Boeing

In an effort to assist employees affected by layoffs at United Space Alliance (USA), The Boeing Company has reviewed hiring plans at its space businesses. Based on new launch vehicle business, and the usual level of employee attrition due to retirements, it foresees approximately 150-400 job openings in the Houston and Florida areas.

"With the new combination of Boeing and the former McDonnell Douglas and Rockwell businesses, Boeing currently has over 5,000 employees in the Florida and Houston areas," said John McLuckey, president of Boeing Space Systems. "These businesses support major programs such as Delta launch vehicles, the Space Shuttle and the International Space Station."

McLuckey added, "Current forecasts show approximately 150 job openings on the Delta launch vehicle program." This includes 100 openings in Florida in launch operations support and engineering -- plus 50 engineering openings in Houston.

In addition, past experience has shown that Boeing expects an annual turnover of five percent of the workforce due to normal attrition such as people leaving the company for retirement or taking new jobs with other companies. This translates into approximately 250 openings during the year in the Houston and Florida areas.

"Over the past several months we have also increased our presence in Florida by adding over 200 employees for Space Station hardware testing and processing for launch," McLuckey said. "With planned Space Station launches scheduled over the next five years we expect our Florida operations to remain relatively stable."

While there are always uncertainties over what kinds of job openings become available due to attrition, and the timing of those openings, Boeing will try to match these openings to the affected USA workers and will work closely with USA in their outplacement efforts -- including participating in job fairs in Florida and Houston.

To help accelerate the process, Boeing has set up a special electronic database to accept applications and resumes over the Internet. This will enable Boeing to match candidates with local job openings quickly - as well as those in other parts of the company. It can be accessed at: http://www.resjobs.com/boeing.