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Porch Monkey,
Funny...no. Ironic...yes. True...very. At the end of the day, it doesn't matter who pays what. Fact is the group (forget individual segments and business units) is not making money. It's not rocket science, reduce labour costs & airfares, improve cabin service and stop rubbishing your product. Most travelers want to be treated like royalty and pay as little as possible. Satisfy their needs and the company will prosper. Everything else is emotional white noise. It's not hard. |
FPvdude,
Couldn't be further from the truth. Like many on this thread I prefer Joan's coffee's in the morning. The fact that you immediately attack the player and not the ball leads me to only one conclusion. These ill-informed, self indulgent and repetitive arguments will only be solved by returning QA to government & taxpayer ownership. Which won't happen nor should happen. I say again, provide a better product at a lower or equal cost to the competitors and there will be no problem. |
Following ALEA Fed Sec linked their excellent submission, a must read, there is also this very cogent and tightly argued view.
http://www.aph.gov.au/DocumentStore....d&subId=205378 I have not heard of nor know whom Colonial Airways represent, which in itself is of no consequence, the argument stands for itself. |
Really...'Troll' Is that it?
(To avoid accusations of hypocrisy I won't go further.) Although, I will say that your support of SP's submission seems appropriate. The submission reveals a US$40k bill addressed to QA but which was recharged. Whilst simultaneously illustrating that alternative maintenance facilities overseas only charge US$45.00 P/hr. Don't be surprised when QA team enthusiastically provide local hourly rates (with the add-ins) for comparison. Tks |
Ric_god:
I am happy to label you a provocative, know nothing, lick-spittle troll. So what? Bring to us facts that the recently admitted loss-making JQ is subsidising anything more that your own meagre salary. And what's with your username? Was "lapdog" already taken? |
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Live feed from today's Senate, Rural & Regional Affairs & Transport References Committee (Qantas`s future as a strong national carrier supporting jobs in Australia (Sydney)) hearing AEDT 0900 ~ 1345
Direct Streams (should work directly in media players) If these don't work, go directly to the web page and you should be able to view directly with your browser. |
The Australian
After a long flight, final destination in doubt ALAN Joyce often tells the joke about the Irishman asked by his compatriot the best way to get to Limerick from County Derry. After a long pause, the Irishman strokes his chin and replies: ‘‘Well Seamus, I wouldn’t be starting from here.’’ The same can be said about the debate over our national aviation market and the best way to arrive at a profitable Qantas. The debate began with the Qantas Sale Act and has drawn thunderous comment about the rights and wrongs of supporting or restricting a national icon, for sensible reasons and some not so sensible. It is true that any conditions placed on who can invest in a public company, and how much, put limits on the availability of capital. The Qantas Sale Act does more harm than that, of course. It also directs that the bulk of Qantas operations must be in Australia, significantly handicapping its cost structure against international competitors. Imagine telling Seek, a global powerhouse in the online employment broking industry, where it had to base its operations. But the act is not the cause of Qantas’ woes. It’s important to take a step back and reflect on how we got here, and what is really driving the fragile economics of both our domestic carriers. When Qantas was privatised in 1993, after the merger of the publicly owned international and domestic carriers, it started with a strong balance sheet, a substantially new fleet, and the beginnings of an important tie-up with its cornerstone investor British Airways. The new airline also boasted a surfeit of talent, led by highly regarded chairman Gary Pemberton and the genial and brilliant chief executive James Strong. These men were supported by the cunning and commercial genius of Geoff Dixon and John Borghetti, astute numbers men Gary Toomey and Peter Gregg, along with network and fleet mastermind Paul Edwards. The team was joined later by the supremely talented Alan Joyce. Inch by inch, plane by plane, they took the former government enterprise into battle against an equally impressive Ansett team, and began to gain ground and then the lead. The battle produced some of the best domestic airline services in the world, new business class products, l ounges and loyalty programs. Today, passengers can even look forward to a varied menu of edible food. In the mid-1990s, we spent time in the Sydney catering centre looking for efficiencies. We were fascinated to see meals made in individual batches for each flight, with the production line cleaned up and reset for each batch and each flight. Asked why, the catering managers told us passengers wanted variety. ‘‘But how many passengers fly on two dinner-time flights in the same day?’’ we asked. ‘‘And how often do you change the menu on the same flight?’’ Every three months was the answer to the second question. Change is hard. I remember another event in the mid-90s that brought this home to me. The drivers in the Qantas catering business had been issued with two-way radios to improve communication and co-ordination of the hi-lift trucks as planes ran late and gates changed. It was a good suggestion from some young consultants. The drivers were troubled by the possible consequences of greater supervision and understandably offended. The first crew to trial the radios returned them at the end of the shift a mess of wires, shredded plastic and flattened aluminium. ‘‘These radios don’t work,’’ they said. They hadn’t survived the back wheels of the truck. In 1999, we were asked to identify possible threats to the profitable, although by now largely unregulated, duopoly. The threat was easy to predict: it would be low-cost carriers and their flexible staffing, operations and work practices. In 2000, Impulse and Virgin Blue were launched and an almighty price war broke out. Simple maths tells you the first losers in a price war are those without deep pockets. Impulse failed, and was acquired by Qantas under the failing firm rules and parked in its regional network for possible future use. The next most vulnerable are the operators with the highest costs. By this time, Ansett’s costs were probably 10 per cent higher than Qantas. We all remember Ansett’s collapse with 14,500 hard-working people losing their jobs. We estimated at the time that Virgin Blue, if it had been the same size as Ansett, would have run the same operation with fewer than 5000 people. That was the power of the new, disruptive model. And just like gravity, it wasn’t going to go away. Qantas was always going to be the next airline to come under pressure. However, the inevitable was delayed by more than a decade by Australia’s long economic boom and Qantas’s decision to launch its own low-cost carrier Jetstar in 2004. Jetstar is the first and still possibly the only successful lowcost carrier in the world to be launched by an incumbent. It steadily worked on its core domestic and international cost base, closing the gap to the lowcost model by as much as 20 per cent — but still 30 per cent short of the mark on a like-for-like basis. Virgin Blue was preoccupied with competing with Jetstar because it couldn’t match the essential elements of Qantas’s offer to the premium business market. These were good years for Qantas, with record profits and the second year in the last 20 the company met its cost of capital. Despite a decade of chipping away at its high cost structure, Qantas still had a cost disadvantage to Virgin of maybe 30 per cent. When he took over in 2010, Borghetti saw the opportunity to take Virgin Blue to the business traveller. In perhaps one of the most audacious, and so far successful, corporate and brand transformations we have seen in Australian corporate history, he re-made Virgin Blue as Virgin Australia. In order to compete and survive, Qantas has had to leverage its scale, network and product position in the corporate market. But it had little help and apparently no understanding of what is at stake from its union leaders. Qantas staff are great people and always have been. I have worked alongside many of them for nearly 20 years. The occasional accident with a two-way radio notwithstanding, they are passionate about their company — but less so about their management. But with a few notable exceptions, they have been poorly advised by their union leaders, who have generally and wilfully encouraged them to trade in the long-term viability of the business for short-term gains in wages and conditions, effectively threatening their job security. I wonder how much of these union leaders’ super is invested in Qantas shares, or Virgin Australia for that matter. And if it isn’t, why they think anyone else’s would be. So now it is time to pay the piper. The bigger issue is the likelihood that the structure of our domestic airline industry is not sustainable. We think nothing of travelling to another city for a sporting, cultural or family event. And our economy depends on high levels of mobility, every day. So we have come to depend increasingly on low-priced, reliable air services. Currently our carriers are providing all of that with a mix of business models, and extra services that we hope their shareholders, and we, can continue to afford. I have my doubts. Ross Love is managing partner of The Boston Consulting Group in Australia and New Zealand. He consulted to the Australian airline industry for most of the past 20 years and for four years led BCG’s Global Airline Practice. Neither he nor BCG have consulted to any Australian carrier in the past two years. It saddens me to see the self-serving nexus between right-wing corporate media, consultants and QF executive management. QF exco already clearly have an ideological bent. They call in "consultants" of a similar ideological bent who clearly tell them what they want to hear to maintain the business and publish it in a sympathetic media outlet in the format of "News" instead of "Opinion". It's funny: people with a proven track record of running an airline into the ground and by definition proving they know precious little about how to run, grow and improve their own business, call in "consultants" who know even less about the business to tell them the things they want to hear. I'm sure the irony is lost on them. I have run a couple of my own businesses. A smart business owner surrounds themselves with people who are willing to tell him/her the things they DON'T necessarily want to hear or CAN'T or WON'T see for themselves. The dissenting view needs to be aired, embraced and more importantly acted upon. Otherwise the business is led down the garden path to its detriment. If you're the smartest guy in the room you're in trouble. And that's the problem at Qantas. Way too many people claiming to be the smartest guy in the room - not seeing, not listening and not comprehending. Not enough people leaving the ego at the door, getting out of the rarefied atmosphere of Alphabet City to find out the real problems and solutions from the people they need to implement their strategies: the people at the front line. It is akin to the generals of WW1 miles behind the front line ordering their lightly-armed infantry to slog through knee-deep mud and air-burst artillery shrapnel to attack trenches protected by interweaving fields of heavy machine guns and barbed wire, when the two-day preparatory bombardment has not "cut" the wire but only served to further entangle it and churn the ground to an impassable morass. When told the advance is faltering the generals' answer is to exhort the troops to exhibit more martial vigour, spirit and elan without either listening to the reports from the front line or leaving the safety of the chateau to see what the troops face. When that doesn't cut it, call in the consultants who advise more of the same. Vigour, spirit and elan is no substitute for smart tactics like a walking artillery barrage that advances in front of your troops to keep the enemy's heads down and a combined-arms approach of troops, tanks, improved communication and air support. In the case of Qantas, the right airframes, the right policy and procedure, IT that enables and enhances productivity, logistics when and where it needs to be, the right support to keep the whole show running, staff engagement and trust in the leadership that you will not be treated like cannon fodder. At least the generals learned, albeit at the expense of the lives of the best of a generation. But is anyone learning at Qantas? The answer is obvious. |
A piece from Tony Sheldon I thought was meaningful, more to come, AJ due about midday... |
Thanks TIMA9X.
To add to TS's comments. QF has 100 * A320 Aircraft on order. AJ recently stated that the aircraft orders will be restructured. If there are more aircraft arriving, whether its A320's or a change to A330's where are those aircraft going? AJ has already stated a slowdown in the growth of the Asian JQ franchises & as recent as last week one senior executive was rumoured as saying J* Hong Kong wont happen. MC |
you've got to fly someone and I fly Virgin because they treat their staff well |
Pilots Safe From Redundancy???
Listening to the live feed from the Senate...
Joyce just stated that there would be Cabin Crew and Engineer redundancies associated with the reduction in numbers flowing from retirement of the 767s. He did not mention pilots. Does this mean pilot jobs will be safe? Thoughts? PG PS. I just laughed my ass off when Joyce said he believed he DID have the confidence of the staff as he makes all these changes to the business... |
This man is film flamming his way through. Could you imagine John Borghetti being asked the same questions? Or anyone competent? JOYCE IS SIMPLY INCOMPETENT! He cannot answer anything properly, because I don't think he knows!!
I wish there was a proper court experienced Barrister asking the questions.... 'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say''Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say';'Can I just say'... WHAT PLAN????? WHAT IS THE PLAN???????????? |
Live feed from today's Senate, Rural & Regional Affairs & Transport References Committee (Qantas`s future as a strong national carrier supporting jobs in Australia (Sydney)) hearing AEDT 0900 ~ 1345
Direct Streams (should work directly in media players) If these don't work, go directly to the web page and you should be able to view directly with your browser. |
Management takes responsibility for turning this business around He is turning me into an Oscar Pistorius hearing about gunshot wounds. I cannot stand him!! Go - Xeno, hopefully something sensible?? NO YOU D1C8HEAD, NOT ON NOTICE, YOU ARE THE CEO! Give me an answer NOW!!! You can generate cash but if you cannot replace the assets then the business will not be ongoing I almost can't bear to watch! The man is a liar and tool. Slimy, oily vile little man. |
An investment in Jetstar HKG??? We are just an investor???????
God give me strength. And Joyce WONT ANSWER for fear of hoisting himself!! |
Infantile!!! The Senators cannot string a sentence together!!!!
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Joyce was cringe worthy viewing today - unable to respond to anything with a direct answer. And the lack of articulation by most senators - Xenophon excluded - was extraordinary. I doubt the enquiry will have much impact at all.
On another note, did Andrew Finch remind anyone else of Gordon Wood? I found him distinctly creepy. JMO. :eek: So, at the end of the day, post Feb 27th and after senate inquiry questioning, we still have no plan and no answers. What a waste of people's time and resources when he could just be running a quality airline. |
And that's it?! I feel sorry for those who put in all the hard work here. Once again there are senators in this parliament whom are willing to go soft on the subjects of a senate enquiry, wonder why.....
Senator X excluded of course. |
It is embarrassing that Qantas has such a poor excuse for managers and doubly so that our Senators did not do much better. Why is it, however, that Ross Love(Boston Consulting Group) gets to put an opinion piece in The Australian. Boston Consulting have got the airline into the hole it now seems unable to extract itself. Again the most famous brand on the planet(used to be) is being dragged through the mud. I hope Qantas gets their money back from these clowns because they deserve to. Unfortunately all this is a distraction as changes need to be made immediately to reverse the failing strategy. British Airways heading for record profits along with ANZ and Cathay and all the US carriers and we are losing money at a record rate. By the way on-time performance since the announcement on the 23rd of February has dropped and dropped significantly and Qantas has only finished first on ONE day since that date(the announcement of 5000 jobs to go). Alan telling porkies again?
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