She had a number of things she could say and she was sorting through them with less efficiency than usual. I want to ask you something, she said. Not about the aircraft. He waited. The board is going to ask me probably next quarter whether the changes I'm making to HR policy and the maintenance review protocols are a long-term strategic direction or a short-term response to an isolated incident.
She looked at him carefully. They're going to frame it as a question about brand risk, and I'm going to have to give them an answer in those terms, but I want to know what you think the real question is. Caleb was quiet for a moment. He shifted the weight of his bag on his shoulder. The real question is whether the people in this building think they're allowed to tell you when something's wrong, he said.
Right now, they don't. They've been trained not to, the same way any organization trains people, by showing them what happens when they do. You want to change that, you have to show them something different over a long enough period that they believe it. He looked at her. That takes years, not quarters.
I know, she said. Then you already have your answer for the board. She held the door for a moment longer. The fault in the hydraulic actuator, she said on the meridian. You documented it at around 4:00 in the morning.
Yeah. There was nobody there to verify the work at that hour. You could have documented it differently. Claimed you found it earlier. Made it look like a scheduled inspection.
He looked at her with an expression that she couldn't quite categorize. Why would I do that? You wouldn't, she said. That's that's the point I'm making. He seemed to understand what she was actually saying, which was not about documentation.
He looked at the ground for a moment and then back at her. I don't change what I write based on what's convenient. I know, she said. I've read 14 years of your documentation. A pause.
That's a lot of reading. You have very clean reports, she said. Something shifted in the corner of his expression. Not quite a smile, but in that direction. It was the first time she had seen anything like it directed at her.