> run by executives who know nothing about airplanes / engineering
Dennis Mullenberg and Jack Welch were pillaging executives and engineers. The myth of engineering management being inherently incorruptible is empirically misplaced.
> Why does everyone rip on Jack Welch here? Was he ever a Boeing exec?
He was an engineer and an exercise. There is this myth in Silicon Valley about how MBAs and engineers behave in the C suite. It’s empirically unsupported, albeit a satisfying story to tell.
OK, but why does Welch come up so often in Boeing articles? It's like there's this meme that "What happened to Boeing is all Jack Welch's fault!" It comes up over and over and over, and from multiple authors. Why?
James McNerney, the CEO of Boeing who oversaw the development of the 737 MAX, was one of Jack Welch's underlings (along with eventual Home Depot CEO Robert Nardelli and Welch's successor as CEO of GE, Jeff Immelt). [1][2]
The exec brought from McDonnell-Douglas, who was also an adviser to Phil Condit when certain changes (the 7E7 aka 787 program goals and planning, outsourcing strategy, HQ change) were done, and who later replaced Condit as CEO, was well known for being Jack Welch acolyte.
In fact, you can find Jack Welch "acolytes" all over 1990s execs and management and even later, because he was that influential.
Dennis Mullenberg and Jack Welch were pillaging executives and engineers. The myth of engineering management being inherently incorruptible is empirically misplaced.