Leadership Message

Frontiers September 2015 Issue

September 2015 07 S:10” Craig Cooning President, Network & Space Systems It can be done Boeing must nurture good ideas and remove barriers to innovation B:11.375” At Boeing, we have long taken great pride in solving seemingly impossible challenges. Perhaps we were destined to be that kind of company. Consider that our founder, William E. Boeing, recognized that the amazing technological and industrial innovations just coming to the fore in the early 1900s were nothing short of revolutionary, so much so that he declared, “it behooves no one to dismiss any novel idea with the statement, ‘it can’t be done.’ ” As we move ahead in our centennial year, many of the markets in which we operate present us with new challenges that will be among the biggest we’ll ever have faced. While continuing to succeed in the many tried-and-true things that we have done since Bill Boeing’s time, we must also now do something else: Change our own paradigm for gamechanging innovation. We are in a disruptive business environment—at Boeing Defense, Space & Security, large franchise government programs are scarce. Along with the large defense “primes” customer needs rather than waiting for them to tell us their requirements. We need to widen our focus beyond winning and executing programs and shine a stronger spotlight on making amazing products, ones that do not end up as obsolete because they met decades-old assumptions or needs. In the future we will need to provide even more product leadership—in platforms, systems, hardware, software or product-enabled services—and on operational excellence. Finally, we must accelerate all efforts aimed at removing barriers to innovation. New space and Silicon Valley companies enable innovation partly through decentralization, which empowers individuals, and they rely on powerful strategic principles that everyone understands. We will need to adhere to our strategic principles and create new business models that allow us to pivot more quickly, operate more affordably, enter into new kinds of deals and tolerate more risk. We also must continue to do a better job fostering, nurturing and developing new ideas. This can only happen if each of us makes a promise to ourselves to never again hear a wild idea and say, “it can’t be done.” Our company’s ability to grow, sustain and create great jobs, and remain the world leader in aerospace, depends on it. n photo: Pa ul Pinner | Boeing that have been our traditional competitors, we also now compete and partner with well-funded upstart players in information solutions, satellites, space launch, human spaceflight and space exploration. And there’s nothing to stop these “new space” or Silicon Valley players from moving into other markets. The meteoric rise of these upstarts and tech giants has captured the imaginations of everyday consumers and won the admiration of many of our traditional customers. These new players have achieved tremendous success providing products and capabilities their customers did not initially know they wanted or needed. And even as our customers continue to value the mission understanding, reliability and assurance we can provide—thanks to our years of expertise performing well on large and technically complex programs— they’re also looking to us to do things differently. While delivering mission success with our historic “products,” they also want us to act like the more nimble, less risk-averse players with whom we now compete. They want new ideas, quick responses to change in dynamic markets and innovative, “art-of-the-deal” business arrangements. Our colleagues at Commercial Airplanes face similar challenges. What can you do to help? We must envision and anticipate Leadership Message


Frontiers September 2015 Issue
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