[salawat]

The FAA basically picks a Boeing employee and says "you represent and answer to us now."

The employee however, is still managed, and reports first to Boeing management. They're a glorified liaison/paperwork interface. This was different than before as I understand it, because the FAA used to become the direct report for their Designated Engineering Representatives under the old system. This meant there was no management layer running interference between the rep and the regulator.

I might be misremembering that though.

[sseth]

I believe with AR even the picking is done by Boeing. unlike DER. One huge downside of this is that the informal interactions between FAA and Boeing engineers are almost non-existent, leading to even greater lack of technical knowledge on the FAA side.