Hacker News Reader

Comment by colinng | Hacker News Reader

Are we reading the same sources? The ex-CEO, David Calhoun, has a degree in accounting.

https://www.boeing.com/company/bios/david-l-calhoun

> Calhoun has a bachelor’s degree in accounting from Virginia Tech.

You're right about Calhoun- I was actually referring to Dennis Muilenburg, the CEO who was fired in 2019 after the two 737 MAX crashes and the subsequent groundings. My comment wasn't clear enough- I'll edit it for clarity.

The financialization of management at Boeing has been an issue since well before 2019. See:

https://www.airliners.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=213075

The CEOs that triggered various financialization moves were engineers by background, too

They had previously worked under "Neutron" Jack Welch, who had a PhD in chemical engineering. What a wide trail of destruction that guy left.

> The CEOs that triggered various financialization moves were engineers by background, too

They were engineers by degree. When was the last time they looked at a CFD or FEA model?

I have an EE degree, but haven't looked at antenna or power systems design in many moons: I have no background in them (working sysadmin stuff).

What are you proposing then? The CEO not do…CEO stuff? This is a common no true Scotsman argument on HN, where ‘real engineers’ are treated as some sort of shorthand for “someone that has the same values that I do”.

The only meaningful proposal is to fundamentally rethink the culture that’s eaten American companies since the 80s.

The fundamental issue is fiduciary duty getting warped by people like Milton Friedman into the modern meme that executives are legally obligated to maximize shareholder profits (effectively always in the short term).

Boeing is just the next of many, many cases of companies being destroyed by capitalism run rampant.

I think he is proposing that tech company CEOs have some hands-on engineering experience at least for a short while. I agree with that - "MBA only" bosses really have no idea what it's like to be on the ground. I can't even emphasize how true this is, "no idea whatsoever" is a huge understatement. I thought they were faking to be lazy at first, but they really don't understand that some people need to actually do the work and what goes into it. And I say that as an MBA/CFA before engineering.

Many great CEOs of engineering-focused companies are pure suits with no engineering background.

The CEO is mostly a figurehead, whose only actual responsibilities are to manage the investors and build out a leadership team.

Some CEOs take on more, but they really don't need to in order to run a successful company.

The former CEO does (Dennis Muilenburg), but not David Calhoun.

David Calhoun is the current CEO until the end of the year.

Isn't accounting "finance engineering"? :-)

And cleaning staff are actually floor engineers. Everything is engineering if you are imaginative enough.

Nah, cleaning staff are hygiene technicians.

Well, in English, "engineer" does seem to also mean technical worker (what we call "technicien" in French), in addition to "ingénieur".

In my country to be an engineer I have to have a university degree of a certain kind, then do a state exam for the national engineering association, then pay a yearly fee to remain an engineer.

I'm a bit discontent how just about anyone of my coworkers in USA can be a whatever engineer :D

In America we look at the ideas someone has rather than what degree or membership they may have purchased.[0]

[0]https://www.oregonlive.com/portland/2017/04/beaverton_man_cl...

That's why salesmen whose only job is to promise literally whatever to customers are called "sales engineers"… because of their superior ideas -_-'

Studying and learning and taking exams? Nah… that's boring.

I'm going to point out that you have this exact system for lawyers and doctors… you can't just have ideas and be a lawyer or a doctor.

No, they are obviously flat surface managers.

Despite the tongue in cheek sibling response, accounting is more like engineering than the holier than thou techies here would care to admit.

Are you implying techies are engineers? They are not. Just like accounting isn't engineering. Engineering is engineering.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com