Boeing Satellite Systems: Non-innovation, over-outsourced, great pay and benefits, impossible to purge incompetence - Engineer Boeing Employee Review

if you are excited about developing new technology, if you are more interested in engineering than paperwork, if you are young and passionate, this place is not for you. BSS used to be Hughes, which was a non-profit and once produced high-quality, cutting edge technology, where no expense was spared, and engineers were deeply invested in the product. now under the boeing model, BSS outsources everything, leaving only integration activities at the site. cost reduction, lean manufacturing (terrible for custom-built spacecraft), and meeting scheduled milestones are now the most important metrics. innovation is killed because 1) outsourcing has lead to the gradual loss of technical expertise, where activities shifted from in-house knowledge to managing subcontractors, 2) the employees are on average old "grey beards" who protect what knowledge they have to retain employment and command ever-higher salaries, 3) programs are so desperate to produce value in the form of profit that old, proven designs are propagated and new designs are ignored because of their poor short-term investment return, 4) it is impossible to fire anyone, meaning that lazy, incompetent engineers remain, creating a culture that embraces the path of least resistance, i.e. "if it ain't' broke, don't fix it." in addition, boeing has too much management. it is the opposite of a flat management model. i have never seen so many levels of management. everyone in charge of anything is so busy protecting their own "turf" that the bigger picture -- actually making awesome satellites -- is ignored. the organization is too big, too slow to react, too afraid to be daring, too old, too focused on the wrong set of goals.