Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

What Boeing did to all the guys who remember how to build a plane

prospect.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

521–530 of 568 posts

Re: What Boeing did to all the guys who remember how to build a plane

#521

Post by tcmart14 »

polygamous_bat wrote: post #68
Rinzler89 wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Boeing's stock price went up 10x in the time frame covered by the article. The people responsible for gutting the company have cashed out. Why does the stock market reward idiot shit like this? I've seen the same whit a a large US semiconductor company. In the 2008 crunch, the fired the most tenured employees and offshored the work abroad. Granted, the company didn't fail, their stock went up and now it's 5-7x that…

> Why does the stock market reward idiot shit like this? Goodhart’s law, unfortunately. Whatever metric the stock market rewards gets gamed like there is no tomorrow (or next quarter, here.)

Yup. In the incentives align to motivate you to play the current game of the day. Another example I can think of. Google search has sucked for awhile now. Some people pin it directly on to Google, but I think its much broader than that. There is an entire cottage industry around around gaming whatever Google does to improve search. Its a cat and mouse game. Google tries to implement a new pattern that will punish people gaming SEO, the people gaming SEO learn the new pattern and adjust for it, and we are back where we are.

In both cases of the stock market and a popular search engine, I don't really know if there is a solution that prevents people from trying to game it.

Re: What Boeing did to all the guys who remember how to build a plane

#522

Post by pylua »

renegade-otter wrote: post #463
type_Ben_struct wrote: post #11

It baffles me how this happens time and time again in companies as they grow (albeit rarely with this level of human life consequence), and nobody ever seems to learn from it.

They learn. It's a feature, not a bug. Some executive is chilling next to his third infinity pool, chuckling. It's someone else's problem now, suckers.

Exactly. They did learn from it -- and it is by far the best way to optimize around short term gains.

Just like people who join a company, grow the company to unsustainable bounds, then leave for the next company while the previous company struggles to maintain or fulfill previous obligations.

Re: What Boeing did to all the guys who remember how to build a plane

#523

Post by panick21_ »

GolfPopper wrote: post #414
afavour wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because, depressingly, the stock market is correct. Boeing is one of two manufacturers for planes of this size. The other is totally backlogged with orders. The stock market has assessed, correctly, that Boeing can withstand this loss of knowledge and keep generating profit. Does it result in shit equipment that literally kills people? Sure. But how many people are going to stop flying because of it? Not many. Throw…

People won't stop flying until they do - or at least stop flying on Boeing aircraft. And if airlines can't make a profit on a Boeing aircraft flight, there won't be any more Boeing aircraft flights. I don't know whether the point where the market for Boeing aircraft travel is one disaster away or ten disasters away, but it is out there. When it comes, people won't stop flying, but they will fly less, and it will cost…

Objectivly speaking flying with Boeing is still safe. People like us think news about planes and crashes are big but they really arent.

Most people dont have the faintest idea of who makes planes, and what plane models exist or how save they are.

And there isn't any system to activly avoid certain planes even if you wanted too.

Sure at some point with enough failures this can happen. But this is unlikely. Most Boeing plans are already built and are already flying and they are mostly very safe. They are flight proven.

Boeing wont interduce a truely new model for the next 10 years.

And after that, such a plane would need to comply to very strict regulation and it would take a long time for that plane to be built in large numbers.

So practically speaking the scenrio you suggest is impossible.

Re: What Boeing did to all the guys who remember how to build a plane

#524

Post by zer00eyz »

smsm42 wrote: post #415
zer00eyz wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

His whole lawsuit was about being forced to retire 10 years early because Boeing forced him out for whistleblowing. Thats whistleblowing as in past tense. He complained to the FAA and the FAA said 'yes John you're right'. Not to diminish your mental heath but the whole argument here is that what Boeing around "stress", "pressure" and "anxiety" was far worse. Its not like is anti whistleblower retaliation case (AIR21)…

Being forced as whistle-blower and being suicidal are again very different things. Especially when he was in the middle of proving he's right. And right in the middle of the fight, between the testimonies, after he spent so much effort to prove he's right, he decides "fuck it all" and quits abruptly? Doesn't add up. Maybe something else happened but I just am astonished how easily people dismiss it. Ah, he was anxiou…

>> We'll, it's only natural then. No it's not.

If it isnt the case and you have proof the VA would love to hear from you. They have this tiny problem of soldiers coming home from war (to a happy place) with stress, anxiety and PTSD and then offing themselves.

Re: What Boeing did to all the guys who remember how to build a plane

#525

Post by astrange »

bradley13 wrote: post #421
astrange wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pournelle's Iron Law is just him saying "I am a Republican". You are not required to listen to him. For balance, I stopped reading this article at the end of the first page because it called Boeing "neoliberal", which doesn't mean anything except that the writer is a snotty humanities grad.

Huh? His observation is politically neutral. It just notes that the people running organizations are, ultimately, selfish (as are most people). They will ultimately look after themselves, even at the cost of the organization they are supposed to be caring for. You see this everywhere. Crazy CEO salaries and golden parachutes, as CEOs sit on each other's boards approving such packages. Charities that prolong the probl…

"All bureaucracies always fail" is not politically neutral and also not true!

Re: What Boeing did to all the guys who remember how to build a plane

#526

Post by Cpoll »

ForHackernews wrote: post #491
amtamt wrote: post #406

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Something very similar is happening, at a very rapid pace, in software development.

Writing software is nothing like building airplanes. 99% of the time it doesn't matter because most software is worthless or trivial. A sibling thread highlights the decline of Google: What a horror if someone were to receive subpar search results or view an advert that hadn't been auctioned at the most profitable rate.

> subpar search results

This isn't as innocuous as you make it. Add up wasted minutes for millions of users and you're looking at thousands of lifetimes.

I don't think it's an exaggeration to say that access to information is a force multiplier. Google doesn't have a monopoly on that, but it's hardly worthless or trivial.

Re: What Boeing did to all the guys who remember how to build a plane

#527

Post by class3shock »

weinzierl wrote: post #459
class3shock wrote: post #269

"But the average employee assigned to the 737 program has been at Boeing just five years, according to a longtime Boeing executive who is involved in various efforts to save the company; for comparison’s sake, he says the average employee assigned to the 777 program had between 15 and 20 years under their belt." It don't think it's possible to overstate how bad, and sad, of a state of affairs that is. I've never seen…

I'd also blame flat hierarchy and lean management. When I started as a young engineer in aerospace in the late-nineties[1] this trend had already started, but we still had young people that tried to build a career and reputation. This culture is completely gone and replaced by move fast, break things and when you screw up start afresh somewhere else with minimal repercussions. I don't say the old world was necessaril…

I'm still early in my career in aerospace and am mulling over the same decision. What's stopping me is I'm already older and I do actually enjoy the work, whereas coding with no relation to a physical thing is not appealing. Currently thinking of trying to get into some inbetween role but haven't stumbled on something that struck me as an obvious path yet.

What convinced you to make the jump?

Re: What Boeing did to all the guys who remember how to build a plane

#528

Post by class3shock »

iforgotpassword wrote: post #467
camkego wrote: post #465

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’ve honestly wondered about this since those two 737 Max crashes. How on the earth did they design in a non-redundant single point of failure, such as the single angle of attack sensor as in the 737 max? (if this type of component is typically redundant) But if, “the average employee assigned to the 737 program has been at Boeing for just five years”. It might explain how such a design decision happened. Would be re…

I also don't understand how you can accept to do this job if there's almost nobody there with enough experience. "Well I have to make ends meet and don't want to look for a new job, so YOLO". What's going through these people's mind today? Especially those who worked on that non-redundant system? They just shrug it off and say "well stupid managers made us do it", or do they feel remorse, responsibility? I genuinely…

Remember people are willing to do just about anything if someone in a position of authority tells them to. New engineers have little "intuition" of what is an isn't appropriate, we rely on the experienced engineers to learn this, along with experience we get along the way, as school mostly teaches us how to learn, not the particulars of whatever job we end up in (speaking mostly of aero's/meche's). You hope you end up in a good place that will train you well but often you are just the newest meat to enter the grinder.

And yes, we often do worry and feel responsibility if something goes wrong or could go wrong. I remember working on a job where I was incredibly out of my depth, where no one in my group had any experience to check what I was doing, which would have had serious implications for peoples lives if my work had an error. I was so stressed I got grey hairs. I know many people who've been in similar positions, or positions of trying to meet impossible deadlines, deal with an unreasonable amount of work that makes doing it correctly unfeesable, or be put in a position where they have to accept practices that they would never put up with later in their careers.

Re: What Boeing did to all the guys who remember how to build a plane

#529

Post by class3shock »

nebula8804 wrote: post #498
class3shock wrote: post #269

"But the average employee assigned to the 737 program has been at Boeing just five years, according to a longtime Boeing executive who is involved in various efforts to save the company; for comparison’s sake, he says the average employee assigned to the 777 program had between 15 and 20 years under their belt." It don't think it's possible to overstate how bad, and sad, of a state of affairs that is. I've never seen…

SpaceX manages to make things work despite rampant burnout induced quitting so its not impossible. Shorts used to make fun of Tesla and how any experience walks out the door with all the turnover but they seem to have a handle on things as well (less so than SpaceX). If management is checked out I agree that it is less likely to turn out good which is what I think happened here.

Alot of bright, energetic people out of school sign up because they are doing something unique and cool they truly have a passion for it. So even though the reviews of the place are terrible they will always have a line of talent at their door (atleast until they have more competition). If you are attracting the top tier talent every year, that can solve alot of problems, even if they aren't that experienced.

That being said you are still leaving yourself wide open for failures. Engineering failures often involve people being overworked, not having adequate experience, and working in areas with high churn. See Boeing as an example.

Re: What Boeing did to all the guys who remember how to build a plane

#530

Post by class3shock »

ProllyInfamous wrote: post #504
class3shock wrote: post #269

"But the average employee assigned to the 737 program has been at Boeing just five years, according to a longtime Boeing executive who is involved in various efforts to save the company; for comparison’s sake, he says the average employee assigned to the 777 program had between 15 and 20 years under their belt." It don't think it's possible to overstate how bad, and sad, of a state of affairs that is. I've never seen…

>...irreplaceable and yet they were actively trying to get rid of them... There are no words. Best response I can offer is Kurt Vonnegut's quote: "We'll go down in history as the first society that wouldn't save itself because it wasn't cost-effective."

So it goes...
Post reply on HN