Reliability in Emerging Technology

There might not ever be a better demonstration of the saying that …

… a fish rots from it’s head.

Boeing is responsible for the half-baked Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System (MCAS) that was forced into its new 737 Max aircraft. This involved a decidedly awful attempt to convince the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) that there was no need to subject said aircraft through all the checks and balances that you need to go through if it is in fact a brand-new and different type of plane. Which it was. This resulted in the deaths of 346 passengers and crew (along with plenty of claims that it was pilot error). And just to be clear, Boeing has since admitted that it’s employees defrauded the FAA during the original certification process – an admission it was not required to make if it was able to complete a three-year period of increased monitoring and reporting. Which it could not.

It is no small irony that a software application that is designed to protect IT systems from malicious actors was behind the biggest IT outage in the history of computers. A company called Crowdstrike provides a ‘Falcon Sensor’ product that is intended to scan computers that use Microsoft operating systems for vulnerabilities. And this product is deployed so deeply into its host operating systems that it has access to the ‘kernel,’ which is the program that runs the basic code that links applications to the computer hardware (like memory, central processing unit and other devices). Unfortunately a Falcon Sensor update that Crowdstrike sent to its customers had a bug that was not picked up by its own validation programs (because it too had a bug). And unfortunately, it accesses a ‘forbidden’ part of the memory that causes the infamous BSOD or ‘blue screen of death.’ So airlines, hospitals, banks, hotels and lots of other companies simply couldn’t operate.

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Many of us like to think that we can, at least sometimes, be objective. Which is the opposite of being subjective.

What does this mean? Something is ‘objective’ if it only depends on the world around it, and nothing else. Like the ‘perfect juror’ who is only swayed by facts and evidence when determining if he or she thinks someone is guilty of murder. Something is ‘subjective’ if it can be influenced … by itself. Like the ‘imperfect juror’ who decides to acquit a murder suspect regardless of the evidence … because the suspect is his or her brother. This is called bias.

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Boeing has somehow managed to make the bad public relations created by those pesky onboard batteries catching fire in 2013 practically disappear. Not through good management. But through a never-ending series of disasters and catastrophes that shows no sign of letting up which is dominating Boeing’s news cycle that there is no remaining airtime for missteps like those battery fires.

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Apple recently did something that it isn’t in the habit of doing. And that is – admitting failure. After spending $ 10 billion on ‘Project Titan’ whose aim was to produce a ‘really cool car,’ Apple decided to pull the pin and cancel it.

Simplifying Apple’s Project Titan ambitions to something as pithy as creating a ‘really cool car’ might seem a little condescending. The problem for Apple was that unfortunately, this was the practical truth. And that is why it failed.

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We like to think we make decisions based on information. We don’t. We make decisions based on emotions. And the most important emotion we rely upon for decision-making is confidence. We can be provided all the information in the world, but if we can’t understand it, trust it or believe it, we look for confidence in other ways. Often to disastrous outcomes. 

The number of ‘well-funded’ production efforts full of ‘very smart people’ that routinely generate expensive but unreliable products is sadly, very high. And it all comes down to the wrong types of confidence that well-paid decision-makers chase. 

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What does it mean to be a ‘visionary leader’? It starts with being different to most people. You can’t just become a visionary leader by completing a leadership course, being mentored by someone awesome, or by compiling an impressive curriculum vitae (although these can help people with the potential to become visionary leaders get there).

One of the first things that the then United States Army Chief of Staff (General George C. Marshall) did at the outbreak of World War II was to fire the majority of his officers who had climbed the ladder of military ranks throughout the previous 20 years of relative peace.

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Boeing is really having a bad stretch. Or more specifically, the passengers flying in its 737 MAX aircraft are.

Most recently a ‘plug’ flew off the side of Boeing 737 MAX 9 plane in flight, leaving a refrigerator sized hole next to startled (but mercifully still living) passengers. A ‘plug’ is a panel that seals up a hole in the fuselage that is included during manufacture to allow an optional emergency exit to be installed. 

This failure is not a good look … especially for a three-month-old plane. Lots of manufacturers of different machines throughout history have been able to successfully bolt panels to cover holes of a similar size to that of an aircraft emergency exit. It is not hard to do. Nor is it hard to have systems in place to make sure it is done right.

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Apple new iPhones will be somewhat different to those of the past. They will now have a USB-C charging and data port, and not Apple’s lightning cables. Why? Because the European Union said so. And they said so because they are not happy with the number of different charging cables we all now need for our various devices. Having a single cable that can charge an iPhone, Samsung smartphone, and virtually every other small electronic consumer product makes sense. It means fewer cables, smaller carbon footprints, less electronic waste, and prices will come down as less and less products assume that they need to provide a charging cable in their packaging. I have at least 20 power cables in my office that have been provided with various electronic gadgetry over the years.

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It looks like 2023 will be the hottest year on record. Along with all the cyclones, hurricanes, floods and bushfires we have already had. Those who study and take climate change seriously unanimously agree that man-made changes to the environment are causing the climate to change so fast that mother nature will struggle to keep up. 

And for the minority (yes, it is a minority as has been confirmed by many surveys and studies across the world), their arguments against climate change go something like this …

It might not be because of us …

… so it’s definitely not because of us.

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