NASA Procedural Requirements

NPR 1385.1A Effective Date: March 04, 2020 Expiration Date: March 04, 2025

Subject: Public Appearances of NASA Personnel, Including Astronauts

Responsible Office: Office of Communications

Chapter 1. Public Appearances of NASA Personnel and the NASA Speakers Bureau Program

NASA employees are encouraged to participate in public appearances as allowed by their programmatic duties and provided that they comply with the policies contained in NPD 1385.2, Public Appearances of NASA Personnel, Including Astronauts. Employees are encouraged to do this through the NASA Speakers Bureau Program. If an employee chooses to do a public appearance outside of this program, or the Astronaut Appearances Program, that employee assumes responsibility for assuring that those appearances follow all Federal and NASA rules, regulations, policies, and procedures.

1.1 Responsibility

1.1.1 The Associate Administrator, Office of Communications, or his/her designee, is responsible for overall management of the NASA Speakers Bureau (SB) Program. This includes approval of policy, standards, requirements and objectives for the NASA Speakers Bureau Program.

1.1.2 The Agency Speakers Bureau Program Manager, Office of Communications, NASA Headquarters, provides direction, coordination, and guidance for the Agency Speakers Bureau Program to include developing and maintaining a unified Speakers Bureau Program Agency-wide and developing policy, procedures, requirements and objectives for the program. In the conduct of the Agency Speakers Bureau Program the NASA Speakers Bureau Program Manager shall:

a. Oversee and lead the Agency Speakers Bureau (SB) Team. Advising Center Speakers Bureau Coordinators on Agency, Communications Coordination Council (CCC) and Office of Communications priorities, initiatives, and activities; orienting new team members; resolving issues, questions, and concerns; monitoring performance and addressing issues and providing performance evaluation input as requested or needed. The SB program manager also organizes and leads regular SB teleconferences and/or videoconferences and identifies training and development opportunities for the SB Coordinators.

b. Organize and implement an annual SB planning meeting to review performance over the past year and plan the priorities and goals for the future.

c. Maintain the policy documents and infrastructure that supports the SB Program, assuring they reflect accurate and current information. This includes the public SB website, a SB SharePoint or other site where standard operating guidance, procedure, processes, etc. can be shared, and an agency wide database, and controls access to these assets.

d. Provide the AA for Communications and the CCC with SB metrics as requested.

1.1.3 Each NASA Center (including HQ) shall designate a Speakers Bureau Coordinator who will manage and administer the NASA Speakers Bureau Program at his/her Center.

1.1.4 Each Center Speakers Bureau Coordinator shall:

a. Receive, review, screen and respond to speaker requests assigned to his/her Center to ensure they are complete and consistent with federal policies and requirements; and processes the requests in accordance with the criteria set forth in this document.

b. Assure records of requests in the Speakers Bureau Database are kept up to date and are closed out in a timely manner.

c. Follow established procedures to assure the Office of International and Interagency Relations has been consulted on all international speaker requests.

d. Follow established procedures to assure the Office of Legislative and Intergovernmental Affairs has been consulted on all congressional speaker requests.

e. Recruit NASA speakers and then routes requests to appropriate speaker candidates for consideration. Assure speakers have required information for event, help with presentation preparation, assure presentations are consistent with current agency key messaging and communication priorities, follow up with speakers post event, and assist speakers obtain needed training.

f. Assist speakers in obtaining background information and audiovisual materials on NASA programs for use in preparing speeches or presentations. Presentations involving scientific and technical information will be administered and approved in accordance with NPR 2200.2, Requirements for Documentation, Approval, and Dissemination of NASA Scientific and Technical Information. This is the responsibility of the speaker and his/her supervisor not the Speakers Bureau Coordinator.

g. Be an active participant in the SB Community, participating in SB telecons and the annual SB planning meetings, cooperating and engaging with other SB Coordinators to share lessons learned and best practices, work requests and actions, and to promote SB by providing accomplishments and achievements for reports as requested by the SB Program Manager.

h. Maintain the inventory of materials at their center available for speakers to borrow to enhance their presentation. This inventory varies by center but includes such items as: mock up space suits, space food, ISS sleeping bag, projectors, laptops, activity kits, etc.

1.1.5. NASA employees who accept public speaking requests outside of the NASA Speakers Bureau process, or the Astronaut Appearance Office process, shall:

a. Assure all public appearances they participate in conform to all requirements and restrictions contained in NPD 1385.2 and this NPR.

b. Provide metric information on their appearance(s) by submitting the "Non-SB Appearance" form that can be found in the NASA Communications Toolkit: https://communications.nasa.gov/ Once on the Communications home page select "Additional Resources," then "Speakers Bureau," then "submit an Event" and complete the form found there. Employees can also access this directly at https://speakers.grc.nasa.gov/external/.

1.2 Speakers Bureau Database

1.2.1 The Office of Communications at NASA HQ is responsible for the maintenance of an Agency Speakers Bureau Database. This Database provides for the submission of speaker requests online and the distribution and tracking of all requests. The NASA Speakers Bureau Database will:

a. Allow for the submission of online speaker requests which populate a request record in the Database accessible to all those with access to the Database.

b. Collect metrics on the SB Program to include at a minimum, requests received, the disposition of those requests, type and size of the audience, assigned speaker and logistics information on the date, time, and location of requested appearance.

c. Assign requests to the centers based on the location of the appearance as described in Table A, Geographic Regions and Responsible NASA Centers.

Table A Geographic Regions and Responsible NASA Centers.

*Coordinate with other California Centers

DISTRIBUTION:
NODIS

This document does not bind the public, except as authorized by law or as incorporated into a contract. This document is uncontrolled when printed. Check the NASA Online Directives Information System (NODIS) Library to verify that this is the correct version before use: https://nodis3.gsfc.nasa.gov.