AOM 2010 Montreal (Day Five)
Hi. Well it’s Day Five and the last day of the conference. There’s so much to report on, but as promised, I must conclude my account of the Southwest Airlines session. By the way, I’ve got to say I am pleased with my stamina and my adaptive ability employed at ensuring I get seats at the sessions I want to hear (this is the only conference I go to where its competitive to get into the sessions and you can’t register for them so its each to their own!). I only admit to once damaging a person (I stood on her foot as we moved actively towards limited seating), I didn’t know attending a conference is a contact sport, but I digress.
Ok, I promised I’d finish off the Southwest story. After James F. Parker finished there were several speakers who analysed Southwest and its success. Again, at the risk of incompleteness I will summarise here:
- Set up the system to serve employees first (there was acknowledgement that this doesn’t mean doing everything they want and nor does it mean that everyone is a good fit for the culture)
- Hire for attitude (once aptitude is confirmed – e.g. no point having a really jolly pilot who can’t land in a storm)
- Encourage staff at all levels to own the customer experience – there are no rules limiting what staff can do to help a passenger – assuming that the passenger is asking for something reasonable – remember form yesterday – Do The Right Thing.
- When the passenger is simply wrong, unreasonable, too demanding, a pain in the butt, be polite but don’t cave. Southwest Airlines staff do not have to be treated badly by anyone.
- Encourage staff to use their intuition, over any rules, when it comes to solving a problem.
- When there is a threat, be aware of response rigidity) a phrase I haven’t heard before but was described as when things look bad the most common reaction is to tighten the reigns, bring things back under central control, cut costs etc. There were several examples of where Southwest went against that and it paid off big time.
- Link actions with vision – if you want to be the most friendly airline, make sure everyone is friendly (when the CEO flies he hands out the nuts and smiles!). They also have a regular competition for the person with the biggest hole in their sock – can’t imagine plane full of Australians readily taking off their shoes to compare sock holes – but hey, its an image that does delight my mind.
- Chose to reward based on psychology rather than financial reward – this is a biggie and I think probably the core of the story. Southwest does not hire the most expensive people, nor does it pay the highest but its 401k plan is the best out there (I of course have to go on the word of these people). In fact this whole subject could be an email on its own but suffice to say they are credited with having used personal psychology to reward people rather than shorter term higher financial rewards.
- Mistakes are fine – in favour of the client – but not to be habit forming.
- All staff are able to articulate their shared purpose (including their social purpose)
- All staff understand the whole of the operation of the airline – not in minutiae of course but to the extent they know how and why things work and where they fit in (I started to get really excited now as it’s the very way I do projects – but again I digress).
- Always invest in relationships with staff and customers
- (At this point it wandered off into some heavy academic stuff such as broadening role identity, social empowerment etc – but I think we’ve got the picture)
James came back to round out the session, doing a very good impression of humility, and gave a serve about the increasing governance, rules and scrutiny in business and said quite simply – you can’t legislate character. He concluded with a repetition of his opening that it didn’t matter what secrets he gave away, we won’t adopt them because:
- There is a long tradition in business of thinking of yourself first
- There is a belief that financial rewards are the ones that drive good outcomes
- Business schools teach about control and monitoring
- People are simply too scared to try something different – even if its been proven to work!
His final words were that he hopes we understand the “economic imperative of empowerment”.
As I said yesterday, I bought the book and I’m enjoying it – it really is worth a read (lots of copies have been ordered so please don’t hesitate to let me know if you’d like one).
Well this is a bit longer than I’d hoped it would be and there is still the final PM presentation to tell you about –and I’ve been reminded that I promised to tell you about the Black Swan. So. I’ll stop now and do one more tomorrow. Hoping that’s ok.
Best regards, Diane