Boeing’s Board acted after months of mounting pressure

Early Friday morning, Boeing’s board gathered on a conference call that had been hastily arranged the day before. Dennis A. Muilenburg, the company’s chief executive and the chairman of the board, was not invited.

By the end of the day, a decision had been reached: Muilenburg would lose his title as chairman, a rebuke from a board that has defended Boeing’s senior leadership after two crashes of its 737 Max jet killed 346 people. The board elevated its lead independent director, David L. Calhoun, to replace Muilenburg as chairman.

For months, the Boeing board had resisted stripping Muilenburg of the chairmanship. In April, a shareholder proposal to split the chairman and chief executive roles was voted down, though by a smaller margin than last year. Calhoun said in an interview with The New York Times in May that the board regularly discussed splitting the roles, but felt confident in Muilenburg.