4 ms·

Most of the time, workers and managers are smart, well-meaning, and hard-working. Even executives (though as you get higher and higher up, you see more and more

Most of the time, workers and managers are smart, well-meaning, and hard-working. Even executives (though as you get higher and higher up, you see more and more people whose qualification is political skills and not expertise). The issue with Boeing is less any individual and more institutional decay. Over time, a spigot of effectively unconditional cash corrupts an organization, especially once anyone with enough internal weight to fight against it is no longer involved in the day-to-day. Give it 20 years, and SpaceX will be the same way.

hackernewds 2y ago
It could be individual incompetence as well, why discount that and thumb our ears?
- upon_drumhead 2y ago
  Because while the issues are serious and many, Boeing is still making extremely safe and working airplanes. It's impressive and shows that in general, things are going right. It doesn't excuse the decay and issues, but this isn't a case where everything they do is faulty. they're just held to an extremely high bar.
  - nottorp 2y ago
    > Boeing is still making extremely safe and working airplanes. It's impressive and shows that in general, things are going right. <cough> 737MAX > It doesn't excuse the decay and issues, but this isn't a case where everything they do is faulty. they're just held to an extremely high bar. ... only to the bar they set themselves with the older 737s?
- scarmig 2y ago
  Every organization will have incompetent individuals. A healthy organization is able to remove them; a typical one will blunt their effects; and an unhealthy one will allow them to reproduce themselves and seize power. We want it all to be a matter of just one or two incompetent individuals, because then the solution is simple. We just need to be aware that incompetent individuals exist, and through sheer force of will we can prevent them from destroying great things! But a much darker possibility is that it's something inherent to complex systems. Then, there's nothing to do to escape the inevitable cycle. Whatever brilliant schemes we come up with are doomed to failure, because the issue isn't individuals being stupid but institutional incapability to repair itself.
whiplash451 2y ago
It doesn’t have to be this way. A visionary leader at the top can prevent decay over decades (see Apple, Nvidia)
- madaxe_again 2y ago
  And yet once that leader is gone, the rot sets in. See Apple. Twice.
  - nottorp 2y ago
    > See Apple. Twice. Apple is one of the halves of the phone duopoly sadly, so it will take a long time for them to pay for Cook's decisions this time.
  - specialist 2y ago
    Succession remains an unsolved problem. Seemingly. I hope to be alive long enough to see how Toyota's story plays out. They seemed to have lost their way under Akio Toyoda. We'll see if Koji Sato can get them back on track. I'm also keenly interested in Haier and its "Rendanheyi model". They're worthy of HBR style case studies, receiving at least as much attention as Apple, Sony, Honda, Toyota, etc. And yet we know so little about them. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haier https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haier In 2021, Liang Haishan succeeded Haier's legendary CEO Zhang Ruimin. What happens next? Continued success? Long slow decline? Jump into a volcano? I'd love to know.
- Kim_Bruning 2y ago
  Visionary leaders do sometimes work I guess. But among other things they are subject to the dictator trap, and of course they have a best before date. So a visionary leader is a good person to have during bootstrap, but then your processes need to become self-sustaining.
- mike_hearn 2y ago
  Neither Nvidia nor Apple have access to a spigot of unconditional cash. Their customers are quite discerning and have alternatives they could switch to.
bugglebeetle 2y ago
> Most of the time, workers and managers are smart, well-meaning, and hard-working. This has not been true at any job I’ve had, from working in fast food as a teenager to now being a data scientist. What you describe would be exceptional in almost any company, where things otherwise regress to the mean of these various aspects, or, in especially bad circumstances, go south of that. Boeing would seem to be in the latter category at this point.
Kim_Bruning 2y ago
This is obviously something we are going to need to solve if we want to advance further as a society. I really want to know about studies being done in this area.

hackernewds 2y ago

It could be individual incompetence as well, why discount that and thumb our ears?

upon_drumhead 2y ago
Because while the issues are serious and many, Boeing is still making extremely safe and working airplanes. It's impressive and shows that in general, things are going right. It doesn't excuse the decay and issues, but this isn't a case where everything they do is faulty. they're just held to an extremely high bar.
- nottorp 2y ago
  > Boeing is still making extremely safe and working airplanes. It's impressive and shows that in general, things are going right. <cough> 737MAX > It doesn't excuse the decay and issues, but this isn't a case where everything they do is faulty. they're just held to an extremely high bar. ... only to the bar they set themselves with the older 737s?
scarmig 2y ago
Every organization will have incompetent individuals. A healthy organization is able to remove them; a typical one will blunt their effects; and an unhealthy one will allow them to reproduce themselves and seize power. We want it all to be a matter of just one or two incompetent individuals, because then the solution is simple. We just need to be aware that incompetent individuals exist, and through sheer force of will we can prevent them from destroying great things! But a much darker possibility is that it's something inherent to complex systems. Then, there's nothing to do to escape the inevitable cycle. Whatever brilliant schemes we come up with are doomed to failure, because the issue isn't individuals being stupid but institutional incapability to repair itself.

whiplash451 2y ago

It doesn’t have to be this way. A visionary leader at the top can prevent decay over decades (see Apple, Nvidia)

madaxe_again 2y ago
And yet once that leader is gone, the rot sets in. See Apple. Twice.
- nottorp 2y ago
  > See Apple. Twice. Apple is one of the halves of the phone duopoly sadly, so it will take a long time for them to pay for Cook's decisions this time.
- specialist 2y ago
  Succession remains an unsolved problem. Seemingly. I hope to be alive long enough to see how Toyota's story plays out. They seemed to have lost their way under Akio Toyoda. We'll see if Koji Sato can get them back on track. I'm also keenly interested in Haier and its "Rendanheyi model". They're worthy of HBR style case studies, receiving at least as much attention as Apple, Sony, Honda, Toyota, etc. And yet we know so little about them. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haier https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haier In 2021, Liang Haishan succeeded Haier's legendary CEO Zhang Ruimin. What happens next? Continued success? Long slow decline? Jump into a volcano? I'd love to know.
Kim_Bruning 2y ago
Visionary leaders do sometimes work I guess. But among other things they are subject to the dictator trap, and of course they have a best before date. So a visionary leader is a good person to have during bootstrap, but then your processes need to become self-sustaining.
mike_hearn 2y ago
Neither Nvidia nor Apple have access to a spigot of unconditional cash. Their customers are quite discerning and have alternatives they could switch to.

bugglebeetle 2y ago

> Most of the time, workers and managers are smart, well-meaning, and hard-working. This has not been true at any job I’ve had, from working in fast food as a teenager to now being a data scientist. What you describe would be exceptional in almost any company, where things otherwise regress to the mean of these various aspects, or, in especially bad circumstances, go south of that. Boeing would seem to be in the latter category at this point.

Kim_Bruning 2y ago

This is obviously something we are going to need to solve if we want to advance further as a society. I really want to know about studies being done in this area.