to lay siege unannounced on the professor’s office with him, that we were granted the opportunity to be ‘field engineers’ on the team- attending the team meetings, launches, and helping around the shop.  We ended up winning the NASA rocket competition all 4 years, with SpaceX recruiting the team’s seniors every year.  At the end of my time at Vandy, I knew that this was my passion and was lucky enough to earn an internship and then a job at SpaceX in the Vehicle Engineering department.  10 graduates from our team were working for SpaceX by then, and they were the only ten from the entire University.
My initial time at SpaceX was a period of rapid learning like I had never experienced before, thanks to generous and brilliant mentors around me and extremely ambitious challenges placed in front of me on a daily basis.  While my rocket team had prepared me for this type of environment, all the technical skills I used in my time at SpaceX were not learned in college but instead through my experiences and projects at SpaceX - it was all learned on the job.    
What’s more is that everyone else at SpaceX seemed to come from similar experiences - they had made contributions on an ambitious team project outside of the classroom and knew how important it was to communicate well, think outside the box, and the weight of making tough decisions with incomplete information.  What made SpaceX successful was that the team was the best in the world at collaborative problem solving and innovation, not that they necessarily had the highest degree in aeronautics (if that were the case, their rockets would look the same as they did in the 80’s).  Those who had spent more time in traditional academia often needed reminders to break out of their habits of working narrowly with their head down and instead to think outside the box, collaborate with others, and make decisions quickly without having all the possible information. 

In the rapidly changing landscape of the 21st century, what are the skills, knowledge, and virtues our students need to have? What is the most effective environment to learn them in?  This is Tiger Team.  As the calling inside me to leave Los Angeles and give back to the next generation grew louder and louder, I knew this is what I had to offer.  

My technical and philosophical perspectives have uniquely positioned me to develop holistic, free-thinking and unique human beings and not just robotic products of another robotics team, blindly turning a technical crank but never understanding the big picture and their place in it.  This is the Tiger Team advantage.  The humanities, sinking towards irrelevance, need the momentum of STEM.  The STEM fields need the wisdom of the humanities to steward their increasing power.  I see the modern world crying out for the next generation to offer more than just technical solutions– rather, to wholeheartedly offer their authentic selves.  My gamble is that as society advances technologically, demand for humane soft skills will continue to increase, especially among the tech-savvy.

Our world is desperate to close the gap between power (through knowledge and information) and wisdom (through character and virtue).  Technology continues to increase our power of influence with no associated increase in our capacity to use it wisely, for good and not evil.  Modern engineers must address not just the risk of a singular disaster from a failed technology (the Challenger, for example), but also the existential risks posed by extinction at the hands of our own engineered devices and abuse of them.  Big questions asked soberly in the face of these risks must frame a good engineering education. 

A funnel of mindless pencil-pushing engineers into the military-industrial complex will not suffice in an age where the “doomsday clock” sits a mere 90 seconds from midnight.  The required formation cannot occur through a lecture-style fire-hose of information and a subsequent charge to “be ethical.”  Instead, students must develop true empathy first for one another, through vibrant collaboration within a “Tiger Team” culture that is founded upon a reverence for the imago dei in each of their teammates, and developed along with other essential soft skills throughout the program through learning that mirrors the vibrant experiential learning of the SpaceX environment. 
Tiger Team's mission is to bridge the gap between the unfettered push for STEM progress and the collective longing for character and relational development. This is done by creating educational experiences that cultivate the character traits that are fundamental to success in professional and personal adult life. These traits are courage, collaboration, and creativity, and they are cultivated on Tiger Teams through challenge, communication, and creation.