20 20 hindsight
Advisory,
it is easy to pick up a newspaper and look at share prices today and determine what should have been bought or sold a year ago - quite another to decide the same thing today looking forward a year.
In 2001 the company had an offer on the table - the negotiating team and the GC rejected the offer. Within a few days 49 guys were fired and the company imposed the very same offer (minus more maternity leave for female pilots, 1 for 1 positioning and higher factored HDP rates - if memory serves?) So in hindsight it is easy to determine that maybe if the GC had approved it and maybe if the membership had accepted it, we would have saved 49 jobs? But then what would have happened with all that built up angst? Would we have had another stoush at a later stage and again the company's big stick would have been wielded? Would the membership have accepted the deal at all?
In 2007, the GC were presented with a deal that would have led to a huge win for one demographic(representing around 15%) and a huge loss for two other demographics (representing well over 50%) and neutral for the rest. Unlike other company offers, this one was contingent on the GC actively endorsing it - so the GC was left with no choice but to reject it. How can you endorse a deal that hurts the majority of your members? It would be nice if the GC at the time could have just presented the deal neutrally, but that wasn't an option.
If we could go back and tell the negotiators of 2007/2001 what was about to happen, I am sure a different outcome would have occurred - but then if the company was privy to the same forward looking information, maybe the respective offers would change(for the worse?).
Everyone is an expert after the fact!