A qualitative study of outsourced aeronautical maintenance: The case of Brazilian organizations
The outsourcing of aeronautical maintenance has been criticized for the quality of services offered. According to the literature, airlines have contracted repair stations to perform maintenance activities on their aircraft or parts when attempting to optimize resources (time, facilities, personnel, money). The attempt to reduce costs in maintenance activities and regulatory deficiencies can lead to maintenance management practices that could threaten equipment airworthiness. Therefore, the aim of this research was to evaluate whether outsourced aeronautical maintenance is aligned to common industrial maintenance management practices. To achieve this goal, qualitative exploratory research was conducted on Brazilian repair stations. For data collection, a questionnaire was developed based on seven factors related to aircraft maintenance. The data revealed that a mismatch exists between the best maintenance management practices and expected repair station performance.
It has been argued that foundation ::: funding has distorted methods in American sociology in the direction of quantification. ::: This argument rests on a number of assumptions, of which the key one is that in the ::: absence of such funding, method would have developed differently. Data on the ::: methods of funded and unfunded research articles are analysed, and show that the trend ::: to increasing levels of quantification is almost equally present in unfunded work, which ::: suggests that funding should not be held responsible for the trend.