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Post by Phaedrus on Oct 21, 2019 14:33:41 GMT -5
In some ways Boeing didn't buy McDonnell Douglas. Oh sure, Boeing money, 13-billion of it, went to the pockets of top MCD shareholders and managers. But after the 'merger' it was the MCD top brass who took over the top executive offices and began running Boeing. The days of extensive research, training, development and planning were mostly replaced with a laser focus on profits. The days of Boeing engineers working their way up the ranks to run the entire company are long gone. Not to suggest that MCD brass don't care about safety. They do of course, because, after all, a deadly accident can be a bump-in-the-profit road. This is not a business model exclusive to McDonnell Douglas or even to the airline industry. It is an epidemic in the business world. R&D, safety, pensions, profit-sharing, unions, and so many other one time American benchmarks of business have been replaced by a focus on lavish profits. There's a reason why you don't have room for your knees on a flight and you can't really recline your seat: top brass need to make MORE, MORE, MORE. There was a story last week, I don't know if it's true, you know, fake news and all....but the story pointed out that Jeff Bezos could give $250,000 to every Amazon worker and he'd still be a billionaire. This was my experience in the American corporate world. We went from engineering focuses, to business focused, to profit focused to cost focused. The quality and engineering suffered every step of the way, but the biggest drop in investment, and I might add, sanity in decision making came when senior management became cost focused. It has happened in every single company I worked for.
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Post by ironhammer on Oct 21, 2019 23:08:38 GMT -5
In some ways Boeing didn't buy McDonnell Douglas. Oh sure, Boeing money, 13-billion of it, went to the pockets of top MCD shareholders and managers. But after the 'merger' it was the MCD top brass who took over the top executive offices and began running Boeing. The days of extensive research, training, development and planning were mostly replaced with a laser focus on profits. The days of Boeing engineers working their way up the ranks to run the entire company are long gone. Not to suggest that MCD brass don't care about safety. They do of course, because, after all, a deadly accident can be a bump-in-the-profit road. This is not a business model exclusive to McDonnell Douglas or even to the airline industry. It is an epidemic in the business world. R&D, safety, pensions, profit-sharing, unions, and so many other one time American benchmarks of business have been replaced by a focus on lavish profits. There's a reason why you don't have room for your knees on a flight and you can't really recline your seat: top brass need to make MORE, MORE, MORE. There was a story last week, I don't know if it's true, you know, fake news and all....but the story pointed out that Jeff Bezos could give $250,000 to every Amazon worker and he'd still be a billionaire. This was my experience in the American corporate world. We went from engineering focuses, to business focused, to profit focused to cost focused. The quality and engineering suffered every step of the way, but the biggest drop in investment, and I might add, sanity in decision making came when senior management became cost focused. It has happened in every single company I worked for. In the New Republic article they mentioned a Boeing engineer telling a group of Wall Street analysts that engineering the best product rather than always looking to cut cost anyway possible should be the proper approach to building commerical airliners. The analysts basically told him to f*ck off, saying what Boeing builds is nothing special and the same cost-cutting approach should be applied to them like any other business. That could not be more wrong, and it speaks volume of the short-term mentality afflicting Wall Street. A modern airliner is not just any product. It's not a toothbrush, toilet roll or a piece of furniture. It is a highly complex piece of machinery requiring advanced skills in aeronautical engineering. Where hundreds of lives depend on the judgement of those who design and build these planes. You cannot treat the process of designing and building an airliner just the same as more mundane products where cost-cutting is the name of the game. It should not work like that.
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Post by tomclen on Nov 1, 2019 7:17:07 GMT -5
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Post by tomclen on Nov 1, 2019 8:30:45 GMT -5
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Post by Phaedrus on Nov 15, 2019 15:53:42 GMT -5
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Post by Phaedrus on Nov 18, 2019 17:48:56 GMT -5
This is an article in The New Yorker, and the byline says it is a collaboration with ProPublica. The article quotes Stan Sorscher extensively. He is the Boeing engineer that is speaking loudly about how the Boeing culture completely changed after Boeing bought McDonnell Douglas and adopted the McDonnell Douglas business model, which he thinks is what caused all the problems. I happen to agree with him about the bottomline business model, but I don't know if this was indeed the reason why the 737 Max had the design issues. www.newyorker.com/magazine/2019/11/18/the-case-against-boeing
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Post by mikegarrison on Nov 18, 2019 17:54:49 GMT -5
Stan is a FORMER Boeing engineer. He left Boeing about 20 years ago to work for SPEEA (the union that represents Boeing engineers and techs in Puget Sound and a few other locations).
He's a very smart guy. He's a very opinionated guy, too, especially about some of the choices Boeing has made in terms of their business models. I don't believe the business model had anything to do with the original 737 issue, but it has complicated the changes made to the software, because it's complicated how the software is partially controlled by Boeing and partially controlled by a vendor.
Many things about how airplanes are built are complicated.
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Post by Phaedrus on Nov 18, 2019 18:45:27 GMT -5
Stan is a FORMER Boeing engineer. He left Boeing about 20 years ago to work for SPEEA (the union that represents Boeing engineers and techs in Puget Sound and a few other locations). He's a very smart guy. He's a very opinionated guy, too, especially about some of the choices Boeing has made in terms of their business models. I don't believe the business model had anything to do with the original 737 issue, but it has complicated the changes made to the software, because it's complicated how the software is partially controlled by Boeing and partially controlled by a vendor. Many things about how airplanes are built are complicated. I think the change in business model definitely affects the choices being made during the engineering process. The business model change affects every decision made during the process. The complexity of the aircraft design process makes it even more sensitive to the business model changes.
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Post by ironhammer on Nov 18, 2019 20:55:00 GMT -5
No question adopting the wrong-headed McDonnell Douglas business model contributed to Boeing's problems, even if it may not necessarily be directly responsible for the MAX issues. This culture has been undermining Boeing for some time now. One of the key culprits for Boeing's culture problem was Harry Stonecipher, the former MD CEO who later became the Boeing CEO. He made some key changes to how Boeing sources materials from its suppliers and how it made decisions that led to so many problems later. Now Stonecipher was later fired by Boeing's board for an improper relationship with another Boeing employee, but his negative influence remain with the company.
Another mistake I think Boeing made was letting highly talented manager and engineers go. It's not necessarily always the case that a good engineer will also be a good business manager, so if someone has the attributes of both, they should be cherished and be promoted by the company. A key example is Alan Mulally. He was, by all accounts, a decent fellow, brilliant aerospace engineer and manager. He worked on the 757/767 programs and later became the general manager of the 777 program and head of the Commerical Airplanes division. I always found it unforgiveable on the part of Boeing that Mulally was pass over for promotion to the top job as Boeing CEO.
Of course, as we all know, Mulally later went on to become Ford's CEO, serving a distinguished career there by saving the company from bankruptcy without asking for a government handout and turning around Ford to become a more consistently profitable company.
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Post by tomclen on Nov 20, 2019 13:07:59 GMT -5
This story, more than anything else I've read, nails Boeing's problem.
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Post by Phaedrus on Nov 20, 2019 15:11:22 GMT -5
This story, more than anything else I've read, nails Boeing's problem. Beat me to it. Damn you!
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Post by Phaedrus on Dec 16, 2019 17:02:36 GMT -5
Boeing Suspends 737 Production for the First Time in 20 Years: WSJ nyti.ms/2EkKfOV
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Post by akbar on Dec 17, 2019 6:34:44 GMT -5
What A Mess!!
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Post by ironhammer on Dec 18, 2019 22:30:17 GMT -5
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Post by ironhammer on Dec 23, 2019 9:59:33 GMT -5
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