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Boeing CEO ousted as 737 Max crisis deepens

reuters.com

191–200 of 637 posts

Re: Boeing CEO ousted as 737 Max crisis deepens

#191
post #94
post #62

I'm really glad to see that there is at least some type of corporate accountability going on for so many people dying. This probably should have happened sooner.

Quoting from the Code of Hammurabi (Ancient Babylon): > If a builder builds a house for someone, and does not construct it properly, and the house which he built falls in and kills its owner, then that builder shall be put to death. There's real accountability for you. Corporate accountability these days is a sick joke.

Corporate accountability?

What is that?

Is that something like the unicorn?

Re: Boeing CEO ousted as 737 Max crisis deepens

#192

Maybe the next CEO will actually try to fix things, seeing as how his job will likely depend on it. Fuck up like Muilenburg did and you're out too. It seems like the incentives may be correct now to focus on the right things rather than just cut costs as much as possible. Hopefully!

Why on earth would the next CEO be incentivized to do anything other than wring all the money out of the company that they can? The punishments for failure are insignificant. They get to keep millions and millions of dollars even if they wreck the company.

Why are you assuming that money is their only incentive?

It seems to me that if the promise of a golden parachute led to CEOs simply not caring if they do well or not, then there'd be no point in paying them well or trying to hire the best. Heck, there'd be no measure of "best", because all the candidates would just have a string of disasters behind them.

There's an S curve to the utility of money. Anyone who works at the kind of level that could become the CEO of a company like Boeing is already quite rich. So money alone isn't the incentive. But thinking of money as sole incentive is kind of characteristic for those of us who actually have to work for a living.

Re: Boeing CEO ousted as 737 Max crisis deepens

#193
post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It turns out that reforming hiring practices for D&I goals gets good PR and doesn't cost so much compared to providing decent work conditions and pay... It doesn't follow that the latter was preventing the former.

I fail to see how "providing decent work conditions and pay" is a cause or solution to the problem of employees leaving "objects" around a plane after it was delivered to customers.

The original comment in this chain implied that it's a consequence of ditching their experienced workers (where they have to provide decent work conditions and pay) in favour of new workers.

I don't work for boeing and haven't looked enough into this to confirm if that is the case or not.

Re: Boeing CEO ousted as 737 Max crisis deepens

#194

Watched an aljazira documentary about falling standards at a Boeing factory a couple of years ago and been waiting to see if something like this would happen. Now they're gonna sacrifice a lamb, keep same corporate struture and philosophy, keep on making billions, remember to appologise even more next time.

I'm not so sure about the "Making Billions" bit. They are going to have to either do a massive 11 figure write down or spread out their losses on the Max over the next 10+ years. Either one is a pretty bitter pill to swallow. I'm betting we'll see a huge write down when the new CEO takes over, that way they can push as much blame as possible on the old regime and move forward with a clean-ish slate.

A hyper-corporation like Boeing must make billions merely to operate. They will not be allowed to fail. They will therefore make billions, one way or another.

Re: Boeing CEO ousted as 737 Max crisis deepens

#195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The 737 faces competition from a few directions. First of all, smaller planes such as the A320 and E195 feel bigger inside than the 737 does. It's like the difference between the "boat of car" from American manufacturers to the Japanese cars that were small on the outside but big on the inside. If you just want a low-cost plane at the A320 level of technology, China is coming online with https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki…

> First of all, smaller planes such as the A320 I was going to go all "what do you mean, smaller ??? ... surely you mean the A220", but had to good sense to look it up and you are right, the A320 Neo is actually a tad smaller than, for example, the 737-800. Also lighter. Just carries more passengers a longer distance faster with slightly wider seats. Hmm..

It's hard to realise how bloody old the 737 is, this thing dates back to the 60s, back when computers were a roomfull of people and assemblers were considered high-level programming languages.

Not that the A320 is any spring chicken (dates back to the 80s), however that's still a quantum leap in technology (e.g. universal fly-by-wire) and I'm guessing more modular as it was intended as a family of planes sharing a type (from the 318 to the 321, though the 318 was dropped for neo).

Re: Boeing CEO ousted as 737 Max crisis deepens

#196
post #189
post #4

After both The Economist[1] and The New York Times [2] publicly undermined faith in Dennis Muilenberg. No question at this point that he needed to be replaced. The question is - why didn't the board act sooner? [1] https://www.economist.com/leaders/2019/12/18/boeings-misplac... [2] https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/22/business/boeing-dennis-mu...

They did act. Muilenburg was Chairman & CEO and they removed him as Chairman in October. It probably took the new Chairman a month or two to work out what shit Muilenburg was feeding the board prior to that.

And yet working from the outside, the NYT can figure out this shit even faster.

Re: Boeing CEO ousted as 737 Max crisis deepens

#197
post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which is ironic given they chose a board member to be the new CEO. It's not new leadership, he was part of the original leadership team as a member of the board.

I have no idea how the Boeing board works, but most boards aren't involved in the day-to-day operations of the corporation and would be considered separate from the "leadership team".

Still the purpose of a board is to have oversight, which is mostly about signing of company structures and signing of processes for large processes the process for creating and approving a major new product line.

And well, if they'd pick some lower manager the critique would be the same. And if they pick an outsider the critique would be about them not understanding the business ... critique is always the easy part.

Re: Boeing CEO ousted as 737 Max crisis deepens

#198
post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's no way they're going to develop a completely new plane. It may have new branding, but it's going to be a 737 at the bones. Since when has the airline industry ever considered passenger misery?

Boeing will eventually have to build a clean sheet replacement for the 737 in response to airline demands for greater fuel efficiency. The long term trend is toward higher fuel prices, especially once some countries start taxing carbon emissions from commercial aviation. But it could be another 20 years until that "797" enters service.

They announced it back in 2014 at least, aiming for 2030: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-boeing-ceo-737/boeing-pla...

Re: Boeing CEO ousted as 737 Max crisis deepens

#199

The big question for Boeing is how they will transition to a post-737 world. Until now, Boeing's business plan is that they will be building a starship for NASA in 2060, but you will still be stuck with a 737 on Southwest Airlines, a A320 on Jetblue, and never know that aviation could be better. The 737 throws off a lot of cash, but the single-aisle monoculture makes flying miserable. A 737 replacement will be expens…

> ...single-aisle monoculture makes flying miserable. What is it that people expect when they say flying is miserable? I expect safety, which is why I'll never get on a 737 MAX. Other than that, I just put sandwiches and snacks in my pocket, fill my water bottle, and in X hours I'm thousands of miles away. Air travel is actually pretty amazing.

It is amazing, but if your Tall, or Wide, or have any kind of handicap, its miserable too..

Re: Boeing CEO ousted as 737 Max crisis deepens

#200

The big question for Boeing is how they will transition to a post-737 world. Until now, Boeing's business plan is that they will be building a starship for NASA in 2060, but you will still be stuck with a 737 on Southwest Airlines, a A320 on Jetblue, and never know that aviation could be better. The 737 throws off a lot of cash, but the single-aisle monoculture makes flying miserable. A 737 replacement will be expens…

> ...single-aisle monoculture makes flying miserable. What is it that people expect when they say flying is miserable? I expect safety, which is why I'll never get on a 737 MAX. Other than that, I just put sandwiches and snacks in my pocket, fill my water bottle, and in X hours I'm thousands of miles away. Air travel is actually pretty amazing.

I expect to be able to sit in my seat without having my knees crushed? How about that for a start?
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