Response Post
Write at least 250 words response to the posts of your peers demonstrating course-related knowledge. Support your assertions with at least 2 scholarly citations from peer-reviewed journals, 1 citation from the text, and one biblical integration all in current APA format.
Peer Post
The British Airways was formed in 1974 when two national airlines, British Overseas Airways and British European Airways came together (Cozmuta, 2012). Regarded as one of the biggest and most successful airlines, British Airways has undergone much re-engineering over the years. The airline had many things going wrong for her, but the management could not handle them because of the belief that the business was always about profit making. As long as money was being made, there was no need to restructure. There were broader challenges because the management and stakeholders could not come into an agreement of the kind of changes to be made. Life in the “old” British Airways was that of depending on the government subvention for its running. The bloated borrowing made the government to put measures in place through the Public Sector Borrowing Requirement (PSBR). This was introduced to curtail the incessant borrowing.
This unfavorable financial position of the airline could not be downplayed by the government anymore. There were issues such as having many pilots who worked less than their competitors in Europe but got paid more money. The whole challenge was because of a management that was highly inefficient. To put the company on a good path of profitability and sustainability, change was a necessity. Roy Watts who was the chief executive informed everyone in the organization through a letter that they were losing money. He sounded a note of warning that certain actions need to be taken for the company to be kept running. There were four main changes that were planned to effect these changes. It’s on record that they changes led to huge successes financially. Their quest to have a sound customer service led to the hiring of Colin Marshall as the chief executive. His knowledge of customer service was brought to bear on the corporation. The employees became beneficiaries of the different innovations he brought into the organization. Knowledge was enhanced through training on customer service. They were given the opportunity to air their views and make suggestions for the growth of the company. The old order of not giving employees the opportunity to speak out in the organization was discarded.
If I was to add anything that these great change managers already did, I would have initiated the Leadership enriched culture. This is the culture of developing other leaders in the organization. One of the reasons why organizational change is difficult is due to the chain of command being top to bottom. For an organization to be effective and efficient, it must be the other way round. Everyone should be given the opportunity to lead something in the organization. An organization as big as British Airways should encourage everyone to take initiatives when necessary.
References
Cozmuta, A. (2021). Selling ‘the world’s favourite airline’: British airways’ privatisation and the motives behind it. Business History, ahead-of-print(ahead-of-print), 1-20. https://doi.org/10.1080/00076791.2021.1926991
