Ethical considerations for Boeing and the airline industry

Term Paper Proposal: Boeing’s Max Probe

Introduction

For millennia, man has been fascinating with air travel. History is riddle with risk takers, using the innovations of their time to engineer mechanism for air travel. These mechanisms often failed, resulting in both death and disappointment. However, these setbacks never deterred the human spirit of innovation as it relates to air travel. Even back, in 1506, Leonardo Da Vinci in his book Codex on the Flight of Birds detailed many aerodynamic principles of nature and flight that where the precursors of modern aviation. 200 years later in 1783, Joseph-Michel and Jacques-Étienne created the first hot air balloon using a duck, a sheep, and a roster as its first test subjects. By 1809 the study of aerodynamics became much more mainstream due to the contributions of Philosopher George Cayley and his seminal book On Aerial Navigation. By the early 1900 hundreds, the Wright brothers, during the industrial revolution, altered air flight forever with their well-documented flight at Kitty Hawk. This monumental event ushered in a entire industry that has ultimately had unfathomable impacts on human civilization. With this achieve came the rise and viability of entire aerospace industry. People where better able to move from place to place in a more efficient and safer manner. Goods were now able to be transported seamlessly across borders. Even space travel became much more possible due to the innovations first established by the Wright brothers. Unfortunately, as with most innovations in society, those with nefarious motives also took advantage of this progress. Many of the deadliest wars were fought shortly after the invention of the airplane by the Wright brothers. Just as people and goods could be transferred through air travel, so too could weapons of mass destruction. We witnessed the attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941 from Japanese airplanes. We witnessed the horrifying destruction of the September 11TH, terrorist attacks. All of these events both the good and the bad results from how humans leverage and utilize these innovations to serve mankind as oppose to destroy it (Adamson, 2020).

Within each of the decisions, innovations and technological breakthroughs discovered above, there was always an element of ethics. Ethics underlie many of the attributes and principles prescribed to each of the historical figures above. As noted above, Joseph-Michel and Jacques-Étienne created the first hot air balloon, but sent animals instead of human to test the innovation out. It would have been unethical for them to send human test subjects within a unproven and unreliable aircraft. This is particularly true, as there was no benefit or difference between sending a human and sending another object. Likewise, there were ethical considerations involved in using aircraft as a tool of war, which was also detailed above. On August 6, 1945, America, through aircraft innovations, was the first nation to ever use nuclear weapons in armed conflict. The two bombs killed over 350,000 people many of whom where civilians. The bombs incinerated children, killed many innocent Japanese and resulting in untold horrors. Here again ethics within the industry played a major role in how air innovations are used in society. The same issues apply to the use of airplanes during September 11 and other terrorist attacks as well. Although there are many ethical considerations with the aerospace industry, many vary in depth and magnitude. As innovations continue to occur in the industry, so too does the ethical considerations surround these innovations. Of recent note is the innovation surrounding the Boeing 737 Max. Here, the company had to battle a variety of ethical considerations that ultimately impact the public, its shareholders, employees, and society at large. In many respects, the implications from these decisions will impact the industry for many decades to come. With multiple crashes and the loss of life of fellow human beings, the company has also eroded the public’s trust in its ability to design safe and secure air travel products. This ultimately, lowers profitability as air carriers are less likely to purchase their products, which adversely impacts the stock price. Shareholders which are often small “mom and pop” investors also suffer as their shareholdings and wealth decline as a result of bad ethical decisions from management of the company. Here, just a few wrong decisions, impacted a very large proportion of the population in both direct and indirect means. The primarily point of contention for this document is that ethical decision must be imbedded in the company culture and reinforced by senior management (Ahmed,, 2019).

Critically examine an ethical issue facing your organization or industry

To begin, to understand the ethical implications of the Boeing 737 Max debacle it is first relevant to discuss the ethical conflicts that impact large corporate organizations. The 737 Max suffered from a litany of ethical issues and considerations. The first was related to design flows with the flight control software. In addition, corporate competition from Boeing main competitor Airbus caused a number of internal pressures and rushed developed time. Third, Boeing lacked a strong communication mechanism, leading to a lack of transparency related to new software within the 737 Max model. The FAA was heavily negligent in its monitoring of the certification process of the 737 Max, even after following the first crash.

All of these above elements can be distilled in to roughly three ethical principles and concepts. The first ethical conflicts relate to the concept of Duty/Responsibility vs. Malice/Indifference. A common example of this concept is corporate managers simply ignoring unethical decisions on the part of others. This occurs heavily in finance industry and Wall Street, where trades use proprietary information to “front run” other traders orders using complex financial algorithms. The next concept is related to Duty vs. Self-Interest. Many common examples include bribery, misuse of power within an organization, intentionally leaking classified information and so forth. Here, managers or corporate executives may ignore their duty to others in enhance their own self-interest. The final concept which is arguable most prevalent to Boeing is the concept of Duty vs. Duty. Here corporations must juggle the duty to maximize shareholder wealth, with their duty to do the right thing for society. This concept can even enter the grey area related to the duty to maintain confidentiality with the duty to whistle blow and correct adverse behaviors. Table 1 below summarizes these ethical concepts.

Table 1

Concept

Example

Duty/Responsibility vs. Malice/Indifference

· Ignoring ethical whistle blowers due to indifference

Duty vs. Self Interest (Conflict of Interest or Principle Agent Problem)

· Wall street fund managers with excessive fees without earning their clients commensurate investment returns.

· Investment banks “Front Running” ahead of client trades to make a profit

Duty vs Duty (Conflicting Ethical Considerations)

· Duty to shareholders vs. Duty to society

Each of these ethical concepts are directly correlated to Boeing and its handling of the Boeing 737. The first and often best documented ethical element is related to pilot training. To begin, the company designed the 737 Max to a natural extension of its highly successful 737 model. The Boeing 737 model prior to the delivery of the 737 Max was the best-selling commercial aircraft in aviation history. To date, this model has sold nearly 16,000 aircraft. Building on the success the earlier model the company attempted to leverage the infrastructure of the prior model to design an improved version of the product. However, development of the 737 Max was rushed internally due to pressures from Boeing rival Airbus. Prior to the release and announcement of the 737 Max, Airbus, announced it innovations relates to the A320 suite of products. Not only where these airlines larger, their where more fuel-efficient and cheaper for operators to maintain. To maintain competitive with Airbus, Boeing release its highly successful 737 update. Immediately the 737 Max became the fastest selling airliner in modern aviation history selling 5000 models to 100 airlines throughout the world. In addition, the company designed the Max model to very similar to the prior 737 models to ensure that pilots would not need to be retrained on the existing model further increasing the value proposition of the offering (Arnold, 2019). This was the first ethical consideration on the part of Boeing. Here, the company was able to saving millions in expenses through the avoidance of training and other similar programs designed for pilots. The company purposefully designed the plane to avoid these training expenses. Here, as the model was new, the company arguable should have spent revenue on proper training of pilots. This however is very debatable as an argument can be made for both elements of the training argument. Here, this is related to the “Duty vs. Duty”” concept discussed in detail earlier. The company has a duty to shareholders to maximize profits. It also has a duty to the aviation industry to properly prepare pilots, staff and other stakeholders who will be using the plane on a day to day basis. In this case, Boeing chose its shareholders as it elected to not spend large sums of money on properly training aviation personnel on the plane. Instead the company believe the similarities from the prior models made training a moot point. This concept was compounded by the fact that the prior model was so successful as it relates to sales, that nearly all air carriers where already familiar with the model. Unfortunately, opponents of this thought process can quickly point to the lack of training that ultimately resulting in the loss of life from two very high-profile airline crashes. In addition, it can also be argued it is in the shareholders best interest for Boeing to actually spend the additional money on properly training pilots, even if the model is very similar to the prior 737 models

The next ethical issue is related MCAS software, a new feature within the 737 Max product. This software product was needed primarily due the new design of the 737 Max relative to its older counterpart. For one the model featured the GE Leap engine which was much larger than its predecessor model. This required the larger engines to be placed further forward on the wings. By placing the engines further forward on the wings, the new design caused the a much higher risk of stalling out if the pilot angled the nose of the aircraft too high. The MCAS software was thus introduced as a means of mitigating this concern as it would counteract this occurrence. Here, this “add on” would automatically nudge the nose of the aircraft down if sensors on the aircraft detected that the nose was too high causing stalling. The “add on” was touted as an additional safety feature for the plane and would only be deployed in extreme circumstances (Bellamy, 2019). This unfortunately, lead Boeing to its next ethical blunder. The MCAS software add on was never taught to the pilots. Again, as noted earlier, the company decided not to train the pilots on the new software, its benefits, or how it operates. As noted earlier, this was primarily informed by the large sales success for the prior 737 model which allowed most of the pilots within the industry to already be familiar with the product. Unfortunately, none of the pilots were familiar with the MCAS software added to the new model. Even more egregious is that none of the flight manuals even mentioned the MCAS software. This unnecessarily provided a layer of complexity with the operation of the product that led to two very high-profile crashes. The first crash was directly related to the software and the pilots lack of understanding of its functioning.

When the MCAS activities, it tilts the rear stabilizer upward, thus causing the nose of the plane to point downward. Generally speaking, the pilot can easily correct this by pulling back on the control column to lift the nose of the plane back to a neutral position. Unfortunately, with the new MCAS system in place, every time the pilot initiates this operation, the MCAS system would reset, potentially triggering when the nose of the plane was too high. This erroneous triggering resulted in a game of “Tug-of-war” between the pilot and the software system. For example, during the first 737 Max crash with Lion Air, this cycle occurred nearly 22 times over the course of the flight. In addition, Boeing designed a warning light that would alert pilots

when the sensors measuring the plane’s angle of attack differed significantly from historical norms. This sensor would ultimately help notify of a faulty MCAS activation. Unfortunately, this feature was not standard on the base level Airline. Instead, airline carriers had to pay extra for this safety feature again undermining the integrity of the product when juxtaposed against the needs of society. Not only where pilots not trained on this software, the safety protocols to ensure that it functions properly where not even standard on the plane. This was exacerbated by the fact the 737 Max was the fastest selling commercial airliner of all time. Here the ethical considerations where heavily related to the proper training, providing transparency related to the MCAS system and eliciting feedback on its operation. This would have cost the company more money, but would ultimately would have resulted in the saving of lives, and less damage to the Boeing reputation in the minds of consumers and other airline carriers. Likewise, the feedback from pilots could have been used to further improve the overall MCAS system.

The next ethical consideration related to the Boeing 737 Max was related to the regulatory oversight associated with the certification of the plane to begin with. Ironically, the FAA delegated much of the safety certification work of the Boeing 737 to Boeing itself. This was an ethical issue as it called into question the independence and objectivity of the FAA. Reports have indicated the that the FAA pressured its internal managers and safety engineers to delegate more of the oversight of the analysis to Boeing in an effort to expedite the certification process. From an ethical perspective, the FAA should not have looked to expedite the approval and certification process. As an oversight organization the FAA works at the behest of the taxpayer and is charged with safe guarding the interest of consumers. By willingly allowing Boeing to have more power in this process, ultimately undermined the confidence the consumers place within the agency itself. The FAA undermined the integrity of the oversight operations and thus consumer confidence. Research findings show that in certain instances, the FAA did not read and of the more technical documents relates to the 737 Max nor the MCAS software (Benning, 2019).

In conclusion, there were a number of ethical failures on the part of Boeing as it relates to the 737 Max. To summarize it was unethical for Boeing to not train pilots on the new model as this is necessarily to help familiarize the users of the product with its functionality. Although the 737 Max was very similar to its predecessor, it would be ethical for Boeing to help entrench its relationships with customers by providing adequately training to pilots who would be flying its products. Next, the FAA’s delegation of safety oversight was unethical as it undermined the integrity of consumer protection and advocacy agencies. The FAA should not have expedited the certification and instead use its oversight power to conduct its own due diligence on the product and its specifications. Third, Boeing made a very large ethical mistake by not properly testing the MCAS system before deploying it live within the planes operating system. The company should have properly trained pilots on the workings of the MCAS system and how it functions in a real-world environment. The company should have also been transparent in how the software works, how it is triggered and how to properly leverage the software output. In addition, the company should have made MCAS safety mechanisms standard within all airlines as oppose to making an additional “add on” service in which customers could pay for optionally. Finally, Boeing should not have succumbed to market share and profitability pressure from its main rival Airbus. Here the business pressures from Airbus force Boeing to compromise the thoroughness of its safety certification. This was unethical as it caused the company to forego the safety of the public in exchange for large revenues and profits. This ultimately undermined the integrity of the business and caused a widespread distrust for both the industry and its oversight. This was exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic as consumers where often unwilling to fly on airlines in general for light of consumer protections related to both the virus and the plane itself.