By Sharon Terlep

Boeing is out to prove it can police itself.

The jet maker said it has overhauled two flawed-but-critical internal systems in which employees flag potential safety issues and manufacturing problems.

The changes are part of Boeing's response to last year's near-catastrophic fuselage panel blowout on an Alaska Airlines flight. The company has said it aims to change a culture that employees, regulators and Boeing's own executives say has historically discouraged employees from flagging problems.

"We're trying to add additional guardrails," said Boeing safety chief Don Ruhmann, speaking to reporters about the changes.

Boeing needs to convince Federal Aviation Administration officials that it is capable of turning out glitch-free airplanes. The company has been under close watch by federal regulators ever since a pair of fatal crashes of its 737 MAX planes in 2018 and 2019. After the Alaska Airlines incident, the FAA stepped up supervision of the company's Renton, Wash., plant and installed a production cap on 737 MAX planes.

An internal reporting system that Boeing put in place after the MAX crashes invited employees to anonymously report concerns. Implemented in 2019 and dubbed "Speak Up," employees have said they viewed the system as opaque and risky, either because they could be ignored or potentially draw the ire of their supervisors.

Among the changes unveiled this week, a third party at the company will investigate claims made through the internal reporting system. Previously, a person's direct manager could be tasked with looking into the complaint.

The Speak Up system has been made easier to navigate and now allows employees to track the status of their complaint to see how it has been handled, Boeing said. Reports to Speak Up more than tripled last year from 2023.

Boeing also said it has reworked an inspection program in which the FAA regularly delegates some regulatory tasks to company employees.

The sheer size of Boeing's manufacturing operations -- its Renton plant employs around 12,000 factory workers -- make it impossible for outside regulators to root out every potential defect as a jet rolls down the line.

Workers tasked with doing inspections on behalf of the FAA now report issues to an engineering leader with expertise in jet certification and safety rather than to the person heading their particular program. The change, Boeing said, removes the potential for a conflict of interest.

Boeing has received fewer reports from employees claiming interference in their work on behalf of the FAA, Ruhmann said. "Ideally," he said, "it's something you'd like to be zero."

The FAA doesn't allow Boeing employees to sign off on its behalf any work involving MAX jets or 787 wide-bodies. Ruhmann said the company isn't pushing for its employees to win back inspection authority on those programs.

Boeing outlined its efforts as part of an annual safety report. The report is required under a settlement of a shareholder lawsuit over its handling of the MAX crashes.

In addition to overhauling its internal reporting systems, the company said it has beefed up training for factory workers, installed limits on work done out of sequence and put in place digital tracking of tools so they don't get misplaced.

While the jet maker has made progress in its operations, a disconnect remains between upper management and the factory floor, said Rich Plunkett, who heads strategic development for Boeing's engineers' union.

"My optimism meter hasn't risen that far," he said. "I am an engineer."

Write to Sharon Terlep at sharon.terlep@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

May 21, 2025 10:00 ET (14:00 GMT)

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