Ever since Dave Calhoun took over as CEO of Boeing in 2020, the airplane manufacturing giant has stumbled from one crisis to the next. Despite being hired to clean up the company’s act after the fatal 737 Max crashes, Calhoun can’t seem to steer Boeing in the right direction.
Incidents Keep Piling Up
So far in 2024, it’s been one embarrassing headline after another for the aerospace leader. In January, a Boeing jet suffered a terrifying mid-flight explosion that investigations suggest may have been caused by improper repairs done by the company’s own workers. Just last week, a whistleblower employee who raised safety concerns ended up dying by suicide on the same day he was scheduled to testify about Boeing’s practices.
Most recently, on Monday a Boeing 787 Dreamliner plunged suddenly in mid-air, injuring 50 passengers before making an emergency landing in New Zealand. While the causes are still under investigation, the repeated incidents and safety lapses have observers baffled as to why Calhoun remains in charge.
“An Extreme Embarrassment”
“It’s become an extreme embarrassment,” said Richard Aboulafia, a longtime aviation expert. “The board seems weirdly absent, investors seem weirdly complacent, and the government doesn’t have a way to deal with this.”
Despite Boeing’s stock plunging over 25% so far this year amid the barrage of crises, Calhoun was actually given a raise in 2022 to $22.5 million in total compensation. At most companies, the CEO would have been fired long ago for such underperformance.
Many critics argue that for real change to happen at Boeing, the entire senior leadership team needs to be replaced with a focus on restoring the engineering excellence that once defined the company. Until then, the incidents and headaches are likely to continue piling up.
