I remember watching the TV documentary about the 777, ("21st Century Jet"?) and was surprised that the plane and engines were to be fully designed on computer and not need testing.
One older engineer insisted that an engine SHOULD be tested for real on a plane and possibly, because of the presence of cameras, the then boss Mullally finally agreed to test fly an engine on an existing plane. As it banked slightly just after take-off there was a compressor stall, and it transpired that the programmers had forgotten to consider Gravity!
I have now learned that rather than strengthen ties between management and engineering, Boeing has separated the two even further by moving management to Chicago, hundreds of miles away.
This division of management from production, then issuing unrealistic demands and deadlines to the "dirty end of the company" is sadly all too common in industry and commerce these days and I feel it is a deeply flawed business model, and one which may be partly responsible for delays and problems with the 787.
We saw this so clearly in UK when companies such as the railways and Water Boards were privatised: engineering staff were rapidly chucked off the management team and side-lined. They were replaced by Business studies graduates with little or no understanding of the dirty end, who soon cut back on maintenance staff and procedures, and a string of serious and fatal accidents soon started.