This is getting way beyond
PR but there are some interesting observations here:
https://leehamnews.com/2019/05/27/po...up/#more-30181Muilenburg’s MCAS
I was at the Airbus Innovation Days last week with more than 130 global journalists. Naturally, the Boeing MAX crisis was the subject of a lot of sideline talk among us.
To a person, the journalists are appalled at Boeing’s handling of the communications and messaging, and of Muilenburg’s various statements.
Also to a person, we believe the corporate lawyers, not the corporate communications team, are calling the shots in the messaging.
One reporter likened Muilenburg’s we-own-it, no-the-pilots-did-it approach to his own MCAS.
First, Muilenburg’s nose would rise with the we-own-it approach.
Then his nose would fall with the-pilots-did-it claim.
Then repeat, over and over.
There was general eye rolling that Boeing would engage “celebrities” to help rebuild the MAX brand.
I suspect that Muilenburg will have to go. I'd also recommend hoisting some of the political window-dressing off the board and adding some engineers from critical-risk industries. If I was in charge, too, I'd be thinking of whether to tell the lawyers to get lost and establish a massive fund for victims' families. It might be cheaper than what might come out of discovery.