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Major Actions Taken by Vought, 1969 - 1971 Dramatic changes were needed to restore business to a viable posture. New Upper Management was appointed with the mandate to stabilize the situation and turn all programs around as soon as possible. The approach to correct the situation was threefold: Directors were assigned to each program vested with total accountability for their project. Changes were made at the Superintendent level and a layer of management was eliminated. In addition, all the scattered elements of Manufacturing Engineering were consolidated to permit more effective support of program needs and to develop new technologies. The new Director was now accountable for all phases of Manufacturing Engineering. A strategic decision was made to immediately go to a seven day work week to regain schedule position on all programs. Although overtime would be expensive, a firm baseline was required for measurement purposes. Some areas worked the seven day week for over a year. Upper Management engagement in the manufacturing process was crucial. In order to be effective, outstanding visibility and controls were a must. There was a need to know exactly where each program stood weekly regarding actual versus planned progress. To accomplish this, control rooms were established for the 747 and A7 programs. Each room had provisions for monitoring; the program office, engineering drawing release, materials, manufacturing engineering, quality control, and any other functions involved on the program. Additionally, special charts were developed for every foreman in the shop to show that individual’s status regarding realization, schedule, shortages, unit cost, head count, overtime, and other appropriate items. One could now follow the battle in the trenches. Charts were distributed to all areas. Top Manufacturing management and all levels down to the foremen attended a weekly meeting in the control rooms. All attendees were “encouraged” to be aware of any problems that were developing so decisions could be made to allocate the assets required to correct the situation. Program reviews with Vought’s customers were also held there so they, too, could get a comprehensive overview of their program’s status. The new approach worked so successfully that in a reasonably short period of time Vought had restored respectability amongst all of its customers: -A7 Aircraft Program -Persistent and dedicated effort finally made the new avionics system work as predicted. Once completed, the production line slowly began moving again. A7D/Es were then soon finished at the scheduled rate of one per day and the program returned to an on schedule position in eighteen months. -F8 Aircraft Program -Appointment of a strong Director and experienced supervisors to the Modification Program, coupled with using the new management and control systems, resulted in a rapid recovery to schedule and final completion of the whole program in ten months. -747 Aircraft Program - The Boeing Company, impressed by the changes in Vought Manufacturing Management and tangible improvements being made, decided to keep the program at Vought. In addition, they furnished seasoned people from Seattle that gave Vought the benefit of their own 747 experiences. The threat of severe financial losses focused all management attention on solving the fastener installation challenge. A production technology team was established to develop and implement the capability required to support a management decision to set an 85% target for all attachments on the yet to be developed automatic riveters. Efforts of the team resulted in the design of advanced state of the art machines, handling equipment and machine control systems. As more and more of the new machines and systems came on line the performance curves on the 747 aircraft improved phenomenally. The program soon regained schedule, eliminating the looming cost overrun.
As a result of these improvements Vought was able to win new subcontracts from Douglas on the DC10 horizontal tail and Lockheed on major portions of their S3A airplane.
By the end of 1971 all programs were meeting schedule and cost targets. Even with the addition of the DC10 and S3A programs, which required 1,500 people, the work force was reduced by 7,000 people (Chart 1 D).
Transition: Serious Vought Problems, 1958 - 1969 Major Actions Taken by Vought, 1969 - 1971 Beating the Competition Into the 1980’s and Beyond.
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