Airline Management 101: I Was a Little Late to Class

By Robert Mark on May 21st, 2007

All this time I thought it was my problem for not understanding the ins and outs of the airline world that have wreaked such havoc on aviation. I never seemed to stop shaking my head every time I read the next chapter from the Northwest or Delta or United bankruptcy.

Now I understand, it actually is my problem.

Having been through an airline bankruptcy myself – and yes, they really are ugly – you’d think I’d be a little smarter by now. I should be better able to line up employee expectations with those of the employer.

Now that the WSJ quoted the Northwest Airlines court appointed examiner on Saturday, it has all become clear why the airline treated and continues to treats its employees as if they had little to do with the company’s emergence from Chapter 11.

Said Richard Nevins … Northwest Airlines “appropriately took a number of steps to investigate and pursue strategic options in order to maximize the value of assets available for distribution to stakeholders.”

See … It’s the worker’s own fault.

Those dumb airline employees at United and Northwest and American just need to give a little more so they can become important stakeholders … like, well … airline passengers. Now there’s a bunch of folks the airlines really know how to treat. 

Too bad those stupid employees didn’t know how the game was going to be played before they gave in to those company demands though.

Of course, if they’d known then what they know now and acted upon it, some of these airlines wouldn’t have made it out of Chapter 11.

When are you dumb employees ever going to learn that it’s the people who have a stake in the success of a company that are most important?

Hang on.

Employees do have a stake don’t they?

My guess is that one of these days … maybe sooner than anyone thinks, airline management is going to really learn that lesson the hard way … the same way they insist on learning it over and over again. 

Will air traffic controllers be far behind?

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2 Responses to “Airline Management 101: I Was a Little Late to Class”

  1. BP Says:

    The employees of Eastern Airlines drew the line in the sand when they knew that Frank Lorenzo was pure evil and cared not for them nor the company, only his own greed.
    They did it to the peril of their own jobs. A very high price to pay for standing up for the right thing.
    The current corporate environment is about nothing other than stealing from companies and employees for the enrichment of “executives” who sit on each other’s boards and award each other absurd riches, even for failure, while ruining the lives of tens of thousands of employees, each one many times more loyal to the company then themselves.

  2. Eric Says:

    Hey very nice blog site. NWA is headed out of Chapter 11, but seems to never be able to get its employee relations right. If they dont, the employees will sabotage the company commercially through bad attitude.

    UAL never ceases to amaze me with the shenanigans of their employees. Recent flight through ORD the airline ticket counter person didnt have on a name badge…literally she had a big button on that said “SHOP STEWARD”. Like I care.

    Keep up the good stuff!
    Eric

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