Aerospace giant Boeing is changing course—from an organization leadership standpoint, that is—as the entire airline industry braces for some extreme turbulence in a post-pandemic world.

Boeing announced Tuesday several leadership and organizational changes, to take effect May 1, that are “aimed at driving greater cross-company integration and continuous improvement; aligning enterprise services to current business conditions while increasing value; streamlining senior leadership roles and responsibilities; and preparing now for the post-pandemic industry footprint.”

Those changes include the creation of a newly formed “Enterprise Operations, Finance & Strategy” global group, to be led by Chief Financial Officer Greg Smith, who is also executive vice president, enterprise operations. This group will consolidate several functions, “bringing together teams responsible for manufacturing, supply chain and operations, finance, enterprise performance, strategy, enterprise services and administration,” Boeing announced.

It is also intended to “embed operational excellence and consistent lean principles across Boeing and its supply chain and restore production and supply chain health as Boeing and the broader aerospace industry recover from the COVID-19 pandemic,” the company said.

Corporate audit will join this new group and continue to report directly to the Boeing board of directors audit committee.

Boeing also announced it will be combining its legal and core compliance programs—including global trade controls, ethics, and business conduct—into a single organization, led by Brett Gerry, chief legal officer and executive vice president of global compliance. “This approach will enhance Boeing’s already strong compliance and internal governance program through focused accountability for, and a more integrated approach to, Boeing compliance responsibilities,” the company said. “It also will help the company proactively address new legal and compliance obligations arising from an increasingly complex global regulatory environment.”

In this same vein, Boeing announced plans to “soon” name a chief compliance officer to be responsible for leading the company’s compliance, ethics, and trade control activities. This person will report to Gerry, with a direct reporting line to new CEO David Calhoun and the board’s audit committee on compliance and ethics issues.

Coinciding with the changes, Boeing announced Diana Sands, senior vice president of the Office of Internal Governance and Administration, will retire later this year after nearly 20 years with the company and following a thorough transition of responsibilities.

Boeing’s legal head of nearly 15 years, J. Michael Luttig, retired last year.

Jaclyn Jaeger is a freelance contributor to Compliance Week after working for the company for 15 years. She writes on a wide variety of topics, including ethics and compliance, risk management, legal, enforcement, technology, and more.

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