Letting the Spaceship Crash. Or Maybe Not.

Apollo 13 was the 7th manned mission in the Apollo Space Programme and the third that was meant to land on the moon. Launched on 11th April 1970, the mission was commanded by Jim Lovell, with Jack Swigert and Fred Haise also on board, and the first two days passed by as 'normal' as any space flight can (not that I would know of course).

However, 2 days into the flight to the moon, disaster struck when an oxygen tank in the service module failed. An explosion followed, resulting in the contents of the oxygen tanks being vented into space. Without the oxygen needed to generate power and for breathing, the crew had to move into the lunar module and shut down the rest of the spacecraft.

It was estimated that the crew had enough oxygen to support two people for two days on the moon; with a few adjustments from Houston, it was estimated that the three men could last 4 days. Not great odds, and a way had to be found to get them home.

With the anticipation that fuel cells had been damaged, a direct return to Earth was ruled out. Not only was this an issue, the computer programme being used in Houston needed to be quickly re-written, as they had never anticipated the spacecraft being flown from the lunar module. Coupled with this, a trajectory had to be set to slingshot the craft around the moon, thereby allowing a 'free entry' back to Earth and avoiding over-use of the necessary engine power that was left. It was fraught with risk and jeopardy, and, during the return trip, Apollo 13 hit the highest-ever altitude of any craft away from Earth (248,655 miles - staggering), a record that still stands.

And the rest, as they say, is history. One Hollywood movie later, and it is etched into both our folklore and our consciousness. Slingshot around the Moon. There's a phrase that nobody will ever forget and one that conjures up the peril, danger and fear of the 3 astronauts, and brings into sharp focus those brilliant minds on the ground in Houston who, with scientific precision, plotted and schemed a safe return from thousands of miles away.

In this story, I find a weird parallel in our strange, sometimes outer-space world of corporate sales. We are all bound to live a (clearly less-perilous) version of the Apollo 13 mission at some point during our careers. Those moments where all around you, things are going wrong and disaster seems inevitable. The failing account, the less-than-appreciative customer who, after much consideration, have decided that the relationship is simply too dreadful for words, the team which doesn't smell anything but the stench of inevitable doom and cannot extricate themselves from their funk.

To add to the problem, there is more than likely a spreadsheet, somewhere in your Finance department, that can PROVE it will all go wrong eventually. Science and maths being used god-like to demonstrate that all is lost, and that our three brave astronauts will, indeed, die of oxygen starvation and that there is nothing to be done except manage the situation and simply await the impending disaster with lacklustre resignation.

In this situation, the last thing anyone wants to hear is a lone voice in the back of the room saying, 'Uh, people, how about we slingshot the spaceship around the Moon? That might work'.

So how did we get here? There is a propensity in corporate culture to make bad decisions based on bad numbers - whilst it must be accepted that revenue is king, and that it drives shareholder value, it is not the only metric to take into account when analyzing the 'propensity for success' in a client account. In fact, in situations where revenues are declining due to poor performance and under-par service, therein lies a direct opportunity to try something new, something different. If there ever was a time to try the slingshot to avoid the inevitable doom, this is it; if you simply choose to manage and protect the declining revenue, the revenue will naturally decline further. That is a dead cert, not even worth speculating a fiver on. The spaceship will not only crash, but there will even be a host of people watching on and remaining determined to make it stay in space a few hours longer anyway, prolonging the agony for no good reason.

This is exactly the time, therefore, to break out the creativity to try and create a successful splashdown. Those old mantras of cross-sell and upsell, creating true business value and failing fast all come into play. And then you have my personal mantra - Imagine. Research. Create. Execute. Repeat. Try things, different approaches, take the team, and the customer, on a journey around the moon and back if necessary, but find something that resonates, that one thing that might just save the day.

This is both time-consuming and energy-sapping of course, but essential work to prove that the impossible can indeed be achieved. Nothing is too out-there, too cosmic, and nothing is irreparable. That is the biggest thing to remember - when everything, including that infamous Finance spreadsheet, is reinforcing the view that pretty much everything has been tried and that it is a waste of time and effort to even attempt to change the status quo, there is always a chance. A slim one maybe, but, with the right ethos and application, one that might provide the glimmer of hope that is needed to shoehorn a little bit of hope into a desperate situation. A shot at the moon, a way to oxygenate the dying revenue stream and re-energize your team and your customer.

If you don't try, the spaceship will surely crash, and will take you with it. No spaceship, no public confidence, no NASA.

Be that little voice. Suggest the slingshot. Why not? But you only have a limited time in any given situation, so be sure to launch your ideas with speed, impact, backed by metrics and with a likely outcome in mind. This is the time for creativity, for conviction and for thought-leadership.

You never know, it might just work.

Imagine. Research. Create. Execute. Repeat.