Boeing CEO Kelly Ortberg is inviting employees to help expose deep-seated problems — even if the response is “brutal” to the plane-maker’s leaders.

Boeing CEO Kelly Ortberg is inviting employees to help expose deep-seated problems — even if the response is “brutal” to the plane-maker’s leaders.

“I want to hear what the employees have to say,” Ortberg said during his second company-wide address to Boeing workers on Wednesday. “And what we’ll do is we’re going to put an action plan on those things, and I think they’re going to be brutal to leadership, quite frankly.”

Speaking to workers on location in St. Louis with tens of thousands more tuning in via a webcast, Ortberg touched on topics ranging from employee bonuses to the role that Elon Musk and DOGE are playing on the tardy Air Force One jets that Boeing is preparing for the Pentagon. 

But much of the session was spent addressing the company’s internal dysfunction, an effort Ortberg sees as crucial to improving quality and safety in its factories and engineering labs, according to people who monitored the webcast. 

Ortberg said he has set up a “culture working group” of workers to advise him on the values and “behaviors” of the company. They represent a cross-section of Boeing sites, unions and other employee groups. 

The new CEO, who started in August 2024, also expressed dismay over Boeing’s culture, echoing remarks he made during his first all-hands session in November 2024.

It’s a reference to the lack of civility with which people treat each other — as well the harsh backlash that lower-level workers and managers can face for flagging operations breakdowns, as whistleblowers have documented.

He’s tackling the ultimate fixer-upper: a storied plane-maker whose reputation and finances have been badly dented by two fatal 737 Max crashes late last decade and an alarming near-catastrophe in early 2024.

Boeing’s also working to restore airplane production following a crippling strike. And as a leading US exporter, the manufacturer faces geopolitical turbulence as the White House threatens trade wars and tariffs.

Ortberg has singled out Boeing’s top-down culture and lack of leadership training as areas of focus. And he said Wednesday that he hopes the company will eventually reach the point where it won’t need hotlines for employees to flag issues anonymously because they’ll feel empowered to speak openly.