Boeing
Boeing has been building commercial
airliners since 1927 with the first Boeing
commercial jet airliner, the 7O7,
introduced in l955. As discussed in the
article on page 172 of the text. This
success is even more remarkable when one
realizes that the Boeing "Design/
Build" process had not changed very
much during the past three decades. The
system was antiquated, cumbersome, and
inefficient creating production
delays, increased costs, and spawning a huge
bureaucracy simply to handle the
paperwork. Boeing must clearly be motivated to
bring this World War II era
process into the 21st Century. Airbus Industries'
increasingly larger share
of the commercial airliner market was a major force
instigating these
changes. Airbus had the advantages of government subsidies to
help defray the
costs of implementing best design practices, as well as
latecomer advantages.
It learned from Boeing's, as well as Lockheed's and
McDonnell Douglas',
mistakes and it did not have 40 years of bureaucratic
momentum to overcome.
Other motivating factors include the need for Boeing to
increase the income
from the commercial aircraft division to offset the loss of
revenue due to
cutbacks in government defense and aerospace contracts. In this
paper I will
attempt to highlight those topics I think should be covered,
suggestions, and
background for those reasons. In this I will hope to show why
the Boeing
Company was in need of the much-needed overhaul of the design/build
process
at Boeing, the changes themselves as well as the methodology used
in
accomplishing those changes. The Commercial Aircraft Industry The last
decade
has seen the commercial aircraft industry dominated by two
manufacturers: the
Boeing Commercial Aircraft Company and Airbus
Industries, with McDonnell
Douglas, a distant third. Airbus Industries is
a relative newcomer, but it has
very quickly provided much competition to
Boeing, surpassing McDonnell Douglas
and Lockheed. Airbus Industries is a
consortium backed by the British, French,
German and Spanish governments.
The great, and many say unfair, advantage that
Airbus has over the
competition is government subsidies allowing Airbus to
operate in the red.
Thus, Airbus can afford to develop new technologies without
having to worry
about passing on the costs to the customers and can price their
aircraft very
competitively to lure away airlines from Boeing. Cost cutting The
effects of
the changing airline industry resulting from deregulation in 1978 are
still
being felt in the commercial aircraft industry. The competition
among
airlines for passengers has resulted in a greater emphasis on cost
cutting
leading to mergers and bankruptcies. In addition, airlines modified
their
routing systems since they were not limited to certain routes, as was
the case
before deregulation, changing their buying patterns for aircraft
accordingly.
Airlines were now less concerned with having a
technologically superior airplane
and more concerned about the cost and
efficiency of that airplane. Why Change.?
The first question that comes
to mind is "why would the undisputed leader
in the commercial airliner
industry make such a risky, change?". In other
words, doesn't the old motto
"If it ain't broke, Don't fix it" apply
in this case? Well according to many
observers both inside and outside of
Boeing, the system was 'broke'. To
give an example of the inefficiency of the
process that coordinates
engineering and manufacturing, it used to take 800
different computer systems
to manage it. This process has been around since
Boeing was building the
B-17 Bomber in World War II. The process of tracking
parts in an airplane was
called "effectinitly" and was done manually!
A drafter required two years
of training to fully understand the system, and
still one-third of the paper
work contained errors. This "effectivity"
just doesn't make sense, and this
process adds absolutely no value to their
product and results in tremendous
costs. Regardless of all the evidence pointing
to flaws in the system,
changing a successful company is not easy, especially if
we consider the cost
and the additional time involved. For the 777, the
additional time is
estimated to be six months over the normal 48 months to
develop a new
airplane. Getting a tremendously large bureaucratic system to move
forward is
a daunting task, especially while continuing to produce airplanes.
The
Changes; The changes to the Boeing Commercial Aircraft Company must
encompass
all fields. From the philosophy of the company to the technical
details,
every aspect of the design/build process will need to be
modified.
Measurement Tools and Practices Need: All content is integrated
and organized to
fit each user's needs and delivery preferences. Barriers: ?
Lack of
collection point for distributed server statistics ? Split
between
internal metrics and vendor hosted metrics ? Lack of direct
user
identification ? Difficulty of collecting true costs and true
benefits
? Lack of accounting tools to measure intangibles What Boeing is
doing:
? Collecting metrics from high volume servers as indicators of
growth
? Using local server statistics to monitor content usage ?
Using
traditional survey methods to answer questions about usefulness, abuse,
and
value ? Collecting data on increased revenue, decreased costs, and
better
use of information for specific sites ? Participating in bench
marking
surveys with peer institutions Delivery Tools and Practices Need: All
content
being able to be integrated and organized to fit each user's needs
and delivery
preferences. Barriers: ? Rapid proliferation of tools for
content
delivery ? Media hype based on marketing claims ? Lack of
software
compatibility ? Instability of tools developed on fast schedules
?
Lack of common standards for content description ? Poor
content
maintenance ? Poor integration of delivery tools and content What
Boeing
is doing: ? Providing enterprise-wide delivery systems for search
and
filtering ? Site licensing search products for local server use
?
Providing product support for licensed products ? Encouraging
internal
information owners to develop processes to manage their information,
and making
visible those sites that succeed ? Encouraging vendors to
separate
content from delivery tools, and to work towards common content
formats
Platforms Need: Ensure all content is integrated and organized to
fit each
user's needs and delivery preferences. Barriers: ? Wide
accessibility
brings enterprise-wide deficiencies into visibility
?Platform
incompatibilities are escalating, driving importance of common
standards
? Those standards are still in evolution, and often pushed
for
competitive advantage ? Problems of scale become major roadblocks
for
needed infrastructure services (directory, authentication) ? Pull
between
distributed and centralized services is a constant struggle
Publishing
Tools/Content Management Need: All content is integrated and
organized to
accommodate each user's needs and delivery preferences.
Barriers: ? Most
difficult piece of the puzzle to solve, and least
interesting to technologists
? Rich content is essential for better
management ? Agreement on
how to enrich that content is not easy ? Very few
standards for content
description are available or stable ? Commercial tools
do not lend
themselves to software- independent content description ? 90% of
the
battle is education What Boeing is doing: ? Starting small
?
Adopting a subset of Dublin Core meta-data as the company-wide tagging
standard
? Initiating groups to examine impact of XML and RDF on Boeing's
existing
and planned content sets ? Promoting and presenting pilot projects
using
rich content through cross-company forums ? Influencing
internal
standards boards to address issues of content management vs.
infrastructure
management ? Participating in research studies and other
activities
related to knowledge management Understanding User's Needs Vision:
All content
is integrated and organized to fit each user's needs and delivery
preferences.
Barriers: ? Users all have different needs ? Identifying
those
needs is difficult ? Meeting those needs is harder still ?
User
expectations are often unrealistic ? Content is often tied to
delivery
systems ? Content is protected by passwords ? Content sets
often
overlap What Boeing is doing: ? Tracking usage statistics to find
high
impact pages ? Using surveys to collect feedback ?
Performing
usability studies on high profile web sites ? Studying specific
user
groups' information seeking behavior ? Looking at cultural barriers
to
effective use of information ? Lobbying vendors to adopt common
content
and retrieval standards ? Purchasing content separately from
delivery
systems wherever possible New Philosophy Needed Vision: All
employees must be
part of a team and have the pride that accompanies it.
Barriers: ?
Working as teams can at times be extremely difficult ?
Knowing your
employees and your supervisors can cause animosity among
sections ? Trust
with in the company must be earned What Boeing is doing: ?
Boeing is
touting the 777 as a new processes not just a new product, a
philosophy that is
espoused by everyone from the top down. ? Cards worn on
name tags were
printed listing the mission, goals, objectives ? The Boeing
company
mission statement is: "To be the number one aerospace company in the
world
and among the premier industrial concerns in terms of quality,
profitability and
growth." On the backside of the 777 division cards was this
mission
statement: "Working together to produce the preferred new
airplane
family." Mind Change: Vision: Change need to not only tangible but
in the
mind of every worker. Barriers: ? Working together solving
problems
? Realizing the benefits of having every one involved What Boeing
is
doing: ? The "I can do it alone " was changed to "We can
do it together
" Computer Aided Drafting (CAD) Simulation and Integration:
Vision:
Computer Aided Drafting should be used and linked to every Engineer so
as to
promote ideas and decrease production time. Barriers: ? Linking
this type and
style of software can be expensive What Boeing is doing: ?
The
development of the 777 was the single largest trial of CAD and the
initial
production time results were impressive. The port wing tip of the
first 777 was
out of position by 1/1,000 of an inch when attached to the
fuselage and the
starboard wing was exactly located to within the accuracy of
the measuring
gauges where by saving countless man-hours and money.
Design/Build Teams Goals:
Vision: Institute teams and publish goals that
are obtainable and common sense.
Barriers: ? Established Companies are
reluctant to change their ways What
Boeing is doing: ? Boeing management
was a hand written list of goals
including statements such as: a) Everything
works, b) No surprises, and c)
Working together. ? This led directly to
the concept of design/build
teams, which were involved, on every aspect of
the design effort. At one point
there were 238 such teams.
Business/Marketing: Vision: Changes in business and
marketing practices are
necessary Boeing will need to be more responsive to the
customer. Barriers: ?
This can be a large hurdle to cross, as the Leader
in the aircraft industry
is some times difficult to change when you are the
leader of the pack. What
Boeing is doing: ? One of Boeing's stated goals
and marketing strategy
cornerstones is the idea of service readiness from day
one. ? Perhaps the
strongest selling point of Boeing's marketing strategy
is the idea of
customer involvement and giving the customer configuration
flexibility. Teams
from four customers, United Airlines, British Airways, All
Nippon and
Japan Airlines, were heavily involved from the beginning of the 777
program.
Boeing gives airlines great flexibility in configuring the cabin by
making
the galleys and lavatories completely modular. Cost Cutting: Vision:
In
today's economy they must be and remain competitive they must reduce
costs.
Barriers: ? This may and some times causes layoffs for several
employees
? It is unpopular to take the needed steps to remain competitive in
a
world economy What Boeing is doing: ? Boeing has set targets for
reducing
costs by 25%, defects by 50% ? Cut order-to-delivery time by half to
six
months. ? A large step toward achieving the cost reduction goal is
going
to just-in-time management of the nearly $8 billion inventory Boeing
keeps on
hand just in-case. Will it Work? Did all these changes substantially
change the
design/build process for commercial jet aircraft at Boeing? Yes!
Was it a change
for the better? Yes! Were the changes enough to maintain the
market share that
Boeing currently enjoys? The answer to the last
question is difficult to answer
now since the changes are not complete and
their effects will not be known until
well into the 21-st century.