Category: British Airways

Introduction & Background

In business organizations, there are many aspects that come onto repetitive considerations; culture is one of those considerations. According to Justin Paul (The Author of the International Business), culture is a manifestation of human custom, values and attributes (Paul, 2011, p. 149).

Such customs and values represent a particular system, group, society, or an organization. They are a sort of identity for such systems group and society. As per Hofstede’s assessment, culture is collective programming of minds. It is programming that distinguishes one group or system from another group or system (Paul, 2011).

According to the modern literature, culture is a source of practice for international business organizations (Kinicki & Kreitner, 1999, p. 42). Culture has influences for strategies, decisions, plans and actions which take place inside the organization system. Similarly, the literature also highlights that culture is a part of the organization system. It has influence for all components of the system, whether its leadership, management or administration all comes under the affect of culture and its changing dimensions (Hauser, 1999).

In theorists’ perspective, there are different levels of cultural diffusion. Likewise, culture diffuses through National level-outside (macro level) and through organizational level-inside (micro level), depending upon the nature and scope of the business in which it corresponds (NDU, 2013). The wider scope of a business the broader are dimensions of a culture to affect. Similarly, the national culture shapes up through societal norms while organizational culture gets formed through human behaviors, practices and attributes. It includes the practices of professionals and practices of the corporate, which eventually shapes up the organizational culture and system (Kinicki & Kreitner, 1999).

For international business organizations, timely assessment and evaluation of the culture is vital (NDU, 2013). Organizations cannot survive or sustain if they do not have a close eye on their cultures. According to the modern literature, cross cultural management is precisely crucial for businesses, especially multinational corporations which comprise a cross-cultural system of human behaviors and attributes (Kinicki & Kreitner, 1999). To bring the competitive strength and effectiveness, it is necessary that organizations change, reform and improve their business cultures. It has been a frequent practice, a popular activity accompanied by all international corporations (Paul, 2011).

In view of the discussion, there are two of the leading companies which are going to be analyzed in this study, Virgin Atlantic Airways and British Airways. Here is the assessment for both organizations in international business perspective:

Company Background and Structure

Virgin Atlantic Airways

Virgin Atlantic Airways is one of the renowned UK’s airline firms established in 1984 by the famous entrepreneur “Richard Branson”. The company owns its place in the international airline market. The best services include mixed fleets based on Airbuses and Boeing wide-bodied airplanes, which are trademarks of the company (Virgin Atlantic, 2013).

Virgin Atlantic has established its name due to innovation and creativeness which are attributes innate by Richard Branson to the company system and culture. Meanwhile, with a starting off name the company determined its first place and still today believes in the philosophy of innovation and advancement which seems to be the company’s real strengths and potencies (Virgin Atlantic, 2013).

British Airways

British Airways is another trademark company in the airline sector. The company got established in 1974 and since then it came out as a flag carrying European organization for airline fleet services. Meanwhile, the organization is the member of the European Royal Family holding the name and recognition of the European monarchs (Hoovers, 2013).

The company provides flight and courier services to more than 70 countries across the world. The fleet services are based on Airbus and Boeings which travels to more than 150 destinations of the world (Hoovers, 2013). BA’s flight central hubs are London’s Heathrow, Gatwick and London airports which take flight exchanges for national and international regions.

Apart from all, British Airways is the member of the American Airlines and One World Alliance, which shows the company’s direct international recognition and status. There is a strong affiliation with governmental authorities, which makes British Airways a public service organization (Hoovers, 2013).

Leadership & Culture

Virgin Airways

As the above discussion highlights that culture is influential for all segments of an organization. Whether its leadership, management or administration, all falls under the influence of culture and its dimensions. Some organizations adopt a culture from their leaders while some take it through learning and experience (Virgin Atlantic, 2012). Virgin Airways is an organization which took inspirations and culture from the leadership.

The leadership of “Richard Branson”, who was a courageous, a daunting and an imaginative man brought the brightest culture of innovation to the organization system. With a true entrepreneurial spirit Richard Branson innate the culture of advancement and technology. This was to bring modification and creativeness in the organization system and in the thoughts and actions of the people associated to the organization (McClendon, 2009).

British Airways

On the other hand, British Airways has a much diversified business system. The diversity is in terms of employees’ experiences and in terms of operations and services. In recent times, the leadership has a wider vision as British Airways is all about bringing people together (British Airways, 2012).

Giving full opportunities to the employees has become a tradition in British Airways system. 36 million people, who travel all the way with BA, are given chances of self development and training. They are provided equal opportunities to make the organization system prolong and effective (British Airways, 2012).

Issues prevailing within Organization System

Virgin Airways

In view of the Virgin Airways system, there have been several issues, which the organization has faced. The issues were at the managerial side just as the young team management or cross cultural development and at the leadership side just as the establishment of Branson’s innovative philosophy (Virgin Atlantic, 2012).

Bringing a technological fleet service with a competitive low price was another significant challenge. Price competition was a core challenge because the fleet services derived from Branson’s rich philosophy were respectively high in price than other rivalries in the market “British Airways” (Burke, 2010).

British Airways has been a direct international competitor of VA. Being a public service organization, BA has competed on price grounds as it offered low price fleet services with respect to VA. VA provided quality fleet in high price while BA provided mid level fleet in respective low price. In this way, price was the greatest challenge for VA especially in the international market, which already contains several other price competitors like Singapore Airlines or Arabian Airlines (Virgin Atlantic, 2012).

These were the macro level challenges (cultural, environmental, political and economical), which VA had to manage to build its place in the international business market. This required an assessment of the VA’s internal culture which is based on two micro level practices, professional and corporate (Virgin Atlantic, 2012).

British Airways

Just like VA, British Airways has also been in the siege of problems. There have been problems associated to culture and system of the organization (Hauser, 1999). Due to cultural instability, the organization has been challenged in the international business operation. Managing business in cross cultural way and in the diversified international market all became difficult for organization and its administration (Burke, 2010).

Since from the origin, BA has remained in the transformation phase, the transformation of culture and the system. The main problem was in the culture which affected all segments of BA.

Some leaders at BA appreciated the conventional culture which was close to governmental rules and interferences while some admired the culture of privatization which contained the elements of advancement, technology and innovation. It was due to governmental interference the organization has remained stagnant in growth and technology (Hoovers, 2013).

Managing Conflicts & Issues

Virgin Airways

According to Richard Branson, “I’m often asked what it is that makes Virgin different. The simple answer is – our people. If it weren’t for a bunch of well trained, motivated and, above all, happy people doing their bit, we’d have never launched a record label, never mind a fleet of 747s” (Virgin Atlantic, 2012). From this statement, it can be said that behind VA’s success, there are two strong forces; one leadership with the brightest vision and culture, and second human resource with the capability to adopt that culture (Virgin Atlantic, 2012).

For managing issues, the leadership precisely focused on personnel management and engagement. Managing individuals first has brought a way for the organization to cross cultural integration (Hall, 2007, pp. 120). Developing wider communication networks and international communication programs are some of the strategies laid by the VA’s administration.

These are to bring strong and effective cross cultural system based on personnel management rules and principles. Hence, it can be said that VA evolved through people oriented culture. Individuals were considered as the force and strengths of the organization to find its way in the international business market (Aluya, 2009, pp. 27).

Apart from all, the organization has brought action plans for international business expansion. Over taking companies running out of the businesses has been part of the VA’s action strategy (Aluya, 2009). The company acquired failed brands and promoted them by its stable name and logo.

This was a risk taking strategy but eventually came out well for Virtual Airways international business. The Virgin group expanded in the form of Virgin Blue (The Australian affiliation of VA). It expanded to US, New Zealand, Thailand, and South Africa, which brought intensive prospects for the company in the next few years of time.

Similarly, with on-board innovation VA worked out on design and service (Aluya, 2009). Providing exceptional flying experience to the customer and taking alternates of the biofuel have been strategies of VA to determine its first place in the international airline market. This was a technological move assessed by the company’s leaders to make VA an international business organization (Walenius, 2010).

British Airways

Culture, mainly acquired from the macro side (National level), and micro side (internal trends) has been the problem for BA. Since from the last decade, the company has shown good progress, and this is because the culture has been changed and improved. Thanks to Long King and Sir Collin Marshall who worked out aggressively to change the culture of BA. The improvement in service is a result of such cultural change which was engineered by both of revered former leaders (Mayle, 2006).

After the company recognized its problem “culture”, it started to change it by personnel management and team leadership. Under the leadership of Sir Collin Marshal, BA acquired revolutionary approach. It was for changing the culture by using human resource as a force of change (Mayle, 2006). In Collin’s period, the company launched the programme of “MFI (Managing People First)”, which was to assert individuals as a source of cultural change.

This was to bring an intrinsic change that is a long term, sustainable and effective for BA’s international business operation. Today, British Airways has acquired a dominant position in the international market, and the secret behind it is not technology nor advancement but in-fact an intrinsic cultural change initially proposed and suggested by Sir Collin and Long King (Mayle, 2006, p. 177).

Apart from all, Nick Georgiades (former head of the human resources BA) introduced a three leg stool approach. The approach was there to establish MFI programme. The first leg of the stool was about communication, coordination and team building; the second on performance appraisal and the third on rewarding employees. After completing the stool and establishing it at the organizational level, the organization was transformed with new principles and trends to achieve progress (Burke, 2010).

This improved segmental performance including performance of engineering, operation and management which overall boosted the performance of BA in the international business market. Hence, by establishing a new culture (a revolutionary one), BA acquired a new place in the market (Burke, 2010, p. 238).

Conclusion & Recommendation

After analyzing both companies, it can be said that culture is a central influential factor for organizations. It affects all areas including, leadership, management or administration. Virgin Airways acquired culture through leadership while BA attained it through learning and experience.

There were significant differences of how culture evolved and affected both organizations and their systems. Meanwhile, British Airways was affected by conventional culture, which was based on Government rules and decisions. As soon as the company realized that it should adapt change, things turned out well for the organization and its system.

Similarly, Virgin Airways, which was more on the innovation side, headed forward by a strong leadership vision. Richard Branson the head of the company had a strong vision and ideology. He established a unified culture within the organization system, which ultimately brought strength for VA to move in the international business perspective.

Based on the analysis, it is recommended that BA should work on the technological aspect. Moving on with innovation has become a requirement and hence has to be adapted within BA’s system. Similarly, for Virgin Airways it is recommended that organization concentrate on price aspect.

Moving on with low price can create a competitive advantage for the company. Apart from all, Virgin Airways should prolong its innovative principles. By sustaining innovation, the company can become more dominant in the international business spectrum.

Reference List

Aluya, J. (2009). Complexity of Leadership, Organizations and the Real Estate Industry: Disrupting Existing Systems. Bloomington: Author House.

British Airways. (2012). Our History and Culture. Web.

Burke, W. (2010). Organization Change: Theory and Practice. London: SAGE.

Hall, D., 2007. Business Studies. New Delhi: Pearson Education India.

Hauser, M. (1999). Cultural Influences on Leadership and Organizations: Project Globe. Zurich: University of Zurich.

Hoovers. (2013). British Airways Plc Company Profile. Web.

Kinicki, A., & Kreitner, R. (1999). Organizational Behavior 3E. New York: Tata McGraw-Hill Education.

Mayle, D. (2006). Managing Innovation and Change. London: SAGE.

McClendon, J. (2009). Richard Branson: Virgin Entrepreneur. Web.

NDU. (2013). Organizational Culture. Web.

Paul, J. (2011). International Business. New Delhi: PHI Learning Pvt.

Virgin Atlantic. (2012). Culture. Web.

Virgin Atlantic. (2013). Profile: Virgin Atlantic. Web.

Walenius, M. (2010). The leadership style of Sir Richard Branson. Web.

Introduction

The British Airways has experienced several challenges over the past. After incurring significant losses, it had ruined its reputation and it was considered not reliable (Campbell-Smith, 1986). In an attempt to salvage the organization, the management adopted a survival plan that was supposed to enable cost cutting.

However, it failed to use collective bargaining. Several issues have also been highlighted in its management procedures. The use of threats by the management in order to forcefully cut down the employees’ salaries led to strikes since the employees were not motivated. The dismissal of a significant number of employees also played a role in reducing job security and tainting its reputation.

This paper will evaluate the British Airways as an airline in the U.K. aviation industry and propose certain aspects that could be emulated by the company based on the success of other airlines. The paper will also address the importance of culture for the success of an airline.

Union power within the U.K. aviation industry

The trade union movements in the U.K. were developed to fight for the socio-economical well being of the employees. However, the Margaret Thatcher’s government turned the tables around and made the lives of the employees miserable. It weakened the powers of the unions and made strikes illegal (Webb, 1920).

This also had an effect on the union power of the aviation industry. With such limitations on the powers of the union, the employees did not have much say on the decision of the company. In case they felt that some of their needs were not being met, they had trouble airing them. When they attempted to air their views, they were either threatened or sacked.

This had adverse effects on the success of the airlines since the employee/s were not motivated to work effectively. Consequently, this means that the employees would not deliver the services to the expectations of the customers and this has negative effects on the success of the company since it does not have the ability to sustain its customers. One of the airlines that suffered a lot from this is the British Airways (Campbell-Smith, 1986).

Reasons behind the history of industrial unrest at British Airways

British Airways had incurred great losses earlier and this had cost its reputation. This was in the early 1980s. Its reputation for reliability became poor and it could not be trusted to deliver as it did before. In addition, its costs were much more when compared to the other airlines. Privatisation became the option for the organization and in order to prepare for this, they decided to recruit new managers. The Thatcher government had believed that this would help bring back the company to its feet.

The British Airways then decided to focus its efforts on adding value as its business strategy. This was to be in terms of putting customer service as a priority. This was greatly to depend on the development of the activities of its human resource management (Boyd, 2001).

This also meant that the company embraced the policy of working in teams and it adopted a pay scheme that was related to profits. The organization became renowned for this. Another strategy adopted by the British Airways was what was referred to as the ‘survival plan’. This was to involve the significant cutting down of its costs.

The company had attempted to embark on a useful venture, which was to improve the relations with the trade unions, but it failed on one area. This was when they failed to use collective bargain as a tool for change. They had thought that the use of open and regular communication alone would be enough but they were wrong.

At around 1985, there were some improvements that had been experienced in the company. Its financial position improved and was consistent with the current market. The company had become almost monopolistic in regards to the domestic flights. It also took a duopoly position when it came to the flights abroad.

There was also a significant improvement in the employment during that period. An addition 15000 employees were recruited. However, this nice picture portrayed a wrong picture about the British Airways. This is because the company still struggled with industrial disputes. Industrial action still characterised the industrial relations of the company. It had been determined that there was at least one industrial dispute yearly.

The fall of the company started to show in the early 1990s. This was when the company’s environment changed drastically. Firstly, deregulation initiated a competitive atmosphere with other airlines within the European nations. Additionally, there was the effect of the Gulf war and the recession.

Both of these phenomenons had a negative effect on the general market. The company decided to cut its costs even more. This was because getting subsidies from the government was not an option any more. This was when the equilibrium between adding value, providing high quality service and cost cutting was lost (Campbell-Smith, 1986).

In order for the company to continue to perform well in such conditions, it had to do away with some of its ethical considerations. This was in the form of franchising some of its activities.

This was in opposition to its business operations since it believed in consultation and negotiation. Within the next three years, its effect on employment had been felt. About 5400 employees lost their jobs. There was a significant decrease in the employee morale because they were not motivated. This also led to disputes in the bargaining groups.

With a new chief executive in 1996, the company resorted to cutting down its costs in order to realize more profits. This had been determined to be a good strategy basing on its success that year when the company announced a record pre-tax profit. The new strategy adopted to cut costs even further was referred to as the Business Efficiency Programme.

However, some of its strategies were not in favour of the employees. For example, the company attempted to restructure the pay scales and the allowances for the staff. This was particularly on the cabin crew. This was not taken positively as it led to a strike in 1997.

In order to stop the employees from striking, the company threatened to sack the workers or sue them for breach of contract. This was an act of bullying by the company and this had a negative effect on employee morale. Another big problem that the company faced was the alliance with American Airlines. This did not go well due to regulatory difficulties and it led to huge losses.

Culture in the aviation industry

Every airline required to recognize the importance of organizational culture. Culture is basically the way the company goes about its activities. It is how things are done there. It may either be weak or strong. A strong one is usually accepted by employees. This is because it has several benefits that favour them and the organization as a whole.

Some of the benefits in the aviation industry include improved financial performance and increased safety. Some of the key features of any culture are the presence of symbols, values, rituals and heroes. A weak culture, on the other hand, is not strongly embraced by the workers. Such cultures do not have significant impacts on the company’s success.

Culture, in the aviation industry, is vital in order to govern collective behaviour. This is because it governs the way employees perceive things. It also governs the way they feel and think. This means that it would affect the way they interact with each other, with their clients and with other stakeholders. This means that organizational cultures are important in ensuring good customer service.

The goal of every organization, including the aviation industry, is to provide proper services to its customers. This will help attract them and ensure that they maintain them. This is necessary in order to maintain the sales and ensure profitability and sustainability of the business.

Employees are required to understand the needs of their customers. This will put them in a position to match the products of the company with their needs. When the needs of the customers are met, they get satisfied (customer satisfaction) and this is what keeps them coming back for more. Therefore, customer service is important for the success of every business.

Providing customer service is quite a simple task, however, providing efficient customer service is another story all together. This requires proper skills. Organizations can ensure that its employees are well equipped with these skills through providing them with proper training. This may be in the provision of courses that would impart these skills and knowledge to them. This can only be achieved if the company has a strong culture. This way, the organization will be able to maintain its customers and keep its airplanes in the air.

Lessons that British Airways can learn from other airlines

Southwest Airlines and Singapore Airlines are some of the most successful airlines and the British Airways can learn some vital lessons that could help it to realize success. Among the strengths of Southwest Airlines is its unique culture. This has helped it propel and become one of the leading airlines in the United States. The culture of the airline is characterised by several dimensions that show it success as a strong culture.

One of the dimensions of the Southwest Airlines organizational culture as per the Organizational Culture Profile is the people-oriented culture (Pfeffer and Veiga, 1999). This culture cultivates the value of fairness and encourages the support and respect for the individual’s rights.

In Southwest Airlines, the main emphasis is on training the people with dignity and respect. Certain studies have shown that generally, organizations that embrace people-oriented cultures enjoy low turnover rates. The employees have been determined to stay for more than a year longer than in those organizations that do not have such cultures in their organizational cultures. The British Airways needs to embrace this kind of culture in order to motivate its employees and make them feel appreciated.

Kelleher and his management team were responsible for creating the organizational culture. It was created in 1971. However, all the individuals are expected to embrace it and bring it to life. This is because they are one big family that has one goal in mind and this is to make the organization an organization that is dedicated to the highest quality of customer service (Milliman et al., 1999).

It endeavours to deliver these services with a sense of friendliness. This shows that the managers play a key role in the success of the organization through the adoption a strong organizational culture. One of the barriers of the British Airways achieving this is the lack of good managers.

Another dimension is the team-oriented culture. The Southwest Airlines emphasize on the use of collaborative efforts in organizational goals (Morrison, 2001). It emphasizes on team spirit in the performance of its activities. It achieves this through cross training the workers in order for them to be able to assist one another when need arises.

In order to be sure that all its employees are team players, the human resource at the Southwest Airlines ensures that the recruitment process ensures this is covered. If the candidate is believed not to be a team player, the position is not available to him or her (Bunz and Maes, 1998). As for the British Airways, teamwork was mainly seen during the strikes.

This was because the conditions in the company did not provide a conducive environment for working. British Airways could adopt this kind of culture and focus the team efforts of the employees on the enrichment of the company.

One of the founders of the airline, Herb Kelleher, has maintained this culture and this explains why the airline has been a success. He and his employees have adopted a successful philosophy that has ensured the nurturing of teamwork as a culture. This is the philosophy of making the organization a family.

Together, they have made the Southwest Airlines one of the lowest cost carriers. The British Airways has experienced bad leadership in the past since one of its chief executives acted as a dictator rather than a partner. This was one of the reasons that the British Airways was on the downfall.

In order to maintain and foster the culture at Southwest Airlines, the organization has ensured that it is engraved in the organization’s mission statement. The organization also considers their employees as a great resource since they are part of the greatest assets.

Therefore, it endeavours to provide them with a stable work environment that will ensure that the workers will be able to produce their best. The organization has also ensured that every individual treated equally and provided equal opportunities. These are especially when it comes to personal growth and learning.

I strongly believe that there is a strong relationship between Southwest Airlines success and its culture. Firstly, its team-oriented culture ensures that only the team workers are recruited.

This means that all individuals who are employed in the organization work together towards one goal. This combined effort helps the organization achieve its goals. These include being a high quality but low cost provider (Morrison, 2001).

The people-oriented cultures also favour its employees a lot. It ensures employee satisfaction and that they have high morale. This enables them to work even more effectively.

The organization also values its customers. Therefore, they always provide high quality service that is affordable to them. All these things have contributed to the success of the Southwest Airlines and if the British Airways adopts them, it could be on the same route towards success.

Another air carrier that needs to be emulated by British Airways is Singapore International Airline. It is ranked top ten worldwide. One of the reasons why this airline has been able to remain successful for several decades is due to its appreciation of employee training and human resource development (Wirtz and Johnston, 2001).

The organization believes in investing in the training and developing of its staff. It has maintained this view and currently, the organization remains committed to its staff and continuously invests in their training (Chan, 2000). British Airways required adopting this mentality of valuing its employees and empowering them through training and development (Holtbrugge, 2004).

There are several aspects that ensure the effective human resource management strategy at the company. These aspects together with the proper management skills of top management have contributed greatly in the company’s ability to achieve cost-effective service excellence.

One of the elements is the stringent selection and recruitment process adopted by the human resource management. Another strategy that has continuously led to the success of the company is the fact that it has formed successful service delivery teams that have ensured that only quality service is delivered constantly. Another important aspect of the company’s strategy is the empowerment of the front-line staff.

Lastly, the organization specialized in the motivation of its employees. These are some of the things that British Airways can learn from in order to be as successful.

One of the most important aspects of Singapore International Airline is crew resource management (Flin, 2002). This is because this delivers improved service excellence. It also ensures that the customer’s expectations are met. Through this, the company is able to adapt to the ever-changing market and the company will be cost conscious. In order to achieve this, the company has focused on particular aspects to do with the selection and training of staff (Wirtz and Johnston, 2001).

The Singapore International Airline is also successful because it values and supports the contributions made by each staff (Heracleous and Wirtz, 2008). Similar to Southwest airlines, the company has been able to bond everyone and has invested in developing mutual relationships between the top management and the subordinates. This is important in ensuring that fast decisions are made and that deadlines are met in a timely manner. The organization is also people oriented since it values its employees.

The stringent selection process has led to the recruiting of competent employees in to the organization. This involves the use of a highly accurate and stringent selection procedure. This ensures that the individuals selected meet the preferred characteristics of the company. After the recruitment process, the selected employees go for an on-the-job training. This ensures that the new employees understand the corporate values of the organization and being accustomed to the corporate culture.

Conclusion

The union power in U.K. aviation industry has faced several challenges. British Airways is one of the airlines that faced such challenges and tried to improve the relations with the trade unions. However, it failed to use collective bargain as a tool for change. They had thought that the use of open and regular communication was sufficient.

British Airways also had a weak corporate culture that led to its inability to satisfy its employees and eventually acted as an impediment. However, British Airways can learn from the Southwest and Singapore Airlines since these two airlines have been successful for several years owing to their proper management skills.

References

Boyd, C 2001, ‘HRM in the airline industry: Strategies and outcomes,’ Personnel Review, vol. 30, no. 4, pp. 438-453.

Bunz, U & Maes, J 1998, ‘Learning excellence: Southwest Airlines approach’, Managing Service Quality, vol. 8, no. 3, pp. 163-169.

Campbell-Smith, D 1986, The British Airways Story: Struggle for take-off, Hodder and Stoughton, New York.

Chan, D 2000, Air wars in Asia: Competitive and collaborative strategies, Republic of Singapore Air Force, Singapore.

Flin, R 2002, ‘Crew resource management: Improving teamwork in high reliability industries’, Team Performance Management, vol. 8, no, ¾, pp. 68-78.

Heracleous, L & Wirtz, J 2008, Strategy and organization at Singapore Airlines: Achieving sustainable advantage through dual strategy, Elsevier Ltd, New York.

Holtbrugge, D 2004, Management of international strategic business corporation: Situational conditions, performance criteria and success factors, Wiley Periodicals Inc., Singapore.

Milliman, J., Ferguson, J., Trickett, D & Condemi, B 1999, ‘Spirit and community at Southwest Airlines: An investigation of a spiritual values-based model’, Journal of Organizational Change Management, vol. 12, no. 3, pp. 221-233.

Morrison, S 2001, ‘Actual, adjacent and potential competition estimating the full effect of Southwest Airlines’, Journal of Transport Economics and policy, vol. 35, no. 2, pp. 239-256.

Pfeffer, J & Veiga, J 1999, ‘Putting people first for organizational success’, The Academy of Management Executive, vol. 13, no. 2, pp. 37-48.

Webb, S 1920, A history of Trade unionism, Longmans & Green, London.

Wirtz, J & Johnston, R 2001, Singapore airlines: What it takes to sustain service excellence – A senior management perspective, NUS Business School, Singapore.

Introduction

Organizational sustainability is often a very key ingredient to the survival or long-term presence of a business in a given market. However, the concept is often misunderstood to mean the financial sustainability of an organization because if an organization is unsustainable, the problem normally manifests itself in terms of financial challenges (Authenticity Consulting 2011, p. 1).

It is therefore important to understand that organizational sustainability is more holistic than previously believed and in simple terms, it could be equated to the sustainability of individuals, a group of people or even a country. This means that there are many aspects of an organization that have to be sustained (not just the financial aspect).

These factors withstanding, it is essential to note that there are a number of primary organizational aspects that if properly sustained, will lead to the overall sustainability of an entire organization. To better gain a more comprehensive understanding of this fact, this study will carry out a case study of British Airways to have a clear picture of its sustainability status.

British Airways has for long been deemed the national carrier for the United Kingdom (UK) (Winthrop Corporation 2000, p. 1). Its headquarters is in London and much of its activities are grounded at Heathrow airport where most of its operations (of its airline services to more than 300 destinations around the globe) are planned.

British Airways (and its subsidiary companies) have since inception undertaken passenger services (both at the local and international levels), freight services and mail services, although recent developments (in 2011) are bound to see a restructuring of the company’s operations to offer new products and services, after it merged with Iberia (a Spanish airline company) which now holds a significant number of shares in the company (Winthrop Corporation 2000, p. 1).

The company’s sustainability has often been dependant on a number of critical organizational aspects. One of them is the personnel or human resource aspect which has seen the organization go through treacherous years of intimidation and threats of strikes by the workers. Another basic organizational aspect is its financial sustainability which was brought to fore by increased competition in the airline and aviation sectors.

Lastly, the organization’s sustainability greatly depends on product, service and program sustainability, which has recently come to the management’s attention (again due to increased competition in the aviation market). This study will, therefore, explain how these sustainability areas are of importance to British Airways and how the company performs with regards to these three sustainability factors.

Product, Service and Program Sustainability

Product and service sustainability has often been associated with financial sustainability, considering products and services essentially attract customers to a given business, and so the higher the number of customers a business has, the higher the revenues it will receive.

Authenticity Consulting (2011) explains that if a business does not have high-quality products, programs or services, it is bound to affect its client’s participation and this will consequently lead to the realization of low revenues.

The liberalization of the airline industry, through a breakdown of economic barriers, has significantly led to increased competition among airlines around the world and in the same manner, given enough room for innovation in the creation of airline products, services and programs. This has especially been evidenced in in-flight services such as the provision of in-flight airline entertainment (The Hindu Business Line 2011, p. 2).

This has caused a lot of discomfort for most traditional airline companies like British Airways because new airline entrants have been on the forefront in spearheading the innovation of new products and services.

Currently, many airline companies are investing a lot of money in the innovation of new products and services as can be seen from studies done by The Hindu Business Line (2011) which suggests that airline companies in the year 1998 invested more than $1.8 billion in the development of new products, services and programs.

The significance of such investments have been acknowledged by many airline companies after recent research studies suggested that the quality of products and services essentially determine the level of customer satisfaction within a given airline company (The Hindu Business Line 2011, p. 2). This also affects a company’s bottom line.

British Airway’s Performance

British Airway’s sustainability in the airline sectors significantly depends on its products, services and programs because it has in the past traditionally enjoyed a longstanding monopoly in the provision of airline products and services in its traditional markets. However, recent decades have seen the entrance of new airline companies like Qatar airways, Emirates (and the likes) infringe on its market share through the provision of high-quality services, products and programs.

This has consequently caused a lot of jitters in the organization because the company has realized that if it does not change its traditional products or services, it may eventually lose out on its traditional markets. This has forced the company to come up with new products and services such as the ‘world travelers plus’ and the ‘lounge in the sky’ products and services (The Hindu Business Line 2011, p. 2).

These two new products are part of a wider scheme to come up with a comprehensive array of new products and services aimed at ensuring the company’s traditional clients are satisfied with the organization and remain loyal to it.

The ‘world travelers plus’ and the ‘lounge in the sky’ products and services are essentially a fourth-class cabin category of products and services which are also a product of a 600 million pound investment scheme undertaken by the company in 2001(The Hindu Business Line 2011, p. 4).

These new products and services were accompanied by a revamping of the company’s class cabins concord, check-ins and lounges, which have been attributed to the companies increased client base over the past few years (The Hindu Business Line 2011, p. 4).

These new products and services are also as a result of an additional 150 million pounds investment in an upgrade of its long-haul fleet (which includes new seats and seatback videos) (The Hindu Business Line 2011, p. 4). From these new products and services, British Airways has done a commendable job of improving its sustainability status with regards to its products and services.

Personnel Sustainability

There is concern among most businesses and managers across the globe that if a company does not have the right employees, then its products and services cannot have the significant impact they are intended to have (Authenticity Consulting 2011, p. 1). This means that the sustainability of a company’s products, services or programs is therefore directly dependent on the personnel sustainability.

Because of this relationship, we cannot ignore the link that these two organizational aspects (personnel sustainability and products, programs and services sustainability) have on the financial sustainability of a firm. This is true because if an organization does not have good employees, its customers are bound to experience ineffective products and services, which will ultimately lead to a significant decrease in the company’s profits.

Because of the importance of having a sustainable personnel team in the organization, Authenticity Consulting (2011) proposes that it is important for organizations to have a well-trained and supervised staff, and if there are employees who cannot deliver in time, they should be replaced with people who can. This analysis is important to British Airways because it has in the past been threatened by its personnel situation.

British Airway’s Performance

British Airways has over the years been faced with threats of industrial action from its workers because of the human resource strategy adopted by its managing board (Smale 2005, p. 1). The managing board actually undertook a new strategy of cost-cutting, which has not been well received by its workers.

This has caused many of its staff (especially the cabin crew) to walk out on the company, therefore leading to a slow down on some of the company’s operations. This has in turn painted a bad picture of the company, especially in the eyes of international investors.

The company has since held on to its strategy of withdrawing perks that the company employees used to enjoy (either as a result of the fact that the company is experiencing increased operational costs or as a result of the penalties imposed on workers who went on strike). This has in turn forced the company’s employees to move to the courts to seek redress regarding the situation.

The problem was started when one of the company’s auxiliary wings in the catering department terminated the employment of more than 350 members, and this move consequently caused a massive strike that has in subsequent periods been acknowledged by BA’s management as being out of control (Smale 2005, p. 1).

British Airways now goes on record as having had three successive strikes in three summers (an action which cost the company up to ten million pounds a day) (Smale 2005, p. 1).

The company currently enjoys very minimal staff loyalty and the current staffing levels are at an all-time low. There is also enough evidence to suggest that there is worker militancy that was characteristic of British Airways employees in the 70s and 80s and the vice is still being perpetrated by current employees (Smale 2005, p. 1).

There is therefore very minimal cooperation between British Airways employees and its management. This has consequently turned into an almost ‘cat and mouse’ game where the workers strategize to affect the company’s operations by striking when the company is supposed to cash in on high travel periods like summers or when the company’s shareholders are meeting (to spoil the company’s reputation in the eyes of its investors).

These kinds of employee actions pose a threat to the company’s long-term sustainability.

Financial Sustainability

As mentioned earlier, financial sustainability is normally a representation of how the organization performs with regards to other sustainability aspects. Often, when the above sustainability indicators are not effectively managed, a company experiences significant financial shortfalls.

Regardless of the situation, Authenticity Consulting (2011) notes that organizations should at all time maintain a financial reserve (so that they are able to survive in case of a financial disaster) and undertake contingency planning (to provide direction to the companies if they do not meet their financial targets).

The importance of maintaining a sound financial health for organizations cannot, therefore, be overemphasized because it is through good financial health that organizations can prove to their shareholders that the company is moving in the right direction.

With regards to British Airways, a good financial health is vital for its sustainability, considering most of its human resource challenges are brought about by management’s decision to cut-back on its operational costs (human resource is one of the areas they decided to cut-back on).

The company now has slightly over 40,000 employees (Smale 2005, p. 1). Nonetheless, it is vital to understand the importance of a good financial health for the company because it is only through a good financial health that the company can be able to regularly pay its workers. Moreover, it would not experience extensive employee objections due to withdrawn perks because it would not have to do so in the first place.

Also, considering most airlines are expanding into new travel destinations because of deregulation of the airline sector and increased globalization, it is essential for British Airways to expand in the same respect.

This will imply that the company needs to open up new offices, hire new staff, purchase more airplanes (and the likes) and this obviously means the company will require more capital to make the exercise a success. This fact reiterates the importance of having a good financial health to stay relevant in the market.

Finally, considering the company has experienced subsequent years of periodic losses (as will be evidenced in subsequent sections of this study), its financial reserve is quickly depleting and there are already increased concerns regarding the company’s ability to withstand future financial storms once its financial reserves run dry.

Essentially, the company will be unsustainable upon such an eventuality or it may be forced to take debts (a move which would ultimately lead to its bankruptcy if things do not look up in the airline industry).

These financial aspects are quite important not only for British Airways but all other airline companies because their financial books are normally affected by intrigues in the world economy such as the recent global economic downturn and airline accidents, which have a severe financial impact on the companies.

British Airway’s Performance

Recent financial performance reports of British Airways have significantly increased investor concerns of the company’s survival (in light of increased competition). In March, 2010, the company reported one of its worst financial performances in decades, brought about by the recent global economic crunch, volcanic ash clouds in the European airspace and a number of employee strikes and walkouts (Mcghie 2010, p. 1).

These factors caused the company to report financial losses of up to 425 million pounds in the period ending March, 2010 (Mcghie 2010, p. 1). This financial performance has caused jitters among the company’s board members who are increasingly registering concerns over the company’s long-term sustainability, considering the company is quickly eating into its only cash reserve of about two billion pounds (Mcghie 2010, p. 1).

As mentioned earlier in this study, this poor financial performance is a symptom of the poor management of other functional areas of the company as noted with the crippling employee strikes that the company has endured over the past few months.

The following diagram best represents the company’s financial standing.

The poor financial performance is one that is quickly painting a bleak future for the company considering it reported a 358 million pound loss in the previous year 2009 (Mcghie 2010, p. 1). In fact, during the year 2009, the company was forced to withdraw its dividend issue, and also in the same year, the company’s shares plunged by more than 6% to 152p (Mcghie 2010, p. 1).

Remarks made by the company’s managing director, Willie Walsh, that there is no hope for future economic improvement in the company’s primary markets have even cast a darker cloud on the future prospects of the company considering the company expects to make more losses in coming years (Milmo 2009).

These repeated losses have further increased concerns that the company may not be able to shoulder another blow in the coming years. Milmo (2009) reiterates this concern by admitting that:

“I understand from staff the atmosphere at BA is like the losses at an all-time low. I think we are seeing the final throes of a once successful airline, with losses of £3 million per day (recent management meeting info) it won’t take long to get through the money BA retains from forward passenger bookings (about £1 billion)” (p. 10).

Conclusion

This study identifies the fact that British Airways is facing a sustainability problem in the sense that some of its major organizational aspects which determine its survival are not being properly managed or not performing to the expected standards.

The major sustainability aspects posing significant challenges to the company include its personnel management and financial performance. However, with regards to its products, service and program innovation, the company is fairing on well. Nonetheless, from the entire analysis, we understand that the three sustainability areas mentioned above are all conjoined, in that; they affect each other in one way or another.

To improve the company’s financial performance, it is therefore quite important for the company to properly manage its human resource, because as evidenced from the company’s financial performance, its losses were significantly caused by the series of losses in the last three years.

It, therefore, comes as no surprise that the biggest financial streak of losses for the company started after it started experiencing industrial action. Comprehensively, we can acknowledge that the company needs to reenergize its human resource functions and at the same time, capitalize on its product and service innovations to revamp its financial performance and consequently enhance its sustainability.

References

Authenticity Consulting. (2011) Organizational Sustainability. Web.

Mcghie, T. (2010) Record Losses at British Airways Spark Survival Fears. Web.

Milmo, D. (2009) British Airways Makes Worst Ever Loss. Web.

Smale, W. (2005) BA’s Long History Of Staff Disputes. Web.

The Hindu Business Line. (2011) British Airways Launches New Products, Services. Web.

Winthrop Corporation. (2000) British Airways Plc. Web.

Introduction

All organisations establish their unique people management strategy with a view of enhancing the achievement of their objectives effectively. Hospitality organisations, in particular, consider this to be an important aspect because they offer services.

This implies that their employees are the actual meeting point between the organisation and its external consumers. This paper analyzes the internal consumer strategies for three companies: British Airways, Hilton Hotel, and the Wembley Stadium.

Hilton Hotels Corporation

Hilton Hotels Corporation has commissioned a third party, Kenexa, to develop its people management programme. The main expectation of the hotel is to develop an HR talent programme that will be aligned to Hilton’s HR vision. Kenexa employs use of focus groups, critical incident questionnaires that focus on existing HR talent, together with the general managers, as well as job analysis with the aim of identifying HR talents (Hilton Hotels and Resorts, 2013).

This strategy also entails formulating a success model that would enhance goal achievement for Hilton. Kenexa has on its part established a web-based solution whose main mandate is to evaluate HR candidates with respect to the trait clusters that are associated with four HR talent types; technical expert, change agent, strategic partner, and team member champion.

Another program aimed at people development strategy at Hilton is referred to as the Top Gear development program that mainly targets the HR professionals. The program operates by allowing up to 20 HR professionals to attend four models, with the main aim being to enhance their competencies on the talent curve blocks. The end objective of this programme is to promote the professionals in order to manage even bigger roles, such as being regional HR managers (Hilton Hotels and Resorts, 2013).

British Airways

The British Airways focuses mainly on motivation as a significant part of its people management strategy. The company invests heavily on its internal customers by ensuring that the best and highest levels of value and service are available. The company has put more attention on the working environments of its employees; where a move to open corporate offices has seen the company set up a state of the art facility at Waterside (British Airways, 2013).

The new office facility at corporate business park mainly seeks to ensure that employees operate in a serene environment in order to motivate them into producing more. This is in tandem with the company’s vision of ensuring that it motivates its human resource towards achieving greater success and results towards serving its customers.

Part of the investments aimed at creating a unique working environment that motivates the workers at Waterside include ‘hot desking’, as well as ‘cyber surfing’. These facilities are open and available to the more than 3,000 workers based at the facility. This highlights the company’s main strategy of achieving greater motivation for its entire workforce.

British Airways also established and maintains an employee strategy that seeks to enable the workers become part of the company’s owners. Through the scheme, more than 70 percent of the employees at British Airways own shares of the company.

This makes the employees part of the company’s owners (British Airways, 2013). Thus, as owners of the company, the employees have a greater motivation to serve their customers with greater diligence and quality service. Good results for the company mean better returns to the shareholders, who also include the workers.

The Royal Caribbean International

The Royal Caribbean International cruise line has mainly adopted an internal people strategy that focuses on talent development. The company has partnered with external companies, both in the HR and IT sectors, with the view of helping it develop its human resources towards achieving optimum capabilities and results.

Royal Caribbean International has partnered with Agilysys, which is an IT firm, with a view of helping it enhance workflow and design (Royal Caribbean International, 2013). The incorporation of IT into its HR management is aimed at allowing the workers an improved opportunity of utilising their skills and capabilities towards improving service delivery.

With a huge labour force that exceeds 60,000 workers and large vessels that require greater coordination in serving customers and managing operations, the workers’ input cannot be realised without IT capability. The management, thus, allows the workers to utilise the improved systems for their service delivery, while at the same time providing an opportunity for them to grow through direct participation and cooperation.

The IT system solution, while enabling greater service delivery and quality, allows the workers ample time to think of new ideas on how they can improve overall performance. The company delivers regular performance reports to the employees in order to help them establish particular areas where their performance is weak.

This helps the workers to self-evaluate themselves and determine improved means and methods through which they can improve on their performance and allow growth in their skills.

Proactive and Reactive Strategies

Proactive strategies involve the daily interventions employed by an organisation for purposes of minimising chances of challenging behaviour occurring. It is a preventative kind of strategy mainly focusing on conditions preceding the behaviour. Proactive strategies target the reduction of future probability of certain behaviour.

Reactive strategies, on the other hand, are course of actions and plans that are employed only once following the occurrence of behaviour or an event. They are the consequences suffered as a result of behaviour, with their main purpose being to prevent the behaviour from persisting while at the same time minimizing the damage.

Proactive strategies are of a better-quality compared to reactive strategies owing to their capability of enabling the organisation to enjoy the freedom of enjoying its own decisions. In other words, the company does not act out of necessity after a certain situation has already occurred. Organizations that employ proactive strategies are better placed to seize and retain a good initiative in competition with their market or industry rivals.

Application

Proactive and reactive strategies are applied on the basis of preparation and accountability. In fire management, for instance, fire departments apply both kinds of strategy as a means of protecting property and people from being affected by fire. Firemen apply proactive strategies when teaching safety courses to families and children. However, they adopt a reactive strategy for purposes of saving people’s property and lives when reacting to put out fire.

Conclusion

Companies employ several people management strategies that are aligned to their objectives in order to enhance service delivery and attainment of their end objectives. Hilton Hotel employs a talent management strategy that focuses on building the capacity and skills of its employees in order to improve on the general service delivery of the company. British Airways, on the other hand, employs a motivation strategy that focuses on enabling the employees to improve their performance through establishing a serene working environment, services, and tools.

References

British Airways (2013). Information. Web.

Hilton Hotels and Resorts (2013). About Hilton. Web.

Royal Caribbean International (2013). Our company. Web.

Executive Summary

This paper is a PR plan for a leading aviation company, British Airways (BA). Traditionally, people have known BA as an experienced and reliable company, but recent industrial strikes have eroded this perception.

This paper proposes that BA should reclaim its image as the most reliable and experienced company by focusing on improving the perceptions of its employees and customers about the company.

Relative to this goal, this paper proposes several strategies including the adoption of an open communication policy, where the company should invite all stakeholders for an open interaction through social media and face-to-face interactions.

The objective of this strategy is to improve the level of interaction between BA, its employees, and its customers.

Through this interaction, BA should demonstrate that it genuinely cares about the welfare of its customers and employees by showing genuine interest in improving customer service and employee working conditions.

Background

A founding member of the One World Alliance, BA is the national carrier for United Kingdom. The UK government established BA in 1974, but in 1987, the same government privatized the company after nearly 13 years of state control.

Since then, British Airways has cut a niche in the aviation industry as being among the largest airline companies in the world. Indeed, only until 2008, British Airways held the reputation of being the largest airline company in the world, in terms of its fleet numbers.

The company’s main operational hub is at Heathrow airport, but its global presence spans across 150 destinations around the world.

Underlying British Airway’s success is an eroding public confidence about the airline’s reliability as a customer-focused airline company. A series of industrial strikes that nearly grounded the company’s operations in most of its key markets caused the eroded confidence.

For example, throughout most parts of the years 2007, 2008, and 2009, British Airways suffered from a string of industrial actions by its employees. The employees protested poor working conditions and low pay.

The industrial actions caused a series of flight delays and flight cancellations that inconvenienced most of BA’s customers. The disorder dented BA’s public image when stiff competition from rival global airline companies and local low-cost airlines undermined the BA’s market leadership.

BA’s management was unable to contain most of these strikes, thereby further denting the airline’s image as a reliable airline company. Since then, BA’s has had a difficult time trying to redeem its image as a reliable airline company in the eyes of the public.

Situation Analysis

This situational analysis follows four main aspects of BA’s operations: strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. They outline below:

Strengths

Most of BA’s strengths stem from its past leadership in the airline industry. For example, BA’s vast global operations earned it the reputation of a respected global airline company with vast experience and operational control around the world.

The company’s expanding fleet of modern aircrafts and the success of some of the company’s loyalty programs (such as the executive club) also comprise some of the company’s key strengths

Weaknesses

Some airline customers regard some of BA’s flights as expensive because many low-cost airlines charge relatively lower prices for air travel. BA has found it difficult to compete with such low-cost airlines because it maintains several extensive global operations.

The high costs of managing and running the extensive global operations have significantly increased the company’s bottom-line costs.

BA’s has also suffered negative publicity from poor services that have culminated through a rise in the number of lost luggage and cancelled flights. These factors have led to the company’s declining profitability.

Opportunities

Since most of BA’s competition come from low-cost airlines, the biggest opportunity that exists for the company is starting a low-cost airline division for its international fleets.

This way, the company would be able to charge low fares for a big part of its core customer base, which is increasingly seeing the rival low-cost airlines as a better alternative than BA.

In addition, since most of BA’s operational costs trace to high fuel costs, the company may invest in the sourcing of alternative fuel to power its aircrafts. This initiative involves funding research and development initiatives that work to serve this purpose.

Threats

Like most airline companies around the world, BA’s greatest threat is increased competition. In addition, as mentioned in the above section of this report, high fuel costs also threaten the company’s future sustainability as it erodes most of its profitability.

BA has also lost most of its cabin crew through its extensive strikes and a crumbling corporate image. This issue has made it more difficult for the company to replace its lost cabin crew, as few potential employees are willing to work with the company.

Message Statement

The emerging themes in this PR plan include customer sensitivity, employee loyalty, and brand consistency. The main idea behind the proposed PR plan is to create a positive brand image by achieving customer and employee buy-in.

In other words, the proposed PR plan singles out BA’s customers and employees as the main stakeholders that have the power to improve the company’s public image.

By achieving employee loyalty, the proposed PR plan aims to convince its customers that all is well with the company and the focus for the company now is the welfare of its customers and employees.

This message statement especially relies on BA’s past image as the leading airline company in the world. The proposed PR plan aims to reaffirm the notion that BA is more experienced, caring, and capable of meeting customer and employees’ demands, compared to other upcoming companies.

Communication Process

The aim of this communication process is to improve the interaction between BA with its employees, its customers, the public, and the media to improve the company’s image in the community. BA’s communication process should stem from a system’s perspective.

The systems perspective will help the organization to communicate with the employees and customers by establishing a stable company image of reliability and community focus. The systems theory explains this model.

Feedback will be an important part of the communication process because feedback may help BA to improve the effectiveness of its communication and PR plans. The communication process will be open to all stakeholders of the PR plan because the PR plan needs to be self-sustaining.

Stated differently, by including the inputs of the company’s main stakeholders (customers and employees), the PR plan will be able to evolve and meet the needs of the organization.

Audiences

BA’s employees and customers outline the focus of the company’s PR plan. Employees are a critical audience for the company because their dissatisfaction with the company created the public image crisis that BA faces today.

In addition, through employee strikes, BA’s customers lost confidence in the company. The employees and the customers therefore outline the main target audiences for BA because both groups stand at different ends of the PR plan.

A change of the employees’ perceptions about BA is likely to rub off on the customers because the employees may offer better customer services if BA’s management pays close attention to their welfare.

Through improved services, BA’s employees will attract more customers to the company. This situation is likely to improve the company’s image, sales, and profitability in the end.

Key Audience Messages

The key audience message of this PR plan is to convince BA’s employees and customers that the company cares for their welfares.

The PR plan should communicate to both groups of stakeholders that the company is genuinely interested in improving their welfare because it understands their importance in achieving corporate success.

Through this commitment, BA should demonstrate that it genuinely values the employees and customers by improving its customer services and rewarding its employees for positive work.

These initiatives should culminate in a “BA open day” program where the managers, employees, and customers meet and share insights regarding the company’s operations.

This way, the company will make the employees and customers believe that it is genuinely interested in their concerns by opening its communication channels to both groups of stakeholders.

Implementation

The best way to reach the target audiences for this PR plan is through social media and face-to-face communication. Demographic assessments of BA’s customers show that the customers frequently use social media. The company can therefore effectively communicate with its customers this way.

Moreover, social media provides a cheap alternative for BA to interact with the customers. However, employees should get a special attention from the top-level management, through face-to-face interaction, because the management should demonstrate that it is genuinely interested in their welfare.

Therefore, BA’s managers should steer the PR implementation process and not fully delegate the responsibility to a PR firm.

Budget

The budget for the public relations plan focuses on research, information gathering, monitoring and evaluation, and strategic integrated communication. The following spreadsheet outlines the budget estimates for these activities.

Monitoring and Evaluation

Measuring Public Opinion

Measuring public opinion is a reliable way of understanding the effectiveness of the PR plan. BA should measure the public opinion before and after the execution of the PR plan, to understand the impact of the PR strategy on the company’s brand.

The public opinion should be measured using customer and employee surveys. Assessing the responses in the customer surveys may show if BA has achieved the objectives of the PR plan, or not.

Social media evaluation

Since social media forms a key part of this PR strategy, social media evaluation may provide a reliable indicator for monitoring and evaluating the impact of the PR plan.

The key indicator of this assessment is the quality and level of interaction between the customers and the company (not the number of followers).

If there is a high level of interaction between the company and its employees, or customers, BA should expect the development of a positive brand image.

However, if the levels of interaction between the company and the employees, or customers, fail to increase, then BA should assume that the PR plan has failed to achieve its objectives.

With over two decades down the line, culture changes continue to attract attention of many organizations. In normal cases, cultural interventions give participants hope of a remedy to both academic as well as organizational imbalances. With cultural changes in place, the paper aims at handling the British Airways case and providing reliable answers to various questions. This will help understand various issues that relate to the company.

What life was like at the old British Airways

Initially, things were not good at the company because aging airplanes were the main hitch to successful transportation. The industrial disputes were the major source of poor performance comparing to competitors who surpassed the standards laid down by British Airways. Further information reveals the dissatisfaction of customers that incurred big losses. With the detrimental effect, the company was compelled to revise its cultural aspects and choose to focus on cultural change (Grugulis & Wilkinson, 2002).

What was difficult about making change

Bringing changes to British Airways was accompanied by difficult moments in adjusting the attitudes of the employees, stakeholders and customers. This is evident from the to launch a training programs that were aimed at addressing the major concerns, especially among the staff members, who had a direct contact with the potential customers. bringing culture of wearing clothes that were not part of the company’s official wear faced big resistance.

The course majorly aimed at addressing the behavioral patterns. The attendance staff were advised to consider taking a positive attitude especially when coping with stress. Employees were to develop a positive attitude when setting their personal goals and build confidence in oneself that would drive their spirit of achievement towards success at both a personal and organizational level.

What factors created the sense of urgency

A number of elements were involved in the unease at the firm. Preliminarily, the clarity and helpfulness factor were majorly aimed at satisfying the urgency of establishing both clear and specific objectives for all the subordinates. This was further directed at supporting the subordinate members and enabling them to comprehend the requirements for their jobs.

This factor was also directed at addressing guidance, as well as availing clear-cut decisions. The second factor was about promotion of achievements to create an emphasis and a demonstrate commitment towards achieving the set goals. The third factor covered influence on a teamwork and personal excellence based mainly on the appreciation of extra efforts while expressing a sense of dedication. Finally, care and trust cover the last but not the least factors that is building friendly and warm relationships.

Who made up the guiding team and what were their credentials

The leading teams comprised mainly of personnel handling PPF messages. Requirements for the guiding teams entailed multi-skills aspect and team work. The direct contact with the members of the staff played a significant role in ensuring an inclusive duty that called for support from team members (Bamber, Castka, Sharp & Motara, 2003). This helped the company improve its operations for the better, given the stiff competition in the market today.

References

Bamber, C. J., Castka, P., Sharp, J. M., & Motara, Y. (2003). Cross-functional teamworking for overall equipment effectiveness (OEE). Journal of Quality in Maintenance Engineering, 9(3), 223-238.

Grugulis, I., & Wilkinson, A. (2002). Managing Culture at British Airways: Hype, Hope and Reality. Long range planning, 35(2), 179-194.

Abstract

The aim of this research is to explore the adoption of biofuels at the British Airways. It is has been noted the aviation industry contributes to more than two percent of human-emitted carbon dioxide emissions. The rapid growth in the industry driven by increasing demands by travellers has done nothing significant to ensure the decline in the rates of emissions, but the aviation industry is nonetheless focused on reducing their rates of emissions and impacts on the environment through new ways of fuelling planes. One major approach that has gained recognition is the use of biofuels. The case study of British Airways shows that the aviation industry can work with other stakeholders to develop biofuels without necessarily destroying forests and creating food scarcity and still contribute to environmental conservation.

Aims, Objectives and Rationale

The aim of this research is to explore the sustainability of biofuels in the aviation industry by focusing on British Airways.

It is imperative to explore the sustainability of the biofuels in the aviation industry and justify why the industry must continuously improve its processes to reduce the rate of carbon emissions and ensure sustainable production processes, follow production criteria in the supply and realise cost-savings from the alternative fuel.

Brief Literature Review

Dolan (2010) has observed that the aviation industry is responsible for at least two percent of the current carbon dioxide emitted into the atmosphere through human activities. It is expected the growth in the industry is most likely to increase this rate. The airline industry has recognised this challenge and is therefore working on various alternatives to reduce the rate of carbon dioxide emission. One prominent approach favoured by the industry is the use of alternative fuels, common referred to as biofuels.

It is believed that the use of biofuels in the industry reflects a strong environmental commitment. Today, for instance, many airline companies have entered into several agreements to manufacture or purchase biofuels for airplanes and other ground engines. Various airline firms may use various sources of biofuels based on technologies and materials used. Generally, biofuels are considered as alternative fuels obtained from living materials, specifically algae and plants.

In some cases, biofuels are obtained from recycled cooking oil. Plants such as algae, castor, camellia and jatropha have abilities to grow in poor land conditions as opposed to other alternative plants such as corn or soybeans that need soil rich in nutrients, and they have been identified as important sources of biofuels (Dolan 2011). These plants for alternative fuels are also easy to grow.

Algae can be effectively used to management atmospheric carbon as an alternative source of energy. Carbon dioxide emitted from other sources may be captured and used to grow algae as fertilizer. The approach is a test for some airline firms and companies, especially those focused on using advanced fermentation processes to obtain biofuels. Hence, there is interest in any potential living organism that can generate biofuels for the industry.

According to Lane (2012), many airline firms across the globe have focused on biofuels. At least any global carriers with a focus on environmental conservation, resources and require alternative cheap energies have turned to biofuels. Smith has reported that the British Airways believes that by the year 2050, the aviation industry will operate on biofuels.

The aviation industry is focused on adopting biofuels because of their economic benefits and environmental protection (Saddler & Kumar, 2013). Consequently, many modern airline firms have concentrated on developing domestic sustainable energy policy, specifically to curtain the dependence on foreign oil supplies (US Department of Energy, 2012).

The aviation industry has focused on reducing emissions by at least 30 percent by the year 2025. This could be possible to achieve because various stakeholders, including university researchers, industrial firms and different government agencies have worked to ensure that some jets operate on biofuels today.

Biofuels, however, pose challenges to the industry. There is a significant technical challenge because extremely energy-dense fuels are required while some planes have limited volume and carrying capacities for such fuels. Fuels with low energy contents will also lower the distance covered. Hence, continuous upgrade of the manufactured jet biofuels is necessary to ensure that they can run the industry.

A critical argument is that a large tract of land is now cleared to provide land for growing crops for biofuels. In addition, some critics have argued that only additional plants would result in the reduction of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. Thus, clearing forests that already absorb the carbon dioxide for biofuel crops would not make much difference. In addition, the possible use of food crops for alternative fuels has also raised sustainability of the biofuels in the aviation industry.

In addition, many aviation firms must redesign their engines and capacity to accommodate such alternative fuels (Smith 2012). This presents huge cost burden to airplane firms. More challenges are most likely to be experienced as the aviation industry further focuses on other alternative sources of fuels like hydrogen and solar (Smith 2012).

One may wonder how the industry will manage conflict interests and direct competition with food crops for human consumption and animal production. Lufthansa, for instance, claims that it relies on sustainable supply and manufacturing process for its biofuels and there is no direct competition for food crops. In addition, no rainforests are cleared to its biofuels. Therefore, the firm must insist on sustainable production processes and meet criteria for biofuels productions.

Some analysts believe that the issue of food vs. fuel is only temporary because of the use of corn to produce biofuels. Hence, it is most likely to change as alternative sources of biofuels are discovered.

Biofuel is a good investment for the aviation industry (Dolan 2011). One major challenge in the aviation industry is the volatility of the fuel prices. In fact, jet fuel is usually the largest cost for many commercial planes. On this note, some critics argue that the use of biofuels will assist in stabilising fuel supplies and prices, and therefore could be the best solution to stabilise volatile crude oil prices to some extent.

It is, however, imperative to recognise that biofuel technology is new and growing, and thus, the initial costs are likely to be high. This raises the concern whether the industry will pass such additional costs to travellers. Cost may not be an important fact given that biofuels have high energy density relative to all other fuels currently found in the market. Therefore, it can enhance fuel efficiency in the industry.

Methodology

A case study methodology was adopted for this study. Past publications on the use biofuels in the aviation were reviewed for critical insights, and therefore, the study was secondary research. Specifically, the study focused on qualitative data to gain insights on how British Airways has adopted biofuels. For this study, the major sources of materials were mainly journal articles in the printed media, which were considered current and credible. Only articles from reputable authors were considered.

Findings, Analysis and Discussion

The study findings show that the aviation industry is determined on reducing the rate of carbon emission into the atmosphere. Consequently, the industry, academics and interested bodies have explored several sources of alternative fuels and identified biofuels (Bomani, Bulzan, Centeno-Gomez, & Hendricks, 2009).

The British Airways is leading the industry by focusing on waste materials rather than food crops to generate alternative fuels its fleet. The company is constructing a self-contained plant to change a half million tonnes of waste materials into 16 million gallons of alternative biofuel (British Airways, 2010). British Airways stresses that the generated green jet biofuel would be more that the volume required for operating its planes and making them carbon-neutral.

The British Airways has developed two strategies for its biofuels agenda. First, the company works with Solena to establish a plant in the UK, change most materials destined for landfill into aviation fuel. Partnership is, therefore, necessary for any airline firm that wishes to adopt alternative biofuels. Second, the company also works with Rolls Royce to develop new, innovative fuels generated from various sources, including algae through new technologies.

The British Airways strives to avoid food crops and fuels obtained from such crops because of their sustainability and issues surrounding their use. Algae and waste materials, therefore, offer the best alternative for the company to lead change in the industry (Gordon, 2014).

The British Airways developed an ambitious goal of achieving 50 percent carbon emission reduction by the year 2050. These efforts may help the company to realise its long-term goal on fuel efficiency and carbon emission reduction. It a real alternative to currently available jet fuels. The company believes that it will focus on real sustainability advantages and create the required technological capacities for such initiatives. Besides, British Airways emphasises that it would continue focusing on the ‘next big thing’ to create real sustainability. The company has expressed that it lacks confidence in biofuels generated from crops, and this notion explains its focus on alternative sources of biofuels rather than crops.

The British Airways shows a paradigm shift in the use of biofuels to drive the aviation industry. Previously, biofuels were touted as the best alternative to decarbonising the aviation and transport industries. Today, however, these alternative fuels are utilised with more caution. Many critics have noted the issue of sustainability of this green source of fuel with regard to food crop security and deforestation (Dolan, 2011).

On this note, British Airways realised that the approach was not sustainable because the future biofuels will have to be sustainable, renewable, as well as technically and economically sustainable (Virkajärvi, Niemelä, Hasanen, & Teir, 2009). Therefore, different stakeholders should work together to make sound investments in the biofuel research to ensure that they can develop such alternative fuels and address environmental and social impacts. Biofuels can only thrive when favourable approaches are adopted. Otherwise, the alternative source of aviation fuel could have negative impacts on other related sectors affected through its production.

The British Airways believes that by the year 2017, it will be able to fuel its fleet destined to the US through trash (Stecker, Pyper, & ClimateWire, 2014).

As all stakeholders work together, they can solve some notable challenges. For instance, Kilaz et al. (2014) noted that there was possible cross contamination of fatty acid methyl esters (FAME) in biodiesel with jet fuels (p. 103), which a critical source of concern for the industry and manufacturers. They believed that the same supply chain resulted in contaminated biofuels and subsequent malfunction of the engine. These researchers, however, established that the concentration less than two percent did not pose any risk for malfunction. As a result, they recommended the aviation industry should review its current limit of 30 ppm (Kilaz et al. 2014).

Conclusion and Recommendations

The aviation industry has focused on reducing its impacts on the environment and using alternative, sustainable biofuels. Practices at the British Airways show best practices that other firms can adopt to achieve similar goals. The company has realised that strategic partnership with academia, governments and industry players can help it to achieve these goals. Furthermore, constant innovation and a focus on sustainability have driven the company to seek for other alternatives sources of fuels. Overall, the company shows that the aviation industry can run on biofuels without necessarily causing destruction of forests and food scarcity. Hence, the industry must recognise that only sustainable, renewable and technologically and economically sound biofuels can take it into the future.

Recommendations

• The British Airways must continue to look for strategic partnership to overcome challenges identified in the current biofuels production processes.
• The British Airways should strive to lead the industry by showing that crop-based biofuels are not sustainable, and therefore, other industry players should focus on alternative sources such as waste materials and algae.
• The British Airways shows the need to invest, research and evaluate outcomes for sustainability strategies, and the success of these outcomes should motive other companies to explore alternative solutions to fuel price and supply volatility.

Reference List

Bomani, B. M., Bulzan, D. L., Centeno-Gomez, D. I., & Hendricks, R. C. (2009). Biofuels as an Alternative Energy Source for Aviation— A Survey. Web.

British Airways. (2010). BA Fuels Green Revolution. Web.

Dolan, R. (2011). Airlines And Biofuels: Carriers Look To Alternative Fuels For The Future. Web.

Gordon, S. (2014). Aviation offers a way forward in biofuels research. Web.

Kilaz, G., Bist, S., Lopp, D. W., Stanley, D. L., & Tao, B. Y. (2014). Investigation of fatty acid methyl esters in jet fuel. International Journal of Sustainable Aviation, vol. 1, no.1 , 103 – 118. Web.

Lane, J. (2012). Aviation biofuels: which airlines are doing what, with whom? Web.

Saddler, J., & Kumar, L. (2013). Special Issue from the NSERC Bioconversion network workshop: pretreatment and fractionation of biomass for biorefinery/biofuels. Biotechnology for Biofuels, vol. 6 , 17. Web.

Smith, T. (2012). Aviation could run on sustainable fuels by 2050, says British Airways. Web.

Stecker, T., Pyper, J., & ClimateWire. (2014). Garbage Fuel Will Power British Airways Planes. Web.

US Department of Energy. (2012). Biomass program: Replacing the whole barrel to reduce US dependence on oil. Web.

Virkajärvi, I., Niemelä, M. V., Hasanen, A., & Teir, A. (2009). Cellulosic Ethanol via Biochemical Processing Poses a Challenge for Developers and Implementors. BioResources, vol. 4, no. 4 , 1718-1735. Web.

Introduction

British Airways (BA) remains one of the leading carriers in Europe. This is the case because it is “the largest airline company in the United Kingdom in terms of fleet size” (British Airways 2016, para. 2). The airline company has its headquarters in Waterside (British Airways 2016). The UK government established the British Airways Board (BAB) in 1972. The BAB was aimed at managing the British European Airways, Cambrian Airways, Northeast Airlines, and the British Overseas Airways Corporation (British Airways 2016). In 1974, the government merged the companies to form British Airways. In 2011, BA “merged with Iberia to form the International Airlines Group” (British Airways 2016, para. 5). The slogan “To Fly: To Serve” continues to support BA’s business model.

Rationale

The Asian market continues to present new opportunities to different companies in the aviation industry. The continent is characterised by new economic activities and improved living standards. In an attempt to maximise its revenues, British Airways should consider the need to open a new route in Mongolia. Although the country has a small population of around 3 million people, its gross domestic product (GDP) has been growing steadily (see Appendix 1). After joining the World Trade Organisation in the year 1997, Mongolia has been interacting with many nations across the globe. The Mongolian government is currently promoting new strategies to maximise its involvement in international and regional trade operations (Isakova, Plekhanov & Zettelmeyer 2012). That being the case, a new route to this country will definitely be profitable for BA.

Context

Mongolia is a landlocked Asian nation with a population of around three million citizens. The official language spoken in this country is Mongolian. Over 95 percent of the people are Mongols. The country’s GDP stands at 36.6 billion USD. The official currency is known as the Mongolian Tugrik (Isakova, Plekhanov & Zettelmeyer 2012). One US dollar is equivalent to 2460 Mongolian Tugrik. The success of the mining industry has led to increased economic growth within the last seven years. The nation’s current economic growth rate stands at 7.9 percent. In 2011, the country was identified by Citigroup as one of the emerging economies in Asia. Mongolia was also identified by the International Finance Corporation (IFC) as one of the best Asian countries for doing international business (Isakova, Plekhanov & Zettelmeyer 2012). The agricultural sector supports the nation’s economy. Mongolia’s unemployment rate is around 9.4 percent (see Appendix 2). Experts believe that new job opportunities will emerge in the future and transform the situation.

Situation Analysis

In order to achieve the targeted business objectives, the leaders at BA should be aware of the constraints, opportunities, and changes experienced in the global environment (Gupta, Li & Yu 2015). A detailed analysis of the external and internal environments should be done in order to predict the company’s future performance.

Industry Analysis

The aviation industry in Mongolia has been profitable for many companies within the past decade (Alvarez 2011). Modern forces such as technology and globalisation have transformed the manner in which many Mongolian citizens travel from one country to another. The production of superior aircrafts and use of modern informatics continue to dictate the performance of the industry. However, this rapid growth has been affected by changing political patterns experienced in Mongolia. Some issues such as oil prices, insecurity, and economic crises have been observed to affect the Mongolian aviation industry (Isakova, Plekhanov & Zettelmeyer 2012). However, many players in the sector are focusing on the best options to emerge successful in the country. This fact explains why BA should target this growing market. The decision to open a new route to Mongolia will boost its profitability and eventually become a leader in the nation’s aviation industry.

PESTEL Analysis

The Mongolian aviation industry is influenced by a wide range of external factors. Such forces should be carefully analysed by companies that want to achieve their business objectives in the country (British Airways 2016). The PESTEL Analysis presented below gives a detailed summary of the forces dictating the performance of this industry.

SWOT Analysis

Before launching its operations in Mongolia, BA should consider the aspects of its internal environment (Gupta, Li & Yu 2015). The information will be used to implement the best strategies that can support its new business decision. The internal environment is therefore summarised using the SWOT Analysis below.

Implications

Several issues should be considered by British Airways as it embarks on the proposed path. The issues presented below should be carefully analysed in order to ensure the firm realises its goals.

Terrorism

This is one of the biggest challenges affecting many players in the aviation industry. Recently, several planes have been hijacked by unknown people (Isakova, Plekhanov & Zettelmeyer 2012). In countries such as Yemen and Syria, terrorism remains a major challenge affecting the industry.

Oil Prices

The changing prices of oil will have significant implications on the performance of BA.

Competition

The industry is characterised by increasing level of competition. Chances are very high that many citizens in the country use Mongolian Airlines. This is the national carrier and it attracts many passengers in the country (McDonald, Frow & Payne 2011). British Airways will therefore have to consider this issue in order to emerge successful.

Underdeveloped Destination

Mongolia is not a developed country. That being the case, specific challenges such as poor infrastructure and reduced profits might affect the company.

Technological Changes

Modern technologies have always been described as disruptive forces in every industry. This force is changing the manner in which tickets and flights are booked. Mongolia is a country that is yet to embrace the power of the internet (Gupta, Li & Yu 2015). British Airways should therefore consider the best strategies to support the diverse needs of the Mongolians using modern technologies. The ultimate goal should be to offer the most desirable support to the targeted customers.

Marketing Objectives and Strategy

Objectives

The SMART (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, Timely) framework can be used to come up with the best objectives for the airline company. The targeted objectives are presented below.

1. The first objective is for the company to design a powerful strategy that will ensure it launches its flights to Mongolia successfully within a period of six months. This objective is specific, measurable, important, and timely (McDonald, Frow & Payne 2011). The goal will be realised if the right resources are considered.
2. The second objective is to increase market share in the Mongolian aviation sector by 20 percent within the first two years. This objective will be realised through the use of advertisements, surveys, and superior products. The objective is also measurable and specific.
3. The third objective is to ensure the targeted Mongolian customers are satisfied with the available services. By so doing, the level of satisfaction and repeat business will increase significantly. This goal is relevant, timely, and realistic (McDonald 2011).

Strategy

Segmentation

British Airways can target traveler segment by providing various types of services to the targeted Mongolians. The products presented below can be used by BA to support the needs of different segments in the country.

• Economy class for frequent travelers
• Business class for entrepreneurs in Mongolia
• First class for affluent citizens
• Loyalty programs: These rewards will be used to empower people who use the firm’s services frequently (Gupta, Li & Yu 2015).

Targeting

British Airways should consider the attributes defining the Mongolian aviation industry in order to have a profitable business. The first group of potential customers includes business travelers and corporate leaders (Isakova, Plekhanov & Zettelmeyer 2012). These people tend to travel frequently in order to engage in international trade. Members of this group are between 35 and 50 years of age. The second group includes individuals who travel for leisure (Gupta, Li & Yu 2015). This group should be targeted using competitive prices. Their preferred destinations should also be considered. The business class segment should be characterised by superior services. The three classes (economy, first, and business) will therefore be targeted using geographic, demographic, behaviourial, and psychographic attributes (Table 1).

Table 1: BA’s targeting strategy in Mongolia.

Positioning

British Airways is revered by many passengers because of its ability to deliver exemplary services. In the Mongolian market, BA should use powerful strategies in order to inform more customers about its superior services (Hoffman & Bateson 2010). The firm should use powerful initiatives such as social network media to inform more people about its services. Proper advertising strategies will be needed to attract the targeted customers in every segment.

The positioning strategy should follow the ADIA (Awareness, Desire, Interest, and Action) approach. In order to achieve this goal, the company will have to create awareness in Mongolia using various strategies. For instance, telecommunication measures will inform more people about the products. Advertisement should be executed using a number of avenues such as social media platforms, television channels, and newsprints. This approach will create desire and awareness. The inclusion of loyalty programs and superior products will attract more customers. Each segmented group will be informed about the products and services usually individualised strategies (Hoffman & Bateson 2010). These initiatives will make the positioning strategy successful. The strategy will play a positive role towards making BA profitable. The figure below shows that British Airways should provide high quality services and use fair prices (Figure 1).

Marketing Programme

Marketing is a powerful strategy that can make a huge difference for many companies in the industry. The decision to launch new flights to Mongolia is a bold move that can transform the company’s business performance. Mongolia is a nation that continues to implement powerful initiatives to realise its economic goals (Hoffman & Bateson 2010). The nation’s economy is growing rapidly due to the positive performance of the agricultural and mining industries. In order to emerge successful, British Airways should focus on superior approaches to deliver safe, comfortable, and convenient services to its passengers.

The best marketing approach should focus on the needs of the passengers and the mission of the company. The strategy will have proper promotional and advertising practices. The ultimate goal is to ensure the customers are informed about the quality of services associated with BA. The 7P marketing mix will therefore be used to support the company’s performance (Hoffman & Bateson 2010). The proposed marketing mix for British Airways is presented below.

Product

British Airways will operate flights to and from many cities in Mongolia. The firm will promote positive practices such as checking baggage, on plane meals or snacks, and arrival to destination. These services will be enhanced using various revenue generating activities such as duty free shopping and extra hand baggage. The firm should offer on time travel with flexibility options (McDonald, Frow & Payne 2011).

Place

The company should liaise with the Chinggis Khaan International Airport (CKIA) in order to manage its operations successfully (McDonald, Frow & Payne 2011). Its online presence will also inform more people about the exemplary services provided by the company. The use of agents and dealers will make it easier for more customers to use BA’s services.

Promotion

The firm should use a powerful promotional model to inform the citizens about its services. The internet will play a positive role towards supporting this strategy. Social media networks will inform the citizens about the services. The use of CSR approaches will encourage more people to embrace BA’s services. Reward systems will ensure the passengers can redeem their points (Isakova, Plekhanov & Zettelmeyer 2012).

Price

A competitive pricing strategy should be used by British Airways. Customers who book their flights early will get increased discounts. Different prices should be used for each of the above segments. Passengers can receive free beverages and snacks (Alvarez 2011).

People

The firm should hire competent marketers to support its business objectives. The cultural attributes associated with Mongolia should be considered throughout the marketing process (Isakova, Plekhanov & Zettelmeyer 2012). The workers should be equipped with the best skills to support the needs of the targeted customers.

Process

The services should be aimed at supporting the expectations of the customers. The use of technology will ensure the company provides evidence-based services to the customers (Hoffman & Bateson 2010). Research and development (R&D) should be considered to produce superior services that have the potential to drive performance.

Physical Evidence

The company’s website will be used to inform the customers about its services, destinations, and initiatives. The issue of customer satisfaction should be taken seriously in an attempt to achieve the targeted objectives (McDonald, Frow & Payne 2011).

Control and Evaluation

The control and evaluation framework guides companies to realise their objectives. The control and evaluation for BA is presented below.

Annual Plan Control

“to become the second preferred company in Mongolia within four years”

The managers at BA should use their competencies to empower the workers. This practice will ensure the marketing and business strategies are aimed at promoting performance (Alvarez 2011). The firm will attract more passengers and eventually become profitable.

Profitability Control

“to become profitable after the first year”

The business strategy is aimed at maximising the firm’s profits. The use of powerful initiatives and marketing processes will attract customers and make BA successful in Mongolia (Alvarez 2011).

Efficiency Control

The organisation’s management and marketers will focus on the issue of efficiency. Evaluations should be done periodically in order to promote the best practices. Sales promotions and distributions channels should be monitored in order to produce positive results (Alvarez 2011). The marketing expenditures should be controlled by competent professionals.

Strategic Control

Strategic control focuses on the best approaches to ensure the company markets its products and services effectively (Alvarez 2011). New market segments will be identified and supported using BA’s superior products.

Conclusions and Recommendations

This discussion shows conclusively that there is a new opportunity in the Mongolian market. Since the country’s economy has been growing steadily within the past few years, British Airways has the potential to succeed in this market. Many people in this country are current engaging in international business activities (Hoffman & Bateson 2010). That being the case, a powerful marketing strategy that considers the challenges affecting the industry will deliver positive results. The managers and marketers must consider the best approaches in an attempt to realise the targeted objectives.

Additionally, some recommendations can make a difference for British Airways. For instance, a powerful pricing strategy is needed to ensure low-income citizens get discounted services. Businesspeople and corporate managers should receive exemplary but expensive services. The company can also consider the need to offer logistical and cargo services in the country. After succeeding in the Mongolian market, British Airways should use a competitive strategy to emerge successful after five years. The company can do this by adopting new technologies that have the potential to make a difference in the industry (Alvarez 2011). Research and development (R&D) is another powerful strategy that can improve the quality of BA’s services. These recommendations will eventually make BA a leading competitor in Mongolia’s aviation sector.

Reference List

Alvarez, S 2011, ‘Marketing in the growing low-cost airline industry’, Rouen Business School, vol. 1, no. 1, pp. 1-49.

British Airways, 2016, Web.

Gupta, P, Li, B & Yu, J 2015, ‘From natural resource boom to sustainable economic growth: Lessons for Mongolia’, Working Paper, vol. 1, no. 1, pp. 1-30.

Hoffman, D & Bateson, J 2010, Services marketing: Concepts, strategies, and cases, Cengage Learning, New York.

Isakova, A, Plekhanov, A & Zettelmeyer, J 2012, Managing Mongolia’s resource boom’, European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, vol. 1, no. 1, pp. 1-36.

McDonald, M, Frow, P & Payne, A 2011, Marketing plans for services: A Complete Guide, Wiley, New York.

Abstract

Automated Storage and Retrieval System has become one of the very popular systems used in managing materials in warehouses. Soon after designing its new warehouse, the management of the British Airways Avionics Engineering realised that they needed this tool to enhance efficiency and cut costs of their operations. This study has revealed that the system was indeed appropriate for this firm at the time of its implementation. The study has also identified several deficiencies in the layout of the firm’s new facility. The main issue identified was the use of vertical space.

Introduction

The British Airways Avionic Engineering Limited (BAAE) was founded in 1993 as a subsidiary of the British Airways Group (Pathak 2005). The firm has its headquarters in Llantrisant, Wales, and it specialises in the repair of avionic equipment for British Airways. According to Tan (2002), this company was established as a way of reducing overreliance on other companies to handle repairs at this firm.

The new subsidiary grew rapidly as it had a major client which was also the parent company. One of the main issues that this firm faced soon after starting its operations was effective warehousing strategies. Most of the equipment and spare parts require proper storage to ensure that they are protected from damage and rust. As the firm grew in size, its inventory also increased considerably and the management realised that much time was wasted in the warehouses.

Sometimes the firm would be forced to purchase parts and equipment that were available but misplaced within the warehouse. This was a serious impediment to the success of this company given that the client was becoming a dominant player in the aviation sector. According to Reeves (2008), for a long time, many companies have always ignored the need to develop technology-based systems to manage inventories in their warehouses.

For British Airways Avionic Engineering Limited, a time had come when it had to re-evaluate its warehousing strategies and find the best ways of using modern technologies as a way of achieving success. One of the most appropriate technology-based systems that were available for this firm was the Automated Storage and Retrieval System (AS/RS). In this paper, the researcher will critically analyse the relevance of this system for this firm.

Automated Storage and Retrieval System (AS/RS) as the most cost-effective and efficient warehouse handling system

The British Airways Avionic Engineering Limited handles a wide variety of equipment and spare parts meant for the maintenance of the British Airways’ planes (Meghanathan, Nagamalai, & Chaki 2013). As shown in the case study, these items are very sensitive and require handling with care. It is, therefore, very important to come up with a warehousing system that can meet the specific needs of this company. Automated Storage and Retrieval System is the most cost-effective and efficient warehousing system for this firm because of the following reasons.

This computerised system keeps data of every item that is within the warehouse specifying the quantity, quality, and any other relevant information. In the past, this company relied on manual records to store such information, and sometimes it was not easy to retrieve the required information as per the required efficiency. Automated Storage and Retrieval System has solved this problem. It made it possible for the data needed to be retrieved without any difficulty.

The management also knew what was available in the warehouse and what needed to be replaced (Wang 2009). This system has also helped in addressing one of the major problems of buying items that were still available within the firm. Sometimes the firm would be forced to purchase new spare parts and equipment simply because those that are available were misplaced. The company was also finding it problematic knowing when important equipment and spare parts needed to be purchased. The poor recording system made it difficult to know when it was necessary to look for additional resources.

Within the warehouses of the British Airways Avionic Engineering, there was a problem of constant damages due to physical handling by the attendants. This was costing this firm a lot because every time an item was broken, it had to be replaced. The case study gives a clear example of how the handling of the items within the warehouse was not only physically demanding for the employees but it was also costing the firm a lot due to the damages.

The use of AS/RS has offered a perfect solution to this problem. The attendants no longer have to handle these tools and equipment. Everything is controlled remotely using a computer. When there is an item within the warehouse that needs to be retrieved, the instruction is fed into the system. Using the conveyor belt, the specific item would be moved from the position where it was stored to the point where it should be picked without any manual labour. This has significantly reduced cases of damage to materials within the warehouse.

This system is very cost effective for this firm. Since the initial cost of installation is high, once installed the system eliminates the need for attendants to handle goods in the warehouse. Most of the physical activities previously done by employees can now be done by the machine. It means that the cost of labour will be reduced significantly within this firm. These are reasons that justify the relevance of this system for the British Airways Avionic Engineering. It is also important to note that this system plays a critical role in strategic management (Jessop, Morrison & Morrison 2005). It provides management with information such as the flow of inventories which can be used to make important decisions.

Deficiencies in the layout of new BAAE’s facility in Llantrisant

The layout of the new British Airways Avionic Engineering was designed precisely to function under the new Automated Storage and Retrieval System that the firm had just employed. According to Moore, Grammich, and Bickel (2007), AS/RS is a unique warehousing system that cannot work in poorly designed warehouses managed through manual labour. It needs a layout that will make it easy for the conveyor belts and other components of the system to coordinate very closely and ensure that instruction issued is followed efficiently.

That is why the management of this firm considered having a new facility that would meet the basic expectations. It is important to appreciate the good work that has been done in coming up with the layout. The designer was also interested in coming up with a beautiful structure besides the issue of functionality. However, this new layout designed in 1995 had several fundamental deficiencies that reduced its functionality.

As shown in the design, one of the biggest deficiencies in the layout of the new facility was space utilisation. According to Taniar and Rusu (2010), in the past emphasis was laid on the size of the warehouse in determining its capacity. However, this has changed in modern society that is highly based on technology. Emphasis is now laid on the inventory turnover rates and efficiency. The design given in the case study has not maximised the use of available space as would be expected given that this firm was planning to fully implement Automated Storage and Retrieval System.

Given the scale provided in the figure, it is clear that the distance between the east wing and the central command center is over 15 meters. The same space has been left between the central command center and the west wing. It means that the layout has been spread within the compound. This is a design that goes against the modern-day designs where architects and engineers are keen on taking advantage of the vertical space instead of the horizontal space.

As the population continues to increase, pressure on the horizontal space continues to increase. As such, designers are keen on taking advantage of the vertical space, something that was not taken into consideration when developing this design. As Morrison and Jessop (2006) say, warehouses that embrace Automated Storage and Retrieval System are expected to maximise on the horizontal space more than the vertical space. This is so because most of the goods in the warehouse are handled by machines. These machines work more efficiently in the vertical space than they do in the horizontal space.

The layout shows that the automated warehouse is in the middle of the two main workshops. This might have been designed purposefully to ensure that materials can move to either of the workshops with ease. However, this may be considered a deficiency despite the rationale. Since most of the physical activities will be done by the machine, an engineer should be concerned about the amount of energy that will be used when the system goes operational.

If the layout involves more work per unit for the machine, then it also means that there will be more energy use per unit. As stated above, the distance between the central command center and the two wings which are the workshops is over 15 meters. What this means is that the machines will use more energy even when delivering a small item from the store to another. The layout should have been designed in a way that each of the two workshops has its warehouses.

Both of them can be controlled from the command center to make coordination of activities easier. These two workshops are responsible for distinct functions in the repair and maintenance of the planes. As such, it is known the type of equipment and spare parts needed in each of the two warehouses. It will be reasonable to reduce the distance covered in delivering products to the targeted area. These fundamental flaws in the layout of the new warehouse can be attributed to the emphasis that was laid on the beauty of the shape. The identified weaknesses should be avoided when coming up with future designs for this firm.

The most effective internal distribution system for BAAE in the new facility

British Airways Avionic Engineering’s new facility needs an effective internal distribution system which will ensure that goods move from where they are stored to places where they are needed. According to Crocker, Jessop, and Morrison (2011), several systems are currently used in ensuring that there is an effective distribution of the materials within the stores and from the stores to the workshop.

Given that the management has decided to automate its warehousing activities, Automated Storage and Retrieval System would be the most appropriate for this firm. As suggested above, the physical gap between the warehouse and the workshop should be minimized as much as possible. When this is done, it becomes possible to move items through the system from the warehouse right to the workshop. This system is recommended because of the number of benefits it offers.

When this system is used effectively, the need for human labour will be significantly reduced. Most of the tasks previously done by the employees will now be done using the system. It means that occupational safety will be enhanced within this firm because the risk of people getting physical injuries in the stores will be significantly reduced. The costs of compensations and treatment of such employees will also be eliminated. The warehouse and the workshops will, therefore, be run cost-effectively.

Compact picking of materials is a task that can be very challenging when it is done using manual labour. This is so because the capacity of humans is always limited in terms of the amount of weight they can carry. However, this is not the case when the Automated Storage and Retrieval System is used. The system makes it easy for a compact of materials to be delivered to the desired location within the warehouse or workshop irrespective of the weight. This capability of the system enhances efficiency in internal distribution.

As shown in the above discussion, the Automated Storage and Retrieval System is multipurpose. It goes beyond ensuring that materials are safely stored within the warehouses. It also takes care of the internal movements and automatic stock-taking within the warehouse. According to Wasserman and McLean (2003), organisations are currently keen on embracing systems that can perform more than one task. This is one way of reducing the costs of production.

The British Airways Avionics Engineering will benefit a lot from this system in terms of efficiency and cost-effectiveness. As Treebhoohun (2011) notes efficiency and cost-effectiveness are issues that are critical in the aviation industry. This firm is often under pressure to ensure that the planes of its parent company are serviced in time and as per the expected standards. The maintenance process should also be conducted using the least cost possible to ensure that operations of the firm are conscious of the need to be profitable.

Conclusion

The British Airways Avionics Engineering was established with the primary purpose of offering repair and maintenance services to British Airways, its parent company. Soon after starting its operations, the management of this firm realized that it needed an inventory management system that does not heavily rely on human labour. Automated Storage and Retrieval System came out as the most efficient system that could address the challenges faced in managing the materials in the warehouse. The system not only increases efficiency in operations but also reduces the overall cost of operation.

References

Crocker, B, Jessop, D & Morrison, A 2011, Inbound logistics management: Storage and supply of materials for the modern supply chain, Pearson, Harlow.

Jessop, D, Morrison, A & Morrison, H 2005, Storage and supply of materials, ELBS with Pitman, London.

Meghanathan, N, Nagamalai, D & Chaki, N 2013, Advances in computing and information technology: Proceedings of the second International Conference on Advances in Computing and Information Technology (ACITY), Springer, Berlin.

Moore, N, Grammich, C & Bickel, R 2007, Developing tailored supply strategies, Rand Corp, Santa Monica.

Morrison, A & Jessop, D 2006, Storage and control of stock: For commerce, industry and public undertakings, Pitman, London.

Pathak, J 2005, Information technology auditing: An evolving agenda, Springer, Berlin.

Reeves, L 2008, A manager’s guide to data warehousing, Wiley, Hoboken.

Tan, F 2002, Global perspective of information technology management, IRM Press, Hershey.

Taniar, D & Rusu, L 2010, Strategic advancements in utilising data mining and warehousing technologies: New concepts and developments, Information Science Reference, Hershey.

Treebhoohun, N 2011, Promoting IT enabled services, Commonwealth Secretariat, London.

Wang, J 2009, Encyclopedia of data warehousing and mining, Information Science Reference, Hershey.

Wasserman, P & McLean, J 2003, Consultants and consulting organisations directory, Gale Research Co, Detroit.

Introduction

British Airways (BA) is an airline that prides itself as the “World’s Favorite Airline”. The airline has terminals around the world and in a bid to attract more customers it has to make sure that people view its services as both classy and affordable. This is the message that is carried in most if not all of its advertisements and marketing campaigns. In this discussion, we shall analyze two of BA’s print media advertisements and a press release, with the aim of establishing whether or not the company uses Integrated Marketing Communication (IMC) techniques as part of its marketing strategy.

Advertisement 1-Terminal 5

This advertisement was meant to let the public know that Terminal 5 was in operation and that it had helped cut the clearance time per customer to 4.7 minutes (“Terminal 5”). The advertisement shows a lady checking out the flight board while leaning on her luggage trolley. She appears relaxed and from the explanation provided, we get to know that she is headed to Beijing to watch her boyfriend compete in a rowing competition.

Advertisement 2-Sea of Tranquility

This advertisement employed the use of graphic design techniques to depict an island in the sea. The island takes the shape of a relaxing man. The sea has branded the Sea of Tranquility and the island has been named the Isle of Comfort (“Sea of Tranquility”).

Press release-World Records

On March 10^th, 2013, BA decided to use a unique technique to raise funds for its charity project named Flying Start. For this purpose, the airline held an exclusive performance for 128 passengers aboard one of its flights (British Airways 1). In the process, the airline entered the Guinness Book of Records for holding the ‘World’s Highest Concert’. After the show, the passengers aboard the plane took part in a recording of the Harlem Shake, which was the biggest internet craze at the time. Coincidentally, this became the ‘World’s Highest Harlem Shake”. The press release describes how the two records were achieved in detail.

From the advertisements and press releases, BA is presented as a time-efficient and caring airline in terms of ascertaining customer-comfort and provision of on-board entertainment. The Terminal 5 advertisement assures the customers that they will save time by using BA, while the Sea of Tranquility artwork guarantees that passengers using the airline’s flights will enjoy the utmost levels of comfort and peace of mind. The World Records press release describes BA as a ‘fun airline’ and one that cares about society through its Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) strategies.

In developing all the three forms of public communication, the advertising specialists at BA clearly went through all the stages of a good IMC technique. Their approach has been summarized below:

1. Awareness: Through the Harlem Shake it is clear that BA strategists are always tracking the changing social and cultural trends.
2. Image integration-BA maintained the message that it is reliable in all aspects through all advertisements.
3. The functional integration-The airline may have analyzed popular airline advertisements and found that most of them seem too serious. This could explain why the Harlem Shake, the Sea of Tranquility, and the Terminal 5 advertisements take a seemingly casual approach.
4. Coordinated integration-All the three advertisements describe BA as better than competitors.
5. Consumer-based integration-The Terminal 5 and Sea of Tranquility advertisements present BA as an airline that is concerned about the needs of its customers.

Works Cited

British Airways. British Airways flies into the Guinness World Records Book. 2013. Web.

“Sea of Tranquility” n.d. Web.

“Terminal 5” n.d. Web.