North West Airlines

Introduction

While the airline industry has been known for many years to be a rather unstable business, it has suffered more than its share of bad luck over the past few years. Indeed, a significant increase in oil prices, terrorism and bankruptcies are only a few of the problems that have prevented a number of American airlines from remaining afloat financially. In fact, up to the present time, the situation has deteriorated to the extent that only one airline declares itself to be financially profitable in the United States (South West Airlines).

The present research aims to uncover the problems encountered in the airline industry on the part of day-to-day employees through the study of a well-known airline, North West Airlines. North West Airlines (henceforth referred to as NWA), based in the Twin Cities, currently has a Montreal office with over 45 employees. An in-depth study of the working conditions at NWA has revealed various issues that the airline will have to address in order to recover from a recent bankruptcy filing if it is to be assured a successful future. The following paper will offer an overview of the key concerns of the Montreal NWA office, that is, absenteeism, motivation, staff turnover and diversity. It will show how these problems stem from current NWA policies, and how they can be rectified through changes and improvements in the company’s guidelines and rules of action.

Company Profile

Colonel Lewis Brittin founded North West Airlines in 1926 under the name of North West Airways. It originally provided services geared towards mail delivery for the U.S Post Office Department between its founding city and Chicago, Illinois. The following year, NWA embarked on a new enterprise, that of passenger service. While the flights were initially limited to the United States, NWA opened up a new international route to Winnipeg in 1928 and became the first airline to offer services to Asia, in 1947, with routes to Tokyo and Shanghai. NWA was part of the war effort in the Second World War, flying military equipment and personnel from the continental USA to Alaska. Subsequently, NWA decided to paint red stripes on its aircraft tails as a visual aid in the rather difficult Alaskan flying conditions. Eventually, the war ended and the red stripes would later form the NWA logo.

From the 1950’s throughout the early 2000’s, NWA enjoyed a steady growth and increased the number of routes available, becoming internationally known through its regular routes to Asia, Europe and Scandinavia. On October 1st 1986, NWA purchased its Minneapolis competitor, Republic Airlines, thereby widening its city hubs to Detroit and Memphis. After this transaction, NWA focused on improving technology to increase its revenues and to enhance its reputation in the airline industry. With over 30 000 employees worldwide, NWA quickly became the fifth largest airline in the world. However, its continued financial success came to a screeching halt in September 2005 when the company decided to file for bankruptcy. Since then, NWA has unfortunately been plagued with a series of strikes and a general state of mayhem amongst its employees.

The Main Symptoms and Problems: Motivation

Northwest Airlines strives for success in an extremely competitive market. Ongoing changes in the airline industry often force management to make radical changes within the organization in order to meet market demands. As fuel prices rise, more discount airlines emerge, and Northwest Airlines experiences conditions of financial turmoil. Most of these efforts are directed at cutting costs and remaining competitive rather than in improving internal affairs or working conditions. Motivating employees under such adverse circumstances can prove to be extremely difficult. The NWA Montreal based office employees are currently experiencing a lack of motivation within the workplace. There has been a significant increase in absenteeism and in turnover rates in recent years, and these problems will be discussed in greater length later on. For now, it is important to note that these problems stem from a lack of motivation. An unmotivated workforce can impede job performance and significantly impact customer satisfaction.

In order to understand the underlying causes of poor performance experienced by this workforce several employees were interviewed. The interviews conducted revealed a clear pattern: that most employees are not satisfied with the nature of their jobs. They identified their tasks as being highly repetitive and redundant, and most employees felt that their tasks were not sufficiently intellectually challenging and did nothing to promote personal growth. In addition, employees were not able to identify potential career advancement opportunities within the organization. Employees seeking to move up the corporate ladder encounter barriers within the organization since lucrative job opportunities are not offered internally. Instead, the Human Resources department prefers to employ individuals from outside the organization.

The extensive competition in the airline industry has also led to a lot of downsizing and outsourcing. Hence employees lack job security and no longer have as much loyalty to the organization. The downsizing has also increased many aspects of the workload, contributing to increased stress levels and thus decreased job satisfaction overall. Employees are expected to make more sales and to provide quality customer services, yet there are no specific goals in place. Likewise, employees do not feel that increasing productivity is worthwhile since there is nothing to aspire to. Needless to say, superiors are said to be quick at criticizing and reluctant at recognizing outstanding performance. There is an evident lack of open communication among employees and their superiors, and the employees seem to lack the drive to excel and to contribute to the organization. Also, as the organizational goals change due to newly emerging market demands, superiors fail to communicate these new goals to bottom line employees. Accordingly, employees do not feel they can relate to the organization due to a lack of information and they feel their work is under appreciated and under valued. Hence they do the minimal work necessary simply to get by. Likewise, employees do not have the drive to perform in an outstanding manner and to perform beyond expectations. Since there are no incentives to excel and no recognition programs in place, employees frequently contribute at a level far below their actual potential.

Recommendations and Plans for Implementation: Employee Motivation

Analysis of the NWA office located in Montreal has revealed a great deal of motivational discrepancies among

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