The new head of Boeing Co.’s sprawling Anaheim defense operation breaks the mold.
Sure, Pamela Drew is a woman in the macho world of aerospace and defense contractors.
But she’s also different in that she’s not a Boeing lifer,she hails from telecommunications. She even worked with technology startups in the 1990s.
And most of her time at Boeing has been spent on the company’s commercial side.
Jake Volkert, Drew’s predecessor, retired in May. He was a longtime Boeing and military contractor guy who took over the Anaheim operation in 2003.
Now Drew is site administrator for about 3,500 Boeing workers in Anaheim, one of the Chicago-based company’s largest operations in Orange County. She also is vice president of Battle Management Command Control Communications & Strategic Systems, which has hundreds of workers in Anaheim and more than 3,200 in all nationwide.
Anaheim is home to some of Boeing’s oldest and newest defense programs, including flashy war room networks and battlefield communications.
“Anaheim is today, and I believe will continue to be, one of the premier engineering (centers) that Boeing has,” Drew said.
The Anaheim operation, which came by way of Boeing’s 1990s buy of the defense business of what was Rockwell International Corp., is home to some of the military’s most important programs, according to Drew.
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Boeing’s Anaheim operation: 3,500 workers |
Among them is the joint tactical radio system, an effort to help unify radios used by the military. Another program, dubbed combat survivor evader locator, boosts communications for rescue missions.
“It’s an area of future growth,” Drew said. “It’s absolutely essential for the Department of Defense.”
Drew stopped short of making any projections for employment growth at Anaheim, which had as many as 36,000 workers in the 1960s before manufacturing was shipped to lower-cost areas.
“I do see opportunities for growth,” she said. “I’m optimistic, but I’m realistic.”
Drew faces some challenges.
Radio Trouble
She inherits not just the potential of the joint tactical radio system, but its problems as well.
Earlier this year, Boeing received a “show cause” letter from the military questioning the company’s radio work. The letter raised questions about delivery schedules and costs.
Boeing is in an “ongoing dialogue” with the Pentagon to get the contract “executable” in terms of costs and times of deliveries, Drew said.
Drew’s job also involves handling a site that has more divergent business units than just about any other site among Boeing’s defense locations.
In the late 1950s and early 1960s, Anaheim began to develop intercontinental ballistic missiles after Washington realized the Soviet Union could be taking the lead in space.
Another program dates back several decades as well,integrated shipboard systems, which designs systems for submarines.
Anaheim also includes missile defense systems, Space and Intelligence and the Boeing Integration Center, which showcases a sort of super network for different military systems.
The site’s customers include the four major military branches.
Drew has direct oversight of the Battle Management Command Control Communi-cations & Strategic Systems operations, which include about 1,800 people of the 3,500 Anaheim workers.
About 500 people in Anaheim at the Space and Intelligence unit fall under a group based in Seal Beach.
Workers Elsewhere
Drew’s other workers are in Ogden, Utah, and Heath, Ohio. Battle Management Command Control includes communications systems, as well as the old intercontinental ballistic missiles and shipboard systems, among other things.
Drew has site management duties for another 350 people who aren’t under Battle Management Command Control.
One of her big duties is recruiting amid a tight labor market. She also is responsible for the site’s human resources, which recruits for all of the businesses at Anaheim.
She said she hopes to foster cooperation among business units whose engineers otherwise might not interact.
Drew’s resume is long.
Prior to joining Boeing in 1996, she headed up software development for five years at Denver-based US West, now Qwest Communications International Inc. At one point, she was an assistant professor at Hong Kong University.
After joining Boeing, Drew climbed the ranks to Northwest regional representative for Phantom Works, where she worked on non-defense projects. Phantom Works tackles some of the military’s newest and advanced programs.
Boeing Background
Before coming to Anaheim, Drew was vice president and deputy of Airborne Intelligence Surveillance and Reconnaissance. During much of that time, she also was director of program management for Boeing Air Force Systems programs.
Drew’s background should serve her well, said Ed Froese, vice president of Airborne Warning Systems in Seattle and a colleague of hers.
“I think she learned a lot of what needs to be done and how it can it be done,” Froese said.
The key to running as diverse a site as Anaheim is tapping others, Froese said.
“She understands leadership and what it takes to do that,” he said. “I haven’t seen her try to be the smartest person in the group.”
Drew’s technology background also should help her, Froese said. She brings software experience, he said, and that should help her improve communication among units.
‘Comfortable’
Drew said she feels “comfortable in doing this.”
“I bring a broad awareness of business practices and program management, as well as capabilities,” she said. “It’s a requirement to have multiple roles.”
As for being the first woman to head Boeing’s Anaheim operation, Drew said she doesn’t feel her gender presents any unique issues.
“There’s no denying it’s a male-dominated industry,” she said. “I haven’t felt any special challenges. I really just stay focused on what I think needs to be done. I’m results focused.”
But it hasn’t been easy. During an address to the Association for Women in Science’s Seattle chapter in March, Drew told attendees as a girl she was encouraged to become a nurse or a teacher with her aptitude for math and science. Her father encouraged her to do more, she said.
