Collaborative leadership and management at American Airlines...? Who woulda thunk it...?
now, if they can just improve their worst-in-class onboard service, terrible food, stop charging for liquor in economy on international flights (only u.s. carriers are that cheap), virtually non-existent amenities, and seedy, worn, and falling-apart aircraft interiors, they might just make a fan outta me...
ya ain't old-fashioned, mr. arpey... it ain't rocket science, it's just common sense...
lemme tell ya... when i read stuff like the above, i literally get chills down my spine... i've devoted my entire career to get words like arpey's to pour forth spontaneously, without scripting, from the mouths of senior excutives... i've also spent my entire career re-learning the lesson that, even if you hear those words, don't believe a single damn one of them until you've walked at least a mile in the shoes of one of that company's front-line employees...
at least arpey's saying the right words as compared to this quote from a united airlines senior executive who i was trying to persuade to provide a little more constructive support to gate mechanics at o'hare: "those guys are worthless, lazy, out to screw us every chance they get, and basically no damn good... they need to get their cry-baby asses back to work..."
i'm doing a long haul on american next weekend... i'll probably end up quizzing the gate agents and flight attendants on their views of mr. arpey... (just for chuckles and grins, of course...!) Submit To Propeller
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Gerard J. Arpey, American’s 47-year-old chief executive, has traded away the bankruptcy card used by most of his competitors — which gave them shelter to prune debt while also tossing out labor contracts and pensions — for the hope of trying to motivate workers. “Our fundamental objective is to make organized labor and our front-line employees our business partners,” he said, asserting that the world’s largest airline cannot become more efficient without such collaboration. “If they don’t want to do it, it ain’t going to happen. It doesn’t matter how brilliant you are.”
“Call me old-fashioned,” he added. “But I think companies ought to pay people back. And I think companies ought to make good on commitments to employees and communities.”
ya ain't old-fashioned, mr. arpey... it ain't rocket science, it's just common sense...
lemme tell ya... when i read stuff like the above, i literally get chills down my spine... i've devoted my entire career to get words like arpey's to pour forth spontaneously, without scripting, from the mouths of senior excutives... i've also spent my entire career re-learning the lesson that, even if you hear those words, don't believe a single damn one of them until you've walked at least a mile in the shoes of one of that company's front-line employees...
at least arpey's saying the right words as compared to this quote from a united airlines senior executive who i was trying to persuade to provide a little more constructive support to gate mechanics at o'hare: "those guys are worthless, lazy, out to screw us every chance they get, and basically no damn good... they need to get their cry-baby asses back to work..."
i'm doing a long haul on american next weekend... i'll probably end up quizzing the gate agents and flight attendants on their views of mr. arpey... (just for chuckles and grins, of course...!) Submit To Propeller
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posted by profmarcus at
7/23/2006
