A murder board, also known as a "scrub-down", is a committee of questioners set up to critically review a proposal and/or help someone prepare for a difficult

oral examination The oral exam (also oral test or '; ' in German-speaking nations) is a practice in many schools and disciplines in which an examiner poses questions to the student in spoken form. The student has to answer the question in such a way as to demonst ...

. The term originated in the U.S. military, specifically from

the Pentagon The Pentagon is the headquarters building of the United States Department of Defense. It was constructed on an accelerated schedule during World War II. As a symbol of the U.S. military, the phrase ''The Pentagon'' is often used as a meton ...

, but has spread to

academic An academy (Attic Greek: Ἀκαδήμεια; Koine Greek Ἀκαδημία) is an institution of secondary or tertiary higher learning (and generally also research or honorary membership). The name traces back to Plato's school of philosophy, ...

and government appointment contexts.

NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agencies of the United States government, independent agency of the US federal government responsible for the civil List of government space agencies, space program ...

contends the murder board was created by

Hans Mark Hans Michael Mark (June 17, 1929 – December 18, 2021) was a German-born American government official who served as Secretary of the Air Force and as a Deputy Administrator of NASA. He was an expert and consultant in aerospace design and natio ...

, Director of

Ames Research Center The Ames Research Center (ARC), also known as NASA Ames, is a major NASA research center at Moffett Federal Airfield in California's Silicon Valley. It was founded in 1939 as the second National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA) labo ...

from 1969 to 1977, derived from the earlier concept of the tiger team. In highly risk-averse, technical endeavors where extreme efforts are taken to prevent mistakes (e.g. satellite operations), murder boards are used to aggressively review, without constraint or pleasantries, a situation's problem, assumptions, constraints, mitigations, and the proposed solution. The board's goal is to kill the well-prepared proposal on technical merit; holding back even the least suspicion of a problem is not tolerated. Such argumentative murder boards consist of many subject matter experts of the specific system under review and of all interfacing systems. In

project management Project management is the process of leading the work of a team to achieve all project goals within the given constraints. This information is usually described in project documentation, created at the beginning of the development process. T ...

, a murder board is a process where a committee asks questions from project representatives as part of the project selection process. In U.S. politics, murder boards are used in preparing candidates for

debate Debate is a process that involves formal discourse on a particular topic, often including a moderator and audience. In a debate, arguments are put forward for often opposing viewpoints. Debates have historically occurred in public meetings, a ...

s and presidential appointees for Senate confirmation hearings. On April 20, 2010 representative

Mary Jo Kilroy Mary Jo Kilroy (born April 30, 1949) is an American attorney and politician who served as the U.S. representative for from 2009 until 2011. She is a member of the Democratic Party from Ohio. She was defeated in her November 2, 2010 re-election bi ...

asked former Lehman Brothers CEO Dick Fuld if he had set up a murder board to prepare for his testimony before the

House Financial Services Committee The United States House Committee on Financial Services, also referred to as the House Banking Committee and previously known as the Committee on Banking and Currency, is the committee of the United States House of Representatives that oversees t ...

concerning the 2008 Lehman Brothers failure. Fuld expressed confusion at the expression, apparently unfamiliar with the term. Fuld indicated that he had not set up a murder board after

Barney Frank Barnett Frank (born March 31, 1940) is a former American politician. He served as a member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Massachusetts from 1981 to 2013. A Democrat, Frank served as chairman of the House Financial Services Committ ...

explained what it meant.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Murder Board Military terminology Terminology of the United States Congress United States presidential elections terminology

See also

References