UA poaches another AA senior exec

[eolesen]

I'm sure that most line employees won't care, but it's never a good thing to leave the door open for one of your largest competitors to keep stealing your executives... In addition to Nocella, Patrick Quayle (who was AA's VP of International Planning) also left AA for UA.

http://www.dallasnews.com/business/...an-airlines-executive-departs-united-airlines

Senior vice president of network planning, alliances and sales Andrew Nocella resigned from American in order to take a leadership role with United, according to a Wednesday memo sent to employees by American’s president Robert Isom. The news was first reported by travel industry website Skift.

Nocella will join American’s former president Scott Kirby at United. Kirby, now United’s president, left American in August as part of an executive shuffle the company attributed to succession planning. The company does not make its executives sign non-compete agreements.

At American, Nocella helped shape the company’s route network and oversaw its partnerships with fellow Oneworld alliance airlines. He's expected to take a similar role at United, although the Chicago-based carrier did not disclose his specific title Wednesday.

 

[Rogallo]

Yep, don't care!

 

[wings396]

Nocella is someone that I would consider a great loss for AA. He is a very sharp guy, that goes way back with LUS. Very foolish on the part of Doug and AA to let him get away to the competition.

 

[swamt]

I'm sure that most line employees won't care, but it's never a good thing to leave the door open for one of your largest competitors to keep stealing your executives... In addition to Nocella, Patrick Quayle (who was AA's VP of International Planning) also left AA for UA.

http://www.dallasnews.com/business/...an-airlines-executive-departs-united-airlines

I would assume that AA will be looking at future no compete clauses in their upper officers contracts. Looks like Kirby is gonna draw who ever he can from AA. This could be just the beginning. Look for more movements in the future.

 

[dash8roa]

Might be a good thing to get rid of past US management. US had the lowest morale and wages, also the customer was treated rather shabbily. The AA I flew years ago was very customer oriented, perhaps some former AA managers can move up the ladder and help Parker to lose the US-AW mentality.

 

[Albert]

Might be a good thing to get rid of past US management. US had the lowest morale and wages, also the customer was treated rather shabbily. The AA I flew years ago was very customer oriented, perhaps some former AA managers can move up the ladder and help Parker to lose the US-AW mentality.

No one is indispensable, those AA managers you speak of the ones loyal to Horton are now mostly shift managers at Chic-fil-A

 

[wings396]

Nocella had nothing to do with wages, morale, or anything else related to the employees. His job had to do with market R&D, and route planning along with rightsizing the A/C based on demand.

 

[eolesen]

Might be a good thing to get rid of past US management. US had the lowest morale and wages, also the customer was treated rather shabbily. The AA I flew years ago was very customer oriented, perhaps some former AA managers can move up the ladder and help Parker to lose the US-AW mentality.

Not likely. Too many of the former AA MD's and VP's left. You now have the leftovers.

 

[Albert]

Not likely. Too many of the former AA MD's and VP's left. You now have the leftovers.

How many had a choice?

 

[luvthe9]

Rats leaving a sinking ship.........smart move!

 

[WeAAsles]

Not likely. Too many of the former AA MD's and VP's left. You now have the leftovers.

Weren't the old AA peeps also the ones that eventually drove us into Bankruptcy?

Yea not really too interested thank you.

 

[Art at ISP]

I have met Andrew Nocella on a few occasions and have had some very interesting conversations with him. Not the most customer friendly guy in terms of caring what we say, but he is a good marketer.

I think this is a noticeable loss for AA, as Kirby raids the AA brain trust. I wonder if he can get Dougie to go too

 

[jimntx]

Weren't the old AA peeps also the ones that eventually drove us into Bankruptcy?

Yea not really too interested thank you.

WeAAsles, please note...AA was not driven into bankruptcy. They went gladly and voluntarily. As a matter of fact the company was not bankrupt at the time it went into bankruptcy. The company had over $5 billion dollars in the bank when they filed. That's billion with a B. The reason AA filed for bankruptcy was simple--they wanted to ditch the underfunded employee pension plan and abrogate as many of the union contracts as possible. All goals reached, we came out of bankruptcy and champagne and bonuses for everyone at Centre Port.

 

[WeAAsles]

WeAAsles, please note...AA was not driven into bankruptcy. They went gladly and voluntarily. As a matter of fact the company was not bankrupt at the time it went into bankruptcy. The company had over $5 billion dollars in the bank when they filed. That's billion with a B. The reason AA filed for bankruptcy was simple--they wanted to ditch the underfunded employee pension plan and abrogate as many of the union contracts as possible. All goals reached, we came out of bankruptcy and champagne and bonuses for everyone at Centre Port.

Jim it was more than that. They had an upcoming balloon payment that would have cut in deep to their cash on hand which was 4 Billion. They were in deep debt with no real sellable assets outside the core business. They had 200 Pilots retire and another 500 on deck because the Market had finally given up on AA. They had tons of old leases and aircraft that they were still responsible for paying and yes they had Pension liabilities that were dramatically underfunded.

There is a test conducted by the court to be able to use the Court in a Corporate BK case and AA passed that test with flying colors.

Now I don't like to say all of this but those were the facts.

Oh and I forgot to mention the competitive disadvantage the Airline had against Delta, UAL and US who had already went through the process and was murdering AA in multiple markets.

 

[WeAAsles]

I have met Andrew Nocella on a few occasions and have had some very interesting conversations with him. Not the most customer friendly guy in terms of caring what we say, but he is a good marketer.

I think this is a noticeable loss for AA, as Kirby raids the AA brain trust. I wonder if he can get Dougie to go too

I honestly very much hope he doesn't.