How do you build a spacecraft so complicated that no single person understands how the whole thing works? You start with the humans. In this episode of _At Work, Under Pressure_, Jessi Beyer sits down with Dr. Lindy Elkins-Tanton, principal investigator of NASA’s Psyche mission and author of _Mission Ready_, to talk about team culture, creativity, communication, burnout, psychological safety, and what it takes to lead hundreds of highly specialized people through extraordinarily complex work. Lindy explains why even the hardest science and engineering ultimately comes back to person-to-person relationships. On Psyche, that has meant deliberately breaking down traditional silos between scientists, engineers, schedulers, budget teams, communications professionals, and everyone else whose expertise is necessary to make the mission work. Jessi and Lindy discuss: • Why high-performing teams need people willing to look beyond their own “swim lane” • How curiosity and asking questions can prevent expertise from turning into ego • Why silence from part of a team can be an important warning sign • How leaders can distinguish productive pressure from the kind of stress that leaves people feeling trapped and unsupported • Why high performers are often rewarded with more work and less support • How punishment and psychological unsafety can shut down the communication teams need to catch problems • Why NASA viewed Psyche’s team culture as an asset capable of helping the mission survive high-stress situations Lindy also shares how she thinks about protecting intensely driven people from burnout: giving people multiple ways to speak up, measuring the temperature of the team, acting visibly on what leaders hear, educating people to recognize burnout in themselves, and providing real support when someone begins struggling. This episode is for executives, scientists, engineers, researchers, project leaders, people managers, and anyone responsible for helping highly driven teams perform when the stakes are enormous. Because extraordinary technical systems still depend on ordinary human relationships. And when the pressure rises, the strength of those relationships can determine whether the team keeps communicating, solving problems, and moving forward.