Amazing article at FastCompany about building jet engines. General Electric’s Durham assembly plant is… well, unusual. It makes 400 engines a year, and there are 170 technicians, but only one manager.
The article’s a lengthy, but fascinating, insight into the radical working practices and methodologies employed. It reminds me of two other circumstances: first, the ‘flat pyramid’ management structure employed in the ThrustSSC supersonic car programme. And second… well… oh, people are going to take this the wrong way however I dress it up: it appears casually similar to the ideal of soviet-era factory planning.
Fascinating.