CEO Dennis Muilenburg Stripped Off Boeing’s Chairman Title as Company Separates Roles

Boeing’s Board has removed CEO Dennis Muilenburg’s title as chairman in an unexpected strategy shift as announced by the U.S. plane maker on Friday.

The latest step which the board has taken in recent weeks to improve executive oversight of its engineering ranks and industrial operations was separating the roles which would pave way for Muilenburg to have ‘maximum focus’ on steering Boeing’s daily operations.

In an announcement on Friday afternoon, Boeing said that lead Director David Calhoun, a senior managing director at Blackstone Group, will take over as non-executive chairman. The announcement expressed the Board’s confidence in Muilenburg, who would remain on the board and retain the top job.

“The board has full confidence in Dennis as CEO and believes this division of labor will enable maximum focus on running the business with the board playing an active oversight role,” Calhoun said in the statement.

This decision was brought forth as company has been striving to put its best selling 737 MAX back in service after the safety ban which had been issued worldwide in March after two crashes which left 346 people dead in Indonesia and Ethiopia. The decision has also been partly brought forth after Muilenburg survived a split in his roles as CEO and chairman, a motion which had been put forth by shareholders six months ago. This is part of the very intense pressure he has felt in the four years which he has been working at the helm of the world’s largest plane maker.

Boeing and U.S. regulators were criticized over certification of the plane earlier on Friday by an international aviation panel. It was revealed by an internal review that the company was looking to re-organize its engineering reporting lines company-wide and ensure higher ranking officials and also achieves the increase at which the reception of feedback concerning safety issues from the lower levels of the company. Weekly reports of potential safety issues discussed in meetings of rank and file engineers were taken to Muilenburg as part of the move too.

Muilenburg is required to testify before U.S. House panel on 30^th October and questions have been raised by lawmakers about 737 MAX certification. More than 100 lawsuits are also being held against the company concerning the crashes alleging flaws in the design.