Why Boeing Killed DEI

An insider reveals the famed aviation company’s apparent change of heart.

A reckoning is underway in corporate America. After the death of George Floyd in 2020, it seemed that every Fortune 500 company had launched a “diversity, equity, and inclusion” program. But now, four years later, many companies are quietly acknowledging the failure of these initiatives and, in some cases, winding them down.

Earlier this year, we reported on the DEI troubles at Boeing, which an insider described in this way: “DEI is the drop you put in the bucket, and the whole bucket changes. It is anti-excellence, because it is ill-defined, but it became part of the culture.”

That is changing. Earlier this month, Boeing’s newly installed CEO, Kelly Ortberg, quietly dismantled the DEI department and accepted the resignation of the office’s vice president. To understand how this happened, we reached out to the same insider. In the following interview, edited slightly for clarity, the insider provides a glimpse into the change of heart—and administration—at company headquarters.

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Christopher Rufo: Tell us what happened with DEI. It went from dominant to extinct in a very short period of time.

Insider: We are shifting from a company whose culture is simply the average of corporate America to a distinct and deliberate vision of leadership. Kelly Ortberg wants Boeing focused on being an airplane company with our own culture and vision. The resulting cash crunch from the strike accelerated this culture shift. When you start to focus on delivering value instead of preserving status, it becomes obvious what drives value, and it’s not DEI.

Rufo: This is happening shortly after the arrival of Ortberg as Boeing’s new CEO. Was this a decision that was made at the top? And if so, why did he make it?

Insider: Yes. Our CEO has always been fighting for efficiency, but the strike and associated cash crunch brought into focus what really drives production. Kelly is looking at every business and every process with fresh eyes, asking the basic question, “Does this help us build airplanes?” HR organizations like to make the argument that you need the right mix of skin color and gender preference to perform and innovate. But everyone who has had to build things knows that what really drives value is integrity, hard work, and technical expertise. This doesn’t mean that bias doesn’t exist and that we don’t need to fight it, but he [Kelly] gets that the best culture directly promotes values and results, not identity groups.

There is one additional factor: the new HR leadership under Kelly has a legal background from outside Boeing. Lawyers are more focused on managing risk and business value than classical HR leaders, who tend to focus on preserving their status in the global HR community.

Rufo: My sense is that many executives are not genuinely committed to DEI as an ideology—they simply want to build airplanes, create software, etc.—but feel social pressure to maintain these departments. Is that true at Boeing? And if so, when did the calculus change?

Insider: DEI is lazy thought leadership best practiced by companies in smooth waters with margins large enough to afford the associated inefficiency. That isn’t Boeing today. When the new boss prioritizes results over fitting in with other CEOs, it sends a strong signal to the culture and builds trust because employees know the rules and it’s clear how to succeed: through hard work and results. McKinsey’s now-debunked analysis was the standard driver in corporate boardrooms, but even if DEI has to defend itself on purely logical grounds, it doesn’t stand up. Boeing more than anything needs an aligned workforce focused on building airplanes, and it’s an easy decision to reject the divisive and U.S.-centric language of DEI in favor of a unified vision for a diverse, global company.

Rufo: Has there been a shift in the conversation or culture within the company?

Insider: Yes. Kelly’s focused question, “Does this help us build airplanes?” combined with the will to change and act, represents a real culture shift. In every big company, a lot of people just push legacy processes forward; you can’t do that when you face a real cash crunch. The furloughs and subsequent layoffs were sufficiently painful to drive a real reckoning that forced us to evaluate whether our actions were driving value or just tied to inertia.

Rufo: Will this improve Boeing’s ability to make airplanes and address some of the real problems at the company?

Insider: Hiring on merit while truly caring for people, regardless of arbitrary one-dimensional identity- or affinity-group labels, is the way to go. After all, people do not want to be beneficiaries of bias any more than they want to be victims of it. Getting past the sloppy wording of DEI to clear goals and criteria for success will help any organization.

Rufo: Do you expect that other companies will follow Boeing’s lead? How do you expect corporate America to look at DEI in the short and medium term?

Insider: Companies will follow Boeing and others’ lead as they acknowledge DEI’s flawed approach. DEI not only oversold imaginary return on investment that could not be measured or verified, but it did so at the cost of expending critical resources and tying up head count earmarked for DEI activities instead of activities that boost performance and capability. There is no way to keep production in focus while also allowing an externally focused bureaucracy with weak ideas to drive culture. In the near term, corporate America is increasingly aware that DEI does not mitigate or eliminate bias or the stereotypes that fuel it. Rather, DEI is simply transferring bias and stereotypes directed at one group to another group. Courageous leadership is finding its way back into the C-suites and finally forcing the logical audit of DEI rhetoric, narratives, and claims that was previously avoided.

This article was originally published in City Journal