Case study: Boeing and Sarbanes-Oxley

The Seattle P-I offers a rare look at what goes on inside a major company struggling to comply with Sarbanes-Oxley. This is a must-read article. Rarely, is the pain reported so clearly. For all its wizardry with jets, the company has struggled with Sarbox. One employee described the process as "pure hell." The same scenario is likely playing out at other companies. The company approached it like it was designing a new plane. But a deep rift between the finance and IT emerged and really hampered the process--something we've been warning about. The finance side said the IT side was too rigid; the IT guys said the finance guys kept changing their minds. PricewaterhouseCoopers and Jefferson Wells apparently were at loggerheads often. Sound familiar? Really this is a great example of all that can go wrong. For all the effort and pain, there are still significant deficiencies--despite millions of dollars and a bevy of high-priced consultants--that the firm must grapple with. A good place to start would be with the compliance culture. Of course that is the hardest thing to change.