With the massive strike in Seattle, Boeing announces the freezing of all expenses

Desperate times call for desperate measures. Boeing announces a freeze on all hiring and postpones all salary increases related to internal promotions. The group also suspends all non-essential business travel for its executives, eliminating first and business class travel, including for members of the management. It also puts on hold consulting contracts with external firms, as well as certain advertising engagements.

The American aircraft manufacturer is also making radical decisions regarding the production of its aircraft. The group will significantly reduce procurement expenses, notably by suspending orders related to the major programs of the 737 MAX – the flagship aircraft on which the group has high hopes – but also of the 777 or the 767, manufactured on sites near Seattle and whose deliveries are already accumulating delays.

These decisions also lead to a drop in production of spare parts, with inevitable temporary measures of technical unemployment for workers, as well as for managers and directors. This is a new very difficult episode that the group is going through. One more, after the technical setbacks that have grounded a good number of its aircraft.

On Thursday, September 12, the group’s 33,000 employees in the Seattle region rejected the proposed collective agreement on wages and approved the strike by 96%. The walkouts began the following day. Negotiations between the American aircraft manufacturer and the International Union of Machinists and Aerospace Workers are due to resume on Tuesday, September 17. Both parties have agreed to begin mediation. Boeing’s management is on edge, as the last major mobilization in the company, in 2008, lasted 57 days and seriously disrupted production.