To:helmet fire
Here are two examples of how much influence I had in changing the minds of Agusta engineers.
1) Several years before my arrival at Agusta they had hired LTV to set up and run the R&M department and the Product Support department during the development of the A-109. LTV had about 30 men on staff and every time they tried to implement any new ideas the Agusta personnel stood in their way. They made it so difficult for the LTV staff that they cancelled the contract and returned to the United States. When I arrived at Agusta to make my presentation relative to what I was proposing they treated me as a visiting dignitary However, shortly after my starting the job I could see that any attempt to change things or make suggestions I realized it was an attack on their collective machismo. It was not that I was treated badly as I was not but they just would not listen.
2) The last six months of my contract I was assigned to work with the director to get the Engineering department and the Product Support department managers to talk to each other. During the development of the A-109 there were three or four key people on the design team. There was a lot of bad blood between them and as the program evolved and they entered into the A-101 program the animosity got worse. Flash forward 10-12 years there had been at least two turnovers of management in engineering and three in the product support and even though the new department heads had minimal involvement with the A-109 design and the A-101 the bad blood still existed. I acted as an ombudsman trying to get them together as full cooperation was required on the EH-101 and A-129 programs. When I left at the completion of my contract they were still not talking to each other.