Today, most organizations must innovate or fall behind. But what’s the key to leading innovation and overcoming challenges and failures? It isn’t just about hiring very talented people. At NASA, Gregory Robinson worked with, led and managed some of the world’s most accomplished scientists and engineers. Instead, he says, it’s about prioritizing relationship-building, creativity, knowledge-sharing and “open communication without fear.” Robinson emphasizes soft skills like knowing when to lead and when to support, understanding how to collaborate, problem solving, and being able to reach out beyond your team to find answers and fresh thinking. Using real-life examples from his 33-year history at NASA, set against a backdrop that takes you a million miles from Earth, Greg Robinson shows how the human element is more critical than ever to driving transformation and achieving our most ambitious goals.

Just being an engineer in a time when few Blacks were in STEM professions would have been an achievement. Just getting into NASA—where the ranks of Black professionals were few and far between would have been an inspiring success story. But Gregory Robinson’s against-all-odds journey to leading the James Webb Space Telescope program had a starting point worthy of Hollywood. Born the ninth of eleven children to tobacco sharecroppers in southern Virginia, where the legacy of Jim Crow was still strong, Robinson attended segregated schools until the age of 10. In this inspiring talk, HBCU graduate Robinson shares how he went from the tobacco fields to being named one of TIME Magazine’s 100 most influential people– and how lessons learned through humble beginnings propelled his much-honored career.