Wednesday, August 8, 2001 SOUTH CHINA MORNING POST
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
Management should be held responsible for present crisis
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It was unacceptable for a large corporation like Cathay Pacific to sack 52 pilots.
I was born in Hong Kong. I feel that I have grown up with Cathay Pacific and I always felt it was the flagship of Hong Kong. Now the company's management have destroyed this feeling.
Looking at what has happened during the pilots' industrial action, I believe it was all caused by mismanagement at the airline. What the pilots are asking for is not what Cathay has claimed. Cathay management have been asking the public to believe the pilots are earning $3 million a year and still want a 30 per cent pay rise. No pilots are earning that amount of money and the 30 per cent is a manipulated figure.
What the pilots are really fighting for are - a better rostering system, so that like the rest of us they can have a life other than work, and a fair pay system for both A-scale and B-scale pilots. I am sure the pilots are flexible and willing to meet Cathay halfway. So why did management halt negotiations even before the deadline of industrial action set by the union?
The pilots should have the right to fight for what they feel they deserve and should not have been penalised because of this limited industrial action. If Cathay Pacific was not short of pilots and aircraft, it would not have experienced the problems it did during Typhoon Utor. The company has tried to expand too quickly without having enough manpower and aircraft to do the job. Pilots are human. As I learned from a production management course, a company should only expect to get about 70 per cent productivity from a member of staff. If a company tries to get 100 per cent productivity, employees will fall ill and in the long run, productivity will be adversely affected.
The airline needs people with basic management skills to run the company. If it does not change its management style, it will not just lose the trust of its pilots. Other members of staff will become disillusioned. And it will damage the image and reputation that the company has built up over the years.
ALICE LAI
Sai Kung