Management Planning

Management Planning - Boeing

MGMT/330

Management Planning - Boeing

In any business there are differences in planning. Without these differences a business would not be successful. There needs to be a variety of planning in order for a business to grown and aspire. This gives creativity to all the levels of management, to make the business the best. In this paper those differences will be discussed and why and how they are integrated through the Boeing Company. There will also be discussed how Boeing creates new strategic plans because of the different issues that arise in running a business, like legal, ethics, and social responsibility issues. It will also be shown how strategic, tactical, and contingency planning is influenced by factors.

Boeing is a major leader in the aerospace company and the largest producer of commercial jetliners and military aircrafts. The company is organized into two businesses; they are the Boeing Commercial Airlines and Boeing Integrated Defense Systems (Boeing, 2010). The reason that Boeing is the leading aerospace company is its successful planning. Being the large company that it is, Boeing uses all four functions of management; most important of those would be planning. The company uses planning to set the strategy of marketing their products. "Boeing has been able to maintain success for many years due to their strong ethics and planning abilities (Associated Content, 2008)." One issue that has been encountered numerous times is legal issues.

All major companies over time have encountered legal issues and Boeing is no exception. In 2005, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission accused Boeing of sex discrimination, and retaliation of two female engineers. Even though two District Court Judges found there was not enough evidence to substantiate these claims, the United States District Court of Appeals ordered that the cases go to trial. It was discovered in the trial that Boeing's conduct violated Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which prohibits employment discrimination and protects employees who report a complaint from retaliation. In the end an agreement was made between parties, and Boeing agreed to pay $380,000 to settle both lawsuits filed by the EEOC. Boeing also agreed to do training to keep from any further discrimination and retaliation from happening again (Azcentral, 2010). With legal issues also comes a companies ethics and Boeing has set ethics standards for its company.

As far as ethics within the Boeing Company, they have a strict ethics policy that all employees must follow. All employees must sign a Boeing Code of Conduct form. Which states they understand the code, will ask questions, find guidance, report violations they suspect and express concerns of compliance. Boeing also gives ethics and compliance programs to its employees to show its commitment to the integrity and values of the Code of Conduct (Boeing, n.d.). They also have the Boeing Ethics Line, where employees can voice their concerns about violations, and ask questions about ethical issues. All policies must be followed so that the integrity of the company stays in-tact (Boeing, n.d.). Not only do they believe in strict ethics within their company, Boeing also strives to use corporate social responsibility.

At the Boeing Company, they call corporate social responsibility, "corporate citizenship", but whatever it is called means the same thing - "how a company conducts its business to have a positive impact on society and communities (Boeing Frontiers, 2009)." One way of this giving back is by the "Soaring with Your Dream" education project Boeing created to inspire Chinese students. Boeing also partners each year with the United States Space and Rocket Center in Alabama to sponsor the educators at the Space Camp (Boeing Frontiers, 2009). Boeing continues to be active in the community and to give back to those who have made them the company they are today. With running a company there is also factors that influence the strategic, tactical, and operational plans of the company.

With changing economic conditions, Boeing sometimes has to make changes to its strategic, tactical, and operational planning. The United States is in a recession and this produces a downturn in economic activity. Because of this recession Boeing has reduced the production of jetliners for 2010. The decline in production will happen in June 2010. Production of the 777 will go from seven to five airplanes per month. According to President and CEO of Boeing, "These are extremely difficult economic times for our customers. It is necessary to adjust our production plans to align supply with these tough market conditions (Bhushan, 2009)." Not only the factors of economic conditions can change the plans of a company, but also new