New American Airline CEO Parker to get $19.5 million in merger pay
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Happy employees = Happy customers = Happy Stockholders???? Nah, that can't be it. The execs at AMR have already shown that the reason the cornerstone strategy failed, the reason gas prices are so high, the reason for the earthquake in Iran is very simple. WE PAY THE EMPLOYEES AT AA TOO MUCH. How many times are we going to have to tell you that? We may have to increase the size of the bonuses we are getting for saving the company in bankruptcy if we have to keep repeating this solution to you. Are you brain-damaged?
While I do not disagree with your premise regarding the company (both AA and US) incessantly thinking that their employees are paid "TOO MUCH," I think the example of SWA goes much deeper than simply pay.
If been in this business over 30 years, and watched SWA go from a regional joke to the industry powerhouse. Kelleher did not make that happen based on employee pay, or lack thereof. He did it based on treating his employees with respect, dignity, and, yes, even fun. He always treated them as priceless assets, and they felt that. At the time (and maybe still,) SWA employees LOVED going to work for the lowest wages in the industry, because Kelleher went out of his way to make sure that going to work was not a chore, but a family reunion.
Now, SWA employees probably have one of the highest compensation rates in the industry. That "family" atmosphere, in and of itself, has eaten our collective lunches at the legacy carriers. Has little to do with pay, and never has. It has everything to do with management perceiving and treating employees as valuable, rather than a liability. But the MBA wizzes never learned that, and likely never will.
At SWA, everyone in the boat rows in the same direction. That doesn't occur at the legacies.
Oh, I was trying to be sarcastic. I am a defender of WN at every turn. Not only did I love commuting on them when I was still based in STL, but when people at AA start the "Ma and Pa Kettle airline routine," I just say "You can stop right there. You can not argue with success. 17 straight years without a losing quarter has never been and never will be duplicated." And, I agree with everything you just said. Of course, making employees feel valued is an important ingredient in the recipe. The "cake" falls flat without it.
I don't know about LCC, but at AA I am struck frequently with the obvious contempt in which AMR management holds the front line employees--especially, the flight attendants who spend the most time with their customers. They frequently make decisions affecting the flight attendants that have no basis in reality. They just decide that this is what we will do. The flight attendants will just have to live with it.
Case in point...the new Samsung tablets for the flight attendants that they decided would replace the On-board sales recorders on a particular date. The fact that some of the tablets do not work right is of no consequence to management. Mine will not read credit cards on the airplane. Now, when I take it to them, they beat on it (literally) and do all kinds of playing with it, then they say "See, it will read credit cards." I try to get them to imagine how little product I sell in the tablet training room, but because it works there, I must be doing something wrong on the airplane. The fact that I spent over 20 years in the Information Technology field also does not matter. (I tried to point out to them that computers are dumb animals that know 2 numbers--zero and one. And, no computer is supposed to produce different results when the same actions are taken. But, since none of them have to deal with the problem on the plane, it isn't a problem.) They have decided that 01June, the OSRs will be removed from the airplanes and I will just have to figure out how I'm going to handle product sales after that.
It is just another example of you get what you pay for. The programming for the tablets is being handled under the "there's not enough time to do it right, but there will always be time to fix it later" philosophy. When I was in the business, it was the provider of the programming that was penalized if the product was not finished on the deadline date. At AMR, it seems that we can't hold the programmers responsible, we must make the end user pay for the sloppy programming.
Fortunately, I don't need the job financially; so, I know I can walk away at any time that I get my fill. I would be a lot more bothered by it if this were not so.
I don't know about LCC, but at AA I am struck frequently with the obvious contempt in which AMR management holds the front line employees--especially, the flight attendants who spend the most time with their customers. They frequently make decisions affecting the flight attendants that have no basis in reality. They just decide that this is what we will do. The flight attendants will just have to live with it.
Case in point...the new Samsung tablets for the flight attendants that they decided would replace the On-board sales recorders on a particular date. The fact that some of the tablets do not work right is of no consequence to management. Mine will not read credit cards on the airplane. Now, when I take it to them, they beat on it (literally) and do all kinds of playing with it, then they say "See, it will read credit cards." I try to get them to imagine how little product I sell in the tablet training room, but because it works there, I must be doing something wrong on the airplane. The fact that I spent over 20 years in the Information Technology field also does not matter. (I tried to point out to them that computers are dumb animals that know 2 numbers--zero and one. And, no computer is supposed to produce different results when the same actions are taken. But, since none of them have to deal with the problem on the plane, it isn't a problem.) They have decided that 01June, the OSRs will be removed from the airplanes and I will just have to figure out how I'm going to handle product sales after that.
It is just another example of you get what you pay for. The programming for the tablets is being handled under the "there's not enough time to do it right, but there will always be time to fix it later" philosophy. When I was in the business, it was the provider of the programming that was penalized if the product was not finished on the deadline date. At AMR, it seems that we can't hold the programmers responsible, we must make the end user pay for the sloppy programming.
Fortunately, I don't need the job financially; so, I know I can walk away at any time that I get my fill. I would be a lot more bothered by it if this were not so.
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