WorldTraveler
Corn Field
- Dec 5, 2003
- 21,709
- 10,721
I love these words from the AMFA website:
“What is our strategy? The contract negotiators will bargain with our eyes open and with cold-blooded precision to defend the members’ interests. We must focus our justified anger.â€
This is the obviously the time when unions must deliver something that their members perceive as value in return for their dues. Given the power of the bankruptcy process, which is decidedly tilted in favor of the company, the task is not easy.
I believe United employees will struggle with accepting the cuts being imposed on them much more than the employees at US. While US has struggled for years, UA’s downfall has come relatively recently. UA employees still see AA, CO, DL, and NW employees as their peers but those airlines are very unlikely to stoop to those levels of cuts in the near future. We are the point in the evolution of the industry where the employee factor will determine the survival of UA and US. UA particularly must work double time to get employees on its side (a very tall task given the long history of employee-mgmt conflicts at UA) or face a very speedy disintegration of its business which has been very heavily built on providing high quality service in prime worldwide markets.
I find a certain irony in the changing dynamic of the airlines, particularly in relation to flight attendants. While airlines have done a masterly job at leading the business world in converting from high-touch to self-service on the ground in attempts to reduce costs and eliminate employees, there are very few (if any steps) that can be done to reduce costs in the air using automation. The in-flight product is essentially a human product and consumers at every airline expect that. As long as governments require people on aircraft for safety, flight attendants will have to provide customer service in all the other times when safety is not immediately threatened. Some airlines provide fun service while some provide elegant but all successful airlines have a distinguished onboard product.
Yes, airlines have succeeded for years at convincing well-educated people to work as flight attendants because of the great perks and hours (which some even on this board have said are priceless) but the real issue is whether the airlines can provide distinctive customer service with flight attendants who don’t have college degrees or an interest in seeing the world. Given that American culture is one of the most me-focused and least service-oriented on the planet, it will be extraordinarily difficult to take people off the street who have not been immersed in a service-oriented mindset and teach them to provide real service. As a consumer, I’m not as interested in the credentials of the person providing the service as I am the finished product. The challenge for the airlines that seek to dramatically cut their costs is not in finding people willing to do the job since there will always be people who will be fascinated by the allure of flying and willing to sacrifice in order to see the world. The challenge is in obtaining and training people that can provide an onboard product that customers view favorably.
“What is our strategy? The contract negotiators will bargain with our eyes open and with cold-blooded precision to defend the members’ interests. We must focus our justified anger.â€
This is the obviously the time when unions must deliver something that their members perceive as value in return for their dues. Given the power of the bankruptcy process, which is decidedly tilted in favor of the company, the task is not easy.
I believe United employees will struggle with accepting the cuts being imposed on them much more than the employees at US. While US has struggled for years, UA’s downfall has come relatively recently. UA employees still see AA, CO, DL, and NW employees as their peers but those airlines are very unlikely to stoop to those levels of cuts in the near future. We are the point in the evolution of the industry where the employee factor will determine the survival of UA and US. UA particularly must work double time to get employees on its side (a very tall task given the long history of employee-mgmt conflicts at UA) or face a very speedy disintegration of its business which has been very heavily built on providing high quality service in prime worldwide markets.
I find a certain irony in the changing dynamic of the airlines, particularly in relation to flight attendants. While airlines have done a masterly job at leading the business world in converting from high-touch to self-service on the ground in attempts to reduce costs and eliminate employees, there are very few (if any steps) that can be done to reduce costs in the air using automation. The in-flight product is essentially a human product and consumers at every airline expect that. As long as governments require people on aircraft for safety, flight attendants will have to provide customer service in all the other times when safety is not immediately threatened. Some airlines provide fun service while some provide elegant but all successful airlines have a distinguished onboard product.
Yes, airlines have succeeded for years at convincing well-educated people to work as flight attendants because of the great perks and hours (which some even on this board have said are priceless) but the real issue is whether the airlines can provide distinctive customer service with flight attendants who don’t have college degrees or an interest in seeing the world. Given that American culture is one of the most me-focused and least service-oriented on the planet, it will be extraordinarily difficult to take people off the street who have not been immersed in a service-oriented mindset and teach them to provide real service. As a consumer, I’m not as interested in the credentials of the person providing the service as I am the finished product. The challenge for the airlines that seek to dramatically cut their costs is not in finding people willing to do the job since there will always be people who will be fascinated by the allure of flying and willing to sacrifice in order to see the world. The challenge is in obtaining and training people that can provide an onboard product that customers view favorably.
UT
