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View Full Version : What the press is starting to say about CX....


The Resistance
2nd Jul 2001, 05:11
This article is in todays 'South China Morning Post' (the main HongKong english language daily).

No longer on their best




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Unlike Tung Chee-hwa (HK Chief Exec...who blasted the CX pilots), I have no particular opinions on the rights and wrongs of the threatened industrial action by Cathay Pacific pilots. Even if right was on their side, it was never going to be easy for a bunch of highly paid expatriates working for a foreign-owned firm to win much public sympathy in this strike-averse community.
What is alarming is the decline in standards of behaviour by top management at Cathay, and at some other public companies where senior executives act not as hirelings responsible to shareholders at large but as though they were owners of enterprises who can demand feudal loyalty and boot-licking behaviour from their employees and even the public.

What is so disturbing about Cathay is the repeated failure of its management to maintain reasonable relations with its staff, whether they are cabin crew or pilots. That is not surprising if the behaviour of its chief executive David Turnbull is a guide.

This doubtless so-well-brought-up gentleman was recently in the news for sacking a pilot who had the nerve to toss some monkey nuts at him in a Cathay private club bar. At a stroke, Mr Turnbull presented himself as a self-important and humourless individual who put his own inflated sense of dignity before the broader interests of the company. His petty spite did nothing to improve the attitudes of his disgruntled staff, and, if my anecdotal soundings are any guide, was negative for frequent-flyer loyalty.

This is all the more disturbing given that Cathay is part of the Swire Group which for generations has been known in Hong Kong for its excellent staff relations, exhibiting the better aspects of both colonial and Confucian paternalism. Has it changed its attitude because the paternalist outlook has gone with the empire? Or because of the pressure on management for short-term profit performance to satisfy investment bank analysts at the expense of long-term corporate and employee interests? Or is this just another example of the spread of boorishness among Brits in general?


....now back to our own private forum..... :)

HotDog
2nd Jul 2001, 10:15
I can't find that article. Who is the author?

HotDog
2nd Jul 2001, 10:49
OK, I've found it. It's in the Sunday edition (datelined Sunday, July 1) by Philip Bowring. HD.

xsimba
2nd Jul 2001, 14:43
Also in today's FT

http://news.ft.com/ft/gx.cgi/ftc?pagename=View&c=Article&cid=FT3UG2B2NOC&live=true&tagid=ZZZHJ52NA0C

Talks between Cathay Pacific Airways and its pilots union, the Hong Kong Air Crew Officers Association (AOA), collapsed over the weekend with each side accusing the other of bad faith.

The stand-off sets the stage for industrial action, which is expected to take the form of a go-slow by the pilots' union from July 3 onwards.

The bitter squabble is likely to take a severe toll on Cathay's bookings and reputation.

The current dispute with the AOA comes little more than two years after a bruising showdown with the union that cost Cathay $64m and forced it to cancel hundreds of flights.

The showdown this time is especially badly timed. "This is slap-bang in the middle of the holiday period," says Timothy Ross, an analyst with UBS Warburg. Cathay is also heading into a cyclical downturn with capacity increasing in the airline industry, prices softening and lower demand for cargo.

Passenger load factors for Cathay fell six percentage points in May, driven by falling traffic and rising capacity, Mr Ross says.

Meanwhile, unflattering and unremitting coverage of the dispute in Hong Kong, Cathay's home market - where it gets about a third of its passenger and cargo business - so soon after the last battle, has hurt the airline's image. Arch-rival Singapore Airlines, which put a disagreement with its own pilots behind it in April, is poised to roll out new features such as DVD-quality films for the front of the aircraft that are expected to impress business customers.

The threat of industrial action may have garnered all the headlines, but in reality the pilots have been working to rule for a few months already, says Mr Ross. The bad blood between the two sides has meant that many pilots have been holding Cathay to the letter of their contracts - for example, refusing to answer their phones outside their on-duty periods.

The pilots complain that their work schedules have been horrendously mismanaged by Cathay and that they often, quite literally, do not know whether they are coming or going. The union cites a case where a pilot arrived at Hong Kong airport in summer uniform, thinking he was bound for Manila, only to be told he was flying to North America in the dead of winter.

Cathay's reputation for the level of service business travellers have come to expect of a premium airline has already begun to fray.

Passengers on Cathay's prestigious New York-Hong Kong flight via Vancouver on June 22 were informed by a form letter that the flight had to be cancelled because of a family emergency affecting "a member of our fight [sic] crew" - a typo that now seems remarkably prescient. Some of the passengers were then brusquely shunted off to a China Airlines flight.

The escalation from July 3 to "limited industrial action" is likely to be a go-slow or a "sick-out," during which pilots resort to calling in sick en masse.

The chances of an all-out strike are remote because, under Hong Kong's regulations, employees can only take part in a strike during work hours if they seek permission first from their employer. Otherwise they must confine themselves to striking outside working hours, says Rebecca Davern of Freshfields, Bruckhaus, Deringer, the international law firm.

Despite its troubles, however, Cathay has plenty going for it; one of the youngest fleets in the world, a reputation for superior service and safety and one of the busiest home markets in the world. Observers point out that several US airlines have muddled on after industrial action. The difficulty for Cathay is that it often competes and is compared with Singapore Airlines.

Mr Ross warns that the looming battle between pilots and management will result either in "customer flight or capital flight as shareholders abandon the company because a generous settlement suggests it is giving away part of the ranch". With a cyclical downturn in the business already under way, his recent advice to Cathay's institutional investors could not be more blunt: "Diminished fundamentals and revolting pilots - get out now". Additional reporting from Douglas Wong in Singapore

iflyboeing747
3rd Jul 2001, 00:51
Mr BOWRING is hitting the point with this question:

"..Or because of the pressure on management for short-term profit performance to satisfy investment bank analysts at the expense of long-term corporate and employee interests?.."

There was a time - long, long time ago - when a decent company were proud to run a good and strong business, with good relations to the employees..

These days are gone..

Nowadays the only thing that matter is to please the shareholders deep pockets..

No reinvestments - such as paying - amongst others - pilots, what the rightfully deserves..
No, no - better suck the funds out of every corner of the business, and stuff them into the pockets of the happy shareholders..

The big question is - however:
Without reinvesting in a company - how long time before there is no more funds to stuff into the pockets..????