Starting June 9, American Airlines is telling front line employees that they will start caring about the quality of their product.
American faces significant financial underperformance and – given their high costs, and customer preferences – need to become more premium in order to earn greater revenue. Management belatedly realizes this. Do they know how to do it?
They used to focus only on exact on-time departures (but without making the investments necessary to achieve them). The message from the top was that avoiding even two minute delays was the only priority. In CEO Robert Isom’s consistent messaging, when the flight is on time ‘the food tastes better, the seats seem comfortable.’
However, as I have written for years, reliability turns out to be table stakes. Customers care about the total experience. the product is more than just the schedule – merely having flights isn’t enough, what those flights are like matters.
It used to be that flight attendants complained if they called over missing first class catering on a long haul flight, managers would be yelling at them from the top of the jet bridge. And they might have to account for it later.
Effective June 9, American says they will begin to pay attention to cabin appearance (but to achieve this they need planes to have more time on the ground for cleaners to clean). They will care that catering is loaded. They will care that flight attendants follow service standards. I already posted that American will be revamping its buy on board program.
Here’s the memo that went out on Friday:
The problem here is the messaging.
- It comes to flight attendants from two middle manager (Managing Directors) while past narratives from the CEO have been they they are primarily competing with low cost carriers and shouldn’t spend any extra money.
- It begins with a veiled threat – that their model for consistent service will be their punitive attendance program where taking sick time when you’re ill (and contagious!) earns discipline points.
- There is no vision offered about what they are trying to accomplish, nothing about the stakes involved or how cabin crew fit in. There are no rewards for delivering on outstanding service.
This is a start, and good to see that they will begin to focus on delivering a consistent and clean product. But the CEO needs to lead, get out in front of the front line, and serve as an evangelist. Can Robert Isom do that?
“So enjoy the remaining 90 days where we’ll continue to ignore any sense of care about the product.”
Will START to care about the conditions of their planes in June?
is TODAY in their vocabulary?
Where is their board of directors?
Welcome to PAN AM version 2 –
What good is DO when you get to CLT and wait on the apron for an hour to get a gate
It’s about time. Things have changed so much in the past several years & not for the better. But, you get what you pay for. If something is wrong, I write it up. Does it help, does it get fixed? NO, most of the time. F/A’s are with the customers more than anyone, yet least appreciated.
So how is American going to motivate contract minimum wage cabin service employees who are treated badly by their employer?
American will have to fire most of their PHL staff if they want to improve customers service.
I’m with @postnobills and @wdchuck on this one—best day to start fixing things is ‘yesterday,’ if not ‘today’—and I do blame management, not the workers, so by all means, @Joe United, please pay the crews more and also ask more of them. This really does come down to good (or bad) leadership. Wishing AA the best.
So American is telling unionized emplyees that they are gonna have to work harder….or else!
Good luck!
This could be the least competent senior management team in the entire history of commercial aviation. Constantly contradictory strategy statements, threatening rather than empowering front-line employees, and no semblance of any desire to innovate and lead. It will ultimately be up to shareholders to toss the entire Board of Directors out before anything meaningfully improves. At this point, I doubt even a prospective activist investor such as Elliott Investment Management could possibly make things any worse.
The only wya to enforce this is to fire the garbage PHL FAs that have given me the worst flying experience in any country on my weekly travels. AA PHL staff is a disgrace and should not be allowed to stay employed if they actually have quality enforcement in June.
It’s a shame that THIRD WORLD countries have nicer airports and better service than their US counterparts.
Traveled to Punta Cana, DR. Airport is new, gorgeous, efficient in all aspects (technology , aesthetics, passport control). It took absolutely no time to get our bags and clear customs
Came back to CLT. Was in business class. Took over an hour and a half to get our bags on a Friday night at 8pm. This isn’t a one off situation either. It’s always a mess
What the June start date tells me is that AA is anticipating similar problems they had last summer with their contracted caterers not being able to keep up with the schedule. Remember how AA was allowing flights of a certain stage length (primarily out of PHL and CLT) to depart with water only if necessary, in lieu of waiting for catering? This doesn’t say to me that they are trying to anything premium, rather that they are just trying to make sure their baseline ops are able to keep up with the peak summer travel season.
Maybe they should buy a copy of the Memoment of truth by Jan Carlzon, former SAS CEO for all the leaders. Jan empowered the front line to make the right decisions for his customers and the airline soared. No pun intended.
Good analysis of a poorly done message, Gary. It’s an example of the old adage about how trying to push a string never works as well as pulling it. But it does look like they are trying to make some changes; I had free wi-fi on a recent MIA-ORD flight, and a follow up survey (which they said was coming and asked me to complete) on cabin service, cleanliness, what they could do to improve, etc. Perhaps they read those, perhaps not, but at least it’s an effort. We’ll see where it goes.
Companies like this need to dump their CEOs fast and quick. Fixated on single metrics and not the whole experience
Hold upper management or the board accountable for Project Oasis/premium downgrade first then you can push this memo. Not having seat back entertainment and decreased leg room points to budget carrier. So they may want to check themselves first.
“We love to fly and it shows” was a brilliant rallying cry. I guess they don’t still use it but if you’d asked me before I just did the Google search I would have guessed that was their current slogan.
You don’t lead by memo and the words I would not use to describe AA include clean, luxury, prestige, or attention-to-detail. It wasn’t that AA was bad (I was fine to choose them for years), but it just lacks an air of anything beyond utilitarian. Stark terminals and planes, constant credit card sales pitches, outrageously expensive upgrades all the way down to barely maintained jet bridges, lackluster signage and boring safety videos. There’s no “air” of “this is something special” flowing through the corporate identity of AA and all the ways you’ll encounter it as a customer. There could be. But it doesn’t start with a memo. It starts with marketing to the customers and also marketing to the employees and it flows into all the little details of the customer experience.
(“their” being Delta. I wrote that first paragraph poorly)
This is what you end up with when senior management thinks like a regional carrier..
I am a two million miler AA who switched to Delta because the quality of the service declined to unacceptable levels. I’ll wait and see if it makes any difference but AA lost me two years ago. They will have to significantly improve and demonstrate long term sustained improvements before I’d consider giving them a second chance. Enjoy the crappy stock prices, executives!
Did I miss something? I do not see anything in this memo that articulates why they are doing this kabuki dance and what the desired end goal (e.g. more premium customers, profitability, etc.)
I am baffled as to why they are waiting until June? My wife and I are flying AA to Europe for a bucket list journey in April – I hope it doesn’t start poorly in Flagship Business!
AA Management needs to make some hard decisions. Many domestic turns on 737s and A321s are at 50 minutes and often involve a crew change and at least first class catering. Consequently, even with gate agents and flight attendants that do their best to get the cattle seated as quickly as possible the flight leaves late. The number of times a flight comes in late to a hub, passengers barely have time to make their connections (and yes most people have no idea of the risks with a sub 60 minute connection) and the plane waits for a marshalling crew, then a gate agent, then the gate agent struggles with aligning the jet bridge. What kind of cleaning do you expect if the cleaners have less than five minutes to clean the plane?
All of this will cost money and require operational changes. But some far it’s just a bunch of talk.
Constantly threatening front line employees, the ‘face’ of the company, doesn’t exactly engender better customer service or flight experience. It creates an environment of resentment, and that’s what AA does best. Reservations Agents threatened to meet metrics 100% across the board, but keep the calls short or penalized with performance levels which eventually lead to dismissal even if the customer loves the way they were treated and other metrics are met, like offering the credit card is a must, offering the customer service survey is a must, sales goals quota, adherence to schedule is a must. Airport agents also pushed relentlessly to push credit card, gate agents must work most flights single handedly while threatened to be written up if flight doesn’t go out on time. Training across the board for all these frontline agents has been cut in order to get boots on the ground, so you have employees who lack the knowledge necessary to perform. Aging work stations, many times agents getting bitten by unknown critters in the podiums, hiring managment personnel without aviation experience, or management experience for that matter.
Where is this “veiled threat” you refer to? You write –
“It begins with a veiled threat – that their model for consistent service will be their punitive attendance program where taking sick time when you’re ill (and contagious!) earns discipline points.”
Sorry if I didn’t get the memo, lol
I sold my stock in AA before the pandemic and am glad I’ve not looked back. Trash company, and the only one worst is Hawaiian Airlines (Alaska needs to scorch the field of HA leadership)
Their service will continue to degrade. Delta or United (out of necessity) are the only airlines worth flying
So Gary complains about AA’s service non-stop, then complains about the way they are addressing it? Dude, you have some serious unhappiness in you.
Same goes for the majority of the commenters on this site.
Are we holding the CEO accountable for the recent detrimental network decisions, such as the elimination of all South American flights and the lack of options from Los Angeles and Dallas? I am unwilling to permit my company to utilize Miami or New York as connecting hubs. Since his appointment, network performance has significantly deteriorated. However, another bonus is under consideration.
I flew AA first class yesterday from Boston to DFW. I opened my service tray and there was a napkin stuck in it from a previous flight. Then lunch was served. No hot towel, no warm nuts. Just a luke warm chicken enchilada that I was afraid I would get food poisoning from. Whenever I get the chance to fly on United, I’m always impressed by how new and clean their planes are and food offerings are better. I started flying AA because that’s all that I could get out of my tiny airport. Sorry to say I fly a lot so I get first class upgrades a lot. If not for this long term investment in AA points, I’d switch to another airline. AA planes are disgustingly dirty and seem very old and falling apart. And the latest decline in first class service makes me wish I never started with them.
I fly ORD to PBI regularly. The service in first class varies wildly. They have run out of entrees at times. And if I saw that neon green and pink mystery one more time..
As an original GOLD, PLT THEN EXEC PLT, I REMEMBER, the excellent service and environment flying AA in the 80’s
through the mid 20 teens. They have lost their way since the tall CEO. They simply don’t care like they use to. Need a 100% house cleaning. First I’d eliminate the
PLT Pro level. Make the ones who made AA special feel special again. Best of luck.
Well, let’s start with yesterday afternoon on AA. Paid business class from DFW to TLH. The flight attendant spent a full hour on their phone before they even got up to serve drinks and snacks. Service indeed.
American is my 2nd choice as I fly 2 times per week and most of my flights are handled by the regional carrier and the planes are usually nasty and service is always hit or miss with the flight attendants being either company minded and proficient or more interested in their phone time. On regular American flights the planes are a little cleaner unless it’s a late evening flight then they are questionable. The biggest issue I have with American is it seems that either I get delayed or for some reason they have crew issues and we get someone subbing in who could care less about flying that particular leg.
I have been EP on American for 10+ years. The service has been worse each year. Maintenance on the contract carries (especially Envoy) is abysmal. Cabin crews are average, but gate agents are openly hostile. And yet, I don’t blame them! The senior management has provided no vision and treats them poorly. They clearly do not value their employees and it shows.
Hard to compete with Delta as most of the issues come from union employees. Nobody puts in 100 % or even 50% because they know they won’t be fired or written up due to union protection.
The flight attendants are in this category
They have no dress standards, age standards or weight standards. Just building time till retirement. Nothing will change till management stands up to the unions.
It seems that American Airlines is the Air India of the USA. Somewhat fitting because Air India has India in it’s name and American Airlines has the America(n) part of United States of America in it’s name.
To those like @Rjb, @Snake93, and @BradleyG who continue to wrongly blame workers or unions, you continue to miss the point. I realize the anti-labor propaganda is force-fed to us all 24/7, but please resist the urge to punch-down.
@Mike Hunt got it right—This is a failure of management. It is lack of leadership. We passengers should be supportive to the flight crews, gate agents, ground staff, and others working for these airlines, all of whom are also getting abused (like us passengers) by bad corporate policies.
@jns — Oof. Cold-blooded. Let’s be real, I’d still take AA over Air India—though, they each badly need new aircraft, so they have that in common.
@FlyingPenguin: You wrote, “Aging work stations, many times agents getting bitten by unknown critters in the podiums…” Besides hobgoblins, what other vermin are biting American Airlines gate agents in the ass? Are passengers at risk for disease transmission from American Airlines gate lice?