Congruence Over Control

Boeing's stated values: "Safety is at the core of who we are." Dennis Muilenburg, then-CEO, in 2019: "When it comes to safety, there are no competing priorities."

Between October 2018 and March 2019, two 737 MAX planes fell out of the sky. 346 people died. The cause: a flight control system tied to a single sensor. Boeing had skipped the redundancy to save time and money.

Muilenburg believed what he said. That's the problem.

Here's what culture initiatives get wrong: they assume behavior should match espoused values. Force compliance. Train harder. Repeat the mission.

But behavior reveals actual values. Boeing's actual value was speed-to-market. Beat Airbus. Skip the expensive redesign. That's what got funded. That's what got rewarded.

The espoused theory said safety. The theory-in-use said schedule.

The solution isn't enforcement.

The solution is updating what you say to match what you do. Then deciding if that's who you intend to be.

Chris Argyris watched this pattern for 40 years. The organizations that closed the gap didn't force compliance. They surfaced what they actually valued by reading the budget, the promotions, what survived pressure. Then they asked: is this acceptable?

Sometimes yes. The poster was the fiction.

Sometimes no. That's when behavior needed to change.

But the sequence matters. Name actual before prescribing ideal.

Your calendar and budget reveal what you actually prioritize. Execution Reveals shows how to read what's really there.