R1. So true. But Lockheed also built good toys that were fun to fly. Pretty much worked as advertised. The Long Beach cable company also had some darn good simple engineering that just worked, not fancy, just good stuff.
Lyman - "Gestalt"? Seriously? Boeings marketing division and the rest of the top down program that ensued coupled with the bean counter's influence on programs that then had inadequate project risk mitigation from overzealousness or hubris got this company right where it is now. A telling indicator of the impending issues was the repositioning of the corporate headquarters from Seattle to Chicago. Now, Boeing is diversified company, but that change was a clear point of departure from the core values that had been historical points of some corporate pride. There are good engineers in the company, grounded in both conservative design and rational evolutionary change. The program has been smoking something else for a while, but within their structure they have the competency to rectify these defects. Too much emphasis on Gestalt and a loss of the practical grounded engineering input into the design is more likely to be a root cause.
PS: NASA pretty much outsourced the space shuttle program... and more or less lost control of the QA of that due to the complexity and inadequacy of management systems related to risk management, attention getting with STS107. TBC has some prior examples of pitfalls from the course they have undertaken.
Last edited by fdr; 5th February 2013 at 09:30.