What it takes to make money in the airline business is the consistent long-term creative conveyance of the founder’s vision passion and goals. “The stock market value of fun-loving Southwest Airlines exceeds the stock market value of every other U.S. airline put together” (Taylor & Labarre, 2006, p. 55). “Every CEO of Southwest Airlines has known that their first responsibility is to their people. Serve them well and they will serve the customer” (Sinek, 2017, p. 285) Southwest is successful largely because of its evidential support of all of its employees. “Stories of Southwest airlines employee empowerment with regards to customers are the stuff of legend” (Kofman, 2018, p. 147).
Herb Keller, a former CEO of Southwest excels at relating. He said “we are not afraid to talk to people with emotion. We are not afraid to tell them, ‘we love you.’ Because we do” (Ancona & Bresman, 2007, p. 179). “It is clear that the organization’s purpose emerged from the founder, However, less apparent are the sacrifices, self-examination, and hundreds-often thousands of “hard rights” it took to sustain the alignment between the founder’s individual purpose and that of the organization” (Craig, 2018, p. 229). Southwest’s employees “values are a ‘warrior spirit’ (which the airline describes as fearlessness in giving workers everything they need to support customers); a ‘servant’s heart’ (treating others with respect, following the Golden Rule); and a ‘fun-loving attitude” (Kofman, 2018, p. 331).
“Southwest was not built to be an airline. It was built to champion a cause. They just happened to use an airline to do it” (Sinek, 2009, p. 70). Southwest clearly established the “why, how and what” of their organization. “You have to know ‘why’ you do ‘what’ you do. If people don’t buy ‘what’ you do, they buy ‘why’ you do it, do if follows that if you don’t know ‘why’ you do ‘what’ you do, how will anyone else?” (Sinek, 2009, p. 65-66). When the ‘why’, is defined, the question is ‘how’ will you do it. “How are your values or principles that guide ‘how’ to bring your cause to life” (Sinek, 2009, p. 66). “A ‘why’ is just a belief . . . ‘hows’ are the actions you take to realize that belief. And ‘whats’ are the results of those actions” (Sinek, 2009, p. 67). In the employee selection strategy the found said “attitude is very important and has to weighed against experience and skills. Someone with a high IQ, who is a backbiter, is a disaster for your organization. Someone who is outgoing and altruistic and can work convivially will be a huge asset” (Gallo, 2013, p. 13).
The main ingredient that makes money for Southwest is that it “instituted an ‘others first’ organizational philosophy in the management of the company, which starts with how it treats its employees” (Northouse, 2019, p. 238). This is by far the biggest single reason for its success.
One of its ‘competencies,’ might be taken from the fact that “their guiding principles and values stemmed directly from their why and were more common sense than anything else” (Sinek, 2009, p. 71). I emphasize, “were more common sense”, as highly important. Their numerous decisions such as no in-flight meals, only two-tier pricing, no transfer flights and only one kind of airplane make common sense.
One of their strategies is consistency. They do not ‘follow the other guys.’ Southwest Airlines sticks with what works. They are not ‘into the newest thing.’ To execute their strategy Southwest Airlines must clearly, consistently and repeatedly articulate their strategy to all involved or those effected.
I believe Southwest Airline’s strategies are sustainable, but if they don’t change them and diligently enforce them. On the question of whether or not their strategy is imitable, my answer is sort of a yes and a no. I’ll rephrase my answer. The strategy can be replicated, but it won’t be. I preface my reasoning by saying I am a capitalist, I support the stock market and share pricing. The stock market won’t allow a CEO to implement the very long term and expensive changes needed to ‘copy’ the strategy of Southwest. “Investors-who were passive when today’s senior leaders started their careers-have turned unforgiving. (Bossidy & Charan, 2002, p. 15). In short, if earnings fall short of expectations there is serious trouble. For decades the tenure time of CEOs has been shortening. I believe it would take years and a great deal of money to replicate Southwest’s strategy, therefore I do not believe it will ever happen.
References
Ancona, D. & Bresman, H. (2007). X-Teams: How To Build Teams That Lead, Innovate, And Succeed. Boston, MA: Harvard Business Review.
Bossidy, L. & Charan, R. (2002). Execution. New York, NY: Crown Business.
Craig, N. (2018). Leading from Purpose. New York, NY: Hachette Book Group.
Kofman, F. (2018). The Meaning Revolution. New York, NY: Penguin Random House.
Northouse, P. G. (2019). Leadership: Theory and practice. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.
Sinek, S. (2009). Start with Why. New York, NY: Penguin.
Sinek, S. (2017). Leaders Eat Last: Why Some Teams Pull Together and Others Don’t. New York, NY: Penguin.