Saying the CEO overrode safety is accurate but not precise. There were many middle managers, many of whom are still there and have since promoted to director roles, that told me to my face that there was far too much money on the line to abide by the operational safety checks we had ourselves set. Benchmarks routinely qualified or outright ignored to preserve deployment velocity. Cruise is facing all of the same incentives now (I.e., get to market as quickly as possible) with all the same leadership in all the same places. One can only hope they don’t cut all the same corners.
Thanks for the additional insight on the situation. I also hope that they are able to improve their safety culture to avoid a repeat cutting of corners on safety. "We fired the bad actors" is insufficient to get there.
Saying the CEO overrode safety is accurate but not precise. There were many middle managers, many of whom are still there and have since promoted to director roles, that told me to my face that there was far too much money on the line to abide by the operational safety checks we had ourselves set. Benchmarks routinely qualified or outright ignored to preserve deployment velocity. Cruise is facing all of the same incentives now (I.e., get to market as quickly as possible) with all the same leadership in all the same places. One can only hope they don’t cut all the same corners.
Thanks for the additional insight on the situation. I also hope that they are able to improve their safety culture to avoid a repeat cutting of corners on safety. "We fired the bad actors" is insufficient to get there.