Live data from Hacker News

Boeing's 737 Max software outsourced to lower-paid engineers

bloomberg.com

41–50 of 166 posts

Re: Boeing's 737 Max software outsourced to lower-paid engineers

#41
I think this is just rabble-rousing. For all the flack outsourcing gets, if you hire an incompetent person, and they fuck up, you're still responsible for hiring an unqualified person. I don't think it matters if that person was outsourced or not. I haven't worked with any offshore teams, but friends tell me you can do what are called "client interviews" where the client, in this case Boeing, has the option of interviewing the actual people who will be assigned to work on your project.

Re: Boeing's 737 Max software outsourced to lower-paid engineers

#42

> Boeing said the company did not rely on engineers from HCL and Cyient for the Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System, which has been linked to the Lion Air crash last October and the Ethiopian Airlines disaster in March.

That may well be, but that constant supervision and error correction takes a lot of your experienced engineers attention away from the important things.

Re: Boeing's 737 Max software outsourced to lower-paid engineers

#43

"Rabin, the former software engineer, recalled one manager saying at an all-hands meeting that Boeing didn’t need senior engineers because its products were mature." Boeing is dead to me.

Understand the sentiment, but can anyone be sure that Airbus isn't doing something similar.

Irrelevant. If Airbus is doing the same, then they are also dead to me.

Re: Boeing's 737 Max software outsourced to lower-paid engineers

#44

I think this is just rabble-rousing. For all the flack outsourcing gets, if you hire an incompetent person, and they fuck up, you're still responsible for hiring an unqualified person. I don't think it matters if that person was outsourced or not. I haven't worked with any offshore teams, but friends tell me you can do what are called "client interviews" where the client, in this case Boeing, has the option of interv…

"but friends tell me you can do what are called "client interviews" where the client, in this case Boeing, has the option of interviewing the actual people who will be assigned to work on your project."

LOL! Ahem. You'll discover that they get someone competent in for the phone interview and you'll later discover that the story is now that the person you spoke to was representative - in terms of skills, experience and competence - of the sort of person who'll actually doing the work, and is not the one doing it. Later still you'll discover that this is not the case.

Still, they're very cheap, aren't they?

Re: Boeing's 737 Max software outsourced to lower-paid engineers

#45
Yet another shocking revelation in how little Boeing values lives when it comes to the bottom line.

This should be a company-ending event for Boeing. These folks should not be making aircraft used by living, breathing human beings.

The stock holders Boeing is beholden to, that clamor for this cost cutting, should pay.

Re: Boeing's 737 Max software outsourced to lower-paid engineers

#46
post #42

> Boeing said the company did not rely on engineers from HCL and Cyient for the Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System, which has been linked to the Lion Air crash last October and the Ethiopian Airlines disaster in March.

That may well be, but that constant supervision and error correction takes a lot of your experienced engineers attention away from the important things.

Assuming same engineers were doing the constant supervision and error correction and not few dedicated ones. (My previous company had one guy whose job it was to do this - that got good results because the guy knew what to look for and how to get it fixed.)

Re: Boeing's 737 Max software outsourced to lower-paid engineers

#48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Understand the sentiment, but can anyone be sure that Airbus isn't doing something similar.

Irrelevant. If Airbus is doing the same, then they are also dead to me.

Er, that does not leave too many options if you wish to fly...

Re: Boeing's 737 Max software outsourced to lower-paid engineers

#49
post #45

Yet another shocking revelation in how little Boeing values lives when it comes to the bottom line. This should be a company-ending event for Boeing. These folks should not be making aircraft used by living, breathing human beings. The stock holders Boeing is beholden to, that clamor for this cost cutting, should pay.

The stockholders are you and I, via retirement plans.

Re: Boeing's 737 Max software outsourced to lower-paid engineers

#50

There are some Boeing executives who should be making $0.35 an hour in prison.

Probably, but not likely to happen.

I guarantee you a lot of the legally binding design and testing documents were signed by engineers, maybe some product manager types. A few QA folks? But that's the extent of it as far as people who have the clear cut legal liability. You want to get anyone else? You're likely looking at a massive investigation, and spending years or even decades looking for incriminating documents or emails. And unless I miss my guess, the government is just not terribly likely to find any.

Post reply on HN