Qantas - Some food for thought....

[Mick F]

I don't know what the engineer's have claimed, but what is wrong with what the pilots have claimed? That being to keep Australian jobs in Australia.

I fail to see what's wrong with that? How is that not workable?

Mick

[Owen H]

You are unlikely to get much comment from any Qantas crewmember at this stage due to the sensitivity of the issue.

Sufficed to say that many suggestions have been put forward by the pilot group, as they want the airline to prosper, but with the one proviso - they come with a guarantee of a future for Qantas pilots. That does not mean they cannot be dismissed, or made redundant - just that the offshoring of jobs into sham companies and the drive to the bottom must stop.

[Kelvin R]

I don't understand, why is it OK to launch personal attacks against a company CEO in a public forum but offering suggestions on how an airline could halt its decline is too sensitive?

As yet I don't have enough information to form an opinion as to who is right and who is wrong. What I do know is as a long term passenger who controls his own travel budget and the budget of 7 staff the decline of Qantas is not new and started well before the current CEO. What I also know is it is very hard to continue to fly Qantas in a premium cabin for international flights when the price is often twice that of a competitor who offers a better hard product (flat bed over angle bed), and makes it harder to get to where I need to go compared to a competitor's direct flying.

I have had some great experiences flying Qantas and I have had some awful experiences. Sadly the good experiences are now few and far between and generally come from the younger crew, while the awful flights are the more consistent, especially in the premium cabins on international flights.

So QF is in trouble because it no longer represents what the flying public want in an airline, yet it seems unable or unwilling to change. What anyone involved in the international section of QF needs to understand is when you loose a previous long term loyal passenger they generally don't return.

This brings me back to my original point, the Unions want all of these new conditions for members, QF management want to restore the airline to being relevant and viable. Yet I have not seen in the public domain a proposal from the Union which would deliver the conditions to members and yet also enable the reform necessary for the airline to continue. Deliver that and you will instantly gather the support of the flying public, save a company and deliver what the members want at the same time.

[Grant Smith]

Originally Posted by Kelvin R

I don't understand, why is it OK to launch personal attacks against a company CEO in a public forum but offering suggestions on how an airline could halt its decline is too sensitive?

Because even the armchair experts have limitations

[Garry Emanuel]

Kelvin, you have summed it up very well.

In the current situation, it is very similar to politics except in this case, the unions are the opposition and management is the government of the day. Caught between the two are the (mainly) innocent - the staff and the customer.

Both of the negotiating parties claim to be representing their "members" (shareholders or employees).

Unfortunately in the current play, it seems neither are particularly tuned in to the reality (and enormity) of the situation. Or more to the point, they are tuned in but a blithely ignorant of the imminent danger of "short termism".

The world of commerce is like so many other things - it is cyclical. One day shareholders are king, the next capital and the next customers. Regardless of that, employees remain, suffering at the whim of the "current king" and occasionally benefitting.

Right now, IMHO, the shareholder is king, management are focused upon short term wins to appease the king and the rest are falling in line behind them.

With choice now more readily available to the customer (a more aggressive and focused Virgin Australia), the customer is starting to gain some ascendancy. Soon, the shareholders will gain more sway over management to think ahead and there will be a shift but as we all realise, "oil tankers" don't change course quickly.

There will be more pain and there will be some casualties along the way - perhaps Clifford and/or Joyce and some others. Somewhere in the shadows, Bain, McKinsey or Booz are awaiting the call to come and assess the situation, make recommendations and arrest the decline.

Won't be of the epic proportions we saw on the waterfront, however, sustained change towards a more agile, competitive and responsive Qantas will only come with a compelling vision for change, a commitment to achieving it and a recognition from all parties that the dance lasted for a long while and now the party is over. Job guarantees, wishful salary increases and attractive fringe benefits come at a cost. So too, executive bonuses.

Until the compelling vision is formulated, communicated and adopted, the posturing will continue and so too will the decline.

Time for the boys and girls to collect their toys, manage their egos and earn their keep.

If they don't, there'll be less earnings to keep.

[Ash W]

Grant, don't think Kelvin's post was aimed at armchair critics, but more so at those from within the company who are willing to whinge and whine and point fingers at Joyce, rather than trying to come up with solutions to the clearly obvious problem in an attempt to keep the majority in a job.

[Justin L]

I was speaking to a buddy about an hour ago who was stuck at ADL due to QF cancellations but was able to change to a DJ flight.

Anyway, he commutes two days a week each week between ADL and SYD and noticed on his QF flight last week that there was only one flight attendant serving drinks/meals etc. He said he wasn't served on his SYD-ADL flight until the plane was over around Mildura which is well over half way into the flight.

He is into aviation as well and out of interest asked the flight attendant why there was only one person serving on that flight. The flight attendant apparently said "it's called Alan Joyce" according to my friend and said she continued that each flight attendant used to serve up to 30 passengers but now it is 178 as of very recently.

I know I have read on the board about minimum crew numbers etc., but could this be true on 737 CityFlyer services? I have no reason to doubt my friend's story as he is cluey on these things and not the average punter whose horror travel stories appear in the papers.

And assuming it is true, it's not good if QF staff are publicly making statements like that to their customers about the CEO of the company. Morale for that staff member at least seems to be very low.

[A McLaughlin]

Airline AOCs mandate that you have to have a flight attendant for every 50 seats or part thereof on an aircraft, so a 737 must have four flight attendants on board to assist in emergency situations.

If she was serving alone, the other three were probably doing other things in the galleys.

[Justin L]

Thanks. Makes sense.

[Owen H]

And assuming it is true, it's not good if QF staff are publicly making statements like that to their customers about the CEO of the company. Morale for that staff member at least seems to be very low.

Its not very good for staff morale when the CEO calls the pilots of the company rogues and kamikaze's in the media either. Could you get much more offensive to a loyal and experienced group of aviators?

As to the Alan Joyce comment, there is some truth to it. It isn't a nasty comment, just a factual one. Just a few short years ago you would get 5 cabin crew on a service. Then it went to 4. Same on longhaul flights, which went from 16, to 15, to 14. However, the CC are expected to deliver the same service standards. That is exactly why there is only one or two serving in the cabin, compared to the past when you would have more.

That is part of the reason you see fewer of them in the cabin - there are simply fewer of them on the aircraft.