Boeing insider claims aviation giant is failing because profit-hungry executives are all working from home and slams DEI push at company for being ‘anti-excellence’
A Boeing insider has claimed that the aerospace giant is failing because profit-hungry executives are all working from home and the manufacturer has become too fixated on DEI.
The anonymous source described Boeing as a “company under administrators” that has lost contact with its workforce.
The beleaguered airline is in the midst of a safety crisis involving its 737 Max jets, which caught fire after a door panel exploded on board an Alaska Airlines flight.
Speak with City magazinethe insider described how the executive suite at Boeing’s headquarters in Arlington, Virginia, sits empty while executives avoid the office.
“We have just introduced a policy that everyone must come to work five days a week, except the executive council, which can use the private jets to travel to meetings,” the source said.
A Boeing insider has claimed that the aerospace giant is failing because profit-hungry executives are all working from home and have become too fixated on DEI. Pictured: A blown-out panel from Alaska Airlines Flight 1282 Boeing 737-9 MAX
Boeing has faced a safety crisis surrounding its 737 Max jets in recent years, including a 2018 Lion Air flight crash in Indonesia
Fears were exacerbated after another 737 Max crashed on an Ethiopia Airlines flight in 2019, killing 159 people.
A Boeing insider claimed that executives like CEO Dave Calhoun are refusing to come in and have alienated the workforce
‘And that’s the story: it’s a company that is under management. It is not under owners. And it doesn’t belong to people who like airplanes.’
The individual also claimed that the company has become obsessed with diversity and inclusion policies, which they view as “anti-excellence.”
“The DEI story is very real, and at Boeing, DEI became tied to the status game. It’s something you embrace if you want to move forward. It became a means to power,” the source added.
‘It’s anti-excellence because it’s poorly defined, but it became part of the culture and was linked to compensation. Every HR email reads: “Inclusion makes us better.” This kind of politicization of HR is a real problem in all companies.’
DailyMail.com has contacted Boeing about the anonymous claims.
Boeing’s fortunes took a turn for the worse in the aftermath of the Alaska Airlines emergency on January 5, when a panel on the 737 Max 9 exploded mid-flight in front of shocked passengers.
The disaster resulted in 171 members of the fleet being grounded pending safety investigations and the Federal Aviation Administration halting production of the jets.
About $30 billion in market value was wiped out in a matter of days, while stock prices fell 25 percent.
Boeing has also had to pay the airline $160 million in “initial compensation” due to the grounding and has faced several lawsuits from passengers who were on board the flight at the time of the incident.
However, the Alaska Airlines incident was just the latest in a series of concerns surrounding the 737 Max jets following two crashes involving the aircraft in 2018 and 2019.
The anonymous person also claimed that Boeing has become obsessed with diversity and inclusion policies, which they view as “anti-excellence.”
The incidents have put the aerospace giant under heavy scrutiny, resulting in a huge turnover of talent, according to the source.
The Alaska Airlines disaster wiped out $30 billion from Boeing’s market value and sent its stock prices plummeting
The Federal Aviation Administration limited production of the 737 Max due to safety concerns, while 171 of Boeing’s fleet were grounded, causing huge financial problems for the company.
The first involved a Lion Air flight in Indonesia that killed 189 people, while the second occurred just a year later when an Ethiopia Airlines flight crashed killing 157 people.
The source said the investigation into the crashes resulted in a “sweeping series of changes that caused a massive turnover of talent” to the detriment of the company.
“Right now we have an executive board running the company that is all made up of outsiders,” the source explained.
‘The current CEO is a General Electric man, just like the CFO he brought in. And we have a completely new HR leader, with no background at Boeing. The head of our commercial aircraft division in Seattle, who was fired last week, was one of the last engineers on the executive board.”
However, CEO Dave Calhoun recently announced his intention to step down from the board at the end of the year as part of a management overhaul.
Calhoun, the chairman of the board and the head of the commercial airlines division are all leaving due to ongoing safety issues with the 737 MAX.
But this is not enough to allay insiders’ concerns.
“There is no visible center of the business and people are wondering what they are connected to,” the source said.
Boeing’s stock price fell by billions in the wake of the Alaska Airlines incident, and the company’s stock has fallen the farthest behind rival Airbus in its history
Former Boeing quality manager John Barnett issued an eerie warning in January about two specific aircraft models recently involved in accidents – before they turned up dead. He will be seen in 2022
Barnett, 62, was in the middle of a deposition in a whistleblower lawsuit related to the production of the 787 Dreamliner, according to his attorney.
“The staff knows if you love the thing you’re building, or if it’s just an extra asset for you. At some point, you can’t restore through process what you’ve lost through love. And I think that’s probably the most important story of all.”
Boeing’s fortunes took another blow after it emerged that a whistleblower who sued the aerospace giant had died in South Carolina from an alleged self-inflicted gunshot wound.
The news wiped $4 billion off the company’s value overnight, as shares fell to their lowest level in five months after news broke that John Barnett was found dead in a hotel parking lot in Charleston.
Barnett, 62, was in the middle of a deposition in a whistleblower lawsuit related to the production of the 787 Dreamliner, according to his attorney.
The suit alleged that suppressors deliberately fitted “substandard” parts to Boeing 787s, and that buyers swept defects under the rug to save money.
But the insider suggested that the problems with Boeing are not unique to the aerospace giant and they denounced the “politicization of HR” through the pursuit of DEI.
“Boeing is just a symptom of a much bigger problem: the failure of our elites. The company’s goal now is “broad stakeholder value, including DEI and ESG,” the insider said.
‘This was then embraced as a means of gaining power, further separating the workforce from the company. And it is tearing our society apart.’