Boeing's Ethical Leadership Crisis: When "Non Mihi Sed Tibi Gloria" Becomes a Cautionary Tale

Earlier this week, I reflected on two powerful examples of integrity in sport—my son's honest acknowledgement of his injury and Wiaan Mulder's selfless cricket declaration—through the lens of our family motto, "Non mihi sed tibi gloria" (Glory to thee, not to me). These moments of character revealed themselves when personal glory was within reach, yet principle prevailed.

Now, a Harvard Business Review analysis of Boeing's ethical leadership failures provides a stark counterpoint to these examples of integrity. The aerospace giant's decades-long pattern of ethical transgressions offers a sobering case study in what happens when organisations abandon servant leadership principles and prioritise short-term gains over collective well-being.

The Anatomy of Ethical Decay

Boeing's trajectory reads like a cautionary tale written in reverse Latin: "Non tibi sed mihi gloria"—glory to me, not to thee. The Harvard analysis reveals a systematic pattern where safety concerns, engineering expertise, and stakeholder welfare were repeatedly subordinated to corporate metrics and executive ambitions.

The 737 MAX crisis exemplifies this perfectly. When American Airlines threatened to defect to Airbus in 2011, Boeing's response wasn't to double down on engineering excellence or long-term innovation. Instead, CEO James McNerney made a decision that prioritised immediate competitive positioning over sustainable value creation, scrapping plans for a new aircraft model and rushing an updated 737 to market in half the usual time.

This decision embodies what Harvard researchers Don Moore and Max Bazerman term "bounded ethicality"—ethically questionable behaviours that fall short of our own values, often without conscious awareness of the ethical dimensions at play.

The Stretch Goal Syndrome

The Harvard piece identifies "stretch goals" as a particular threat to ethical leadership. Boeing's 737 MAX timeline represents the dangerous extreme of this phenomenon, where ambitious targets become so narrowly focused that they eclipse other legitimate concerns, including product safety and stakeholder welfare.

This resonates powerfully with my recent observations about character under pressure. Just as my son could have concealed his injury to pursue selection, or Mulder could have chased personal records, Boeing's executives faced moments where they could have pumped the brakes and prioritised safety over speed to market.

The difference? The sporting examples demonstrate what Harvard calls "ethical leadership"—decision-making that maintains awareness of moral dimensions even under intense pressure. Boeing's leadership exhibited the opposite: what researchers call "ethical fading," where the moral aspects of decisions disappear from view, reframed as purely "business decisions."

The Employment Law Parallel

From an employment law perspective, Boeing's failures illuminate the legal imperative for integrity in workplace relationships. The company's pattern of prioritising short-term metrics over employee voice and safety concerns directly contradicts the evolving legal framework around:

• Duty of care that extends beyond contractual obligations

• Psychological safety as a fundamental workplace right

• Collective responsibility for organizational culture and outcomes

• Transparent decision-making that prioritizes stakeholder interests

When engineers become "fearful of voicing their concerns about safety issues with managers," as the Wall Street Journal reported, we see the breakdown of what employment law increasingly recognises as essential: cultures where truth-telling is rewarded, not punished.

The Servant Leadership Vacuum

Boeing's crisis fundamentally stems from abandoning servant leadership principles. The Harvard analysis describes a shift "away from an engineering-led culture toward more centralised corporate control"—essentially moving from a culture where technical expertise and safety concerns drove decisions to one where executive authority and financial metrics dominated.

This represents the antithesis of "Non mihi sed tibi gloria." Instead of leaders serving the greater good—passengers, employees, and engineering excellence—the organisation became structured around serving narrow executive interests and quarterly performance targets.

Robert Greenleaf's concept of servant leadership emphasises that sustainable organisational success depends on putting "the growth and well-being of people and communities first." Boeing's trajectory shows the devastating consequences when this principle is abandoned.

The Cost of Ethical Blindness

The Harvard piece notes that Boeing's ethical failures followed a predictable pattern: scandal, executive contrition, promises of reform, followed by another violation and "even more fervent pledges to reform." By October 2024, this cycle had left Boeing $58 billion in debt and hemorrhaging $1 billion monthly.

This pattern reveals what happens when organisations lose sight of the fundamental truth my sporting examples illustrated: greatness isn't always on the scoreboard. Sometimes it's in the choices we make when no one's watching—or in Boeing's case, when everyone is watching but we've lost the moral clarity to see what really matters.

Lessons for Modern Leadership

The Boeing crisis offers several critical lessons for contemporary workplace leadership:

1. Ethical Decision-Making Requires Conscious Effort— Leaders must actively resist the psychological biases that lead to ethical fading. This means deliberately asking: "What are the moral dimensions of this decision?" rather than allowing business pressures to obscure ethical considerations.

2. Stretch Goals Must Include Ethical Boundaries— Ambitious targets are valuable, but they must be framed broadly enough to include safety, quality, and stakeholder welfare. The most dangerous stretch goals are those that optimise for a single metric while ignoring other legitimate concerns.

3. Truth-Telling Must Be Systematically Rewarded— Organisations need structures that actively reward employees for "putting on the brakes and raising red flags," as the Harvard piece suggests. This isn't just morally right—it's legally essential and commercially smart.

4. Servant Leadership Isn't Optional— In our interconnected world, where organisational failures can have catastrophic consequences, leadership must be fundamentally about service to something greater than individual or corporate advancement.

The Legal Evolution Toward Integrity

Employment law is increasingly recognising these principles. Enhanced whistleblower protections, expanded director duties, and strengthened collective bargaining frameworks all reflect a legal evolution toward workplace cultures built on mutual respect and collective benefit.

Organisations that embrace servant leadership principles—giving "glory to thee, not to me"—enjoy reduced litigation risk, enhanced employee retention, improved regulatory compliance, and sustainable competitive advantages. Boeing's crisis demonstrates the devastating alternative.

Conclusion: Character in the Crucible

The Boeing case study, juxtaposed with the sporting examples of integrity I shared earlier, reveals a fundamental truth: character is tested not in moments of calm but in the crucible of pressure and ambition.

My son's honest acknowledgement of his injury and Mulder's selfless declaration show us what ethical leadership looks like when personal glory is within reach. Boeing's failures show us what happens when organisational leaders repeatedly choose the opposite path.

The Harvard analysis concludes that Boeing's problems stem not from ill intent but from susceptibility to psychological processes that affect us all. This makes the examples of integrity in sport even more powerful—they show that conscious choice, guided by clear principles, can overcome these natural human tendencies.

"Non mihi sed tibi gloria"—these four Latin words aren't just a family motto. They're a blueprint for sustainable leadership in any context, whether on a cricket field, in a boardroom, or in the complex web of employment relationships that define modern organisations.

The Boeing crisis reminds us that when we abandon servant leadership principles, we don't just risk individual failure—we risk catastrophic consequences for everyone who depends on our integrity. In the end, the greatest professional legacy isn't what we achieve for ourselves, but what we enable others to accomplish safely, ethically, and with dignity.

The author practices employment law and believes that sustainable workplace relationships must be built on principles of mutual respect, transparency, and collective benefit—principles that Boeing's crisis shows are not just morally imperative but commercially essential.

Harvard article referenced/analysed: Learning from Ethical Leadership Failures at Boeing by Katie Shonk

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