Friday, May 21, 2010

MENA Airlines... Bucking The Trend

In the last decade or so the MENA airlines bucked the world airline industry trends, ever since 911, SARS, Avian Flu, H1N1 and even the current Recession. In every occasion the MENA airlines traffic and networks expanded, stayed profitable or sustained minimal losses. There are a few airlines that has always been high loss makers regardless of conditions like Kuwait Airways and Gulf Air to name a few.

The MENA airlines have a different way of achieving productivities and efficiencies than North American and European carriers. The conventional wisdom in North America and Europe is to downsize, lay off people and defer aircraft deliveries.

MENA region carriers actually react in the opposite way.
1. Aircraft deliveries are seldom deferred, but once delivered they are utilized because:
2. The airlines open up new stations that generate additional revenues and passenger uplift;
3. As traffic to North America and Europe reduces the intra MENA region traffic tends to increase and offset any losses on other routes.
The above achieve asset efficiencies

4. The airlines very seldom layoff personnel, except in cases of restructuring. They rely on recruitment freezes, attrition and unpaid leaves.
The above provides employee efficiencies and ensures the availability of highly trained and motivated staff when conditions change and the need to expand is urgent.

5. The airlines will look at means of reducing and realigning costs such as catering, overheads, and fuel to enhance their profitability.

The region suffers from the same world problems but reacts using different dynamics.

1 comment:

  1. I think point 4 has been a key differentiator - you nailed it on the head on having access to highly trained personnel.

    Unpaid leave is so much better than layoffs - certainly the accrued end of service benefits (if, in fact, they do accrue during the unpaid leave) must be far less than the cost of recruiting skilled and experienced staff.

    ReplyDelete

Labels

1 Goal 2010 2012 2013 9/11 AA Abu Dhabi ADAC Air Arabia Air Canada Air India Airberlin aircraft airlines airports ambitions American Airlines Amman aviation AVOD AWST B707-300C B767 B777 B787 BA Bahrain Bahrain Air BangaloreAviation Boeing branding British Airways Business Aviation Cabin Crew Canada change chapter 11 CO Commercials communication community compliance contingency continuity Continuous Improvement cost effective creativity Culture curricula Customer Service Delta Detroit Metro DFW Doha DTW Dubai Dubai Air Show DWC efficiency emergency Emergency Response Emirates employees environment ET409 Etihad ETS EU FA FAA family Flight Attendants flight(s) Flightglobal flydubai GACA Galaxy Tablet GAMCO GCC globalisation GOL Greece Green Gulf Air Hala Hamburg happy health home Hopenhagen Human Resources IFE India Iran Iraq Iraqi Airways Jaffa Jazeera Airways Jet Airways Jordan Just Culture Kuwait Airways LA LCC leadership low cost maintenance management manpower MEA MEBAA MENA Michigan motivation MRO MROAM Oneworld Palestine passengers passion people Philadelphia planet earth Privatization professional QAIA Qantas Qatar Qatar Airways Quality Quick Service Restaurant Radio Repair Stations Risk road roots ROTANAJET Royal Jordanian Safety Sanctions. Sao Jose Dos campos SAT Saudi Arabia Saudi Arabian Airlines Security Sharjah Airport SimliFlying Simplicity SKYTEAM SMS social media Southern California Southwest Airlines Star Alliance Sudan Airways support target teachers Technology terrorism tolerance Toulouse tourism traffic Training transition travel TSA Turkey Twitter UA UAE UBM US Airways VIA Rail Violin Vision volcanic ash Wataniya Airways
 
Top Blogs
Powered By Invesp