Response Discussion 4.1

Southwest Airlines' Strategy and Process

Response Guidelines

Respond to the posts of two peers. See below. When responding to others, seek clarification, share your personal experiences that relate to their experiences, and provide feedback on their posts.

Student 1

Southwest’s strategy and process lies in making the most of what they have and using it efficiently. by

only using one type of aircraft, it keeps training costs at bay because the mechanics don’t have to go to

school to learn how to maintain a bunch of different aircraft. They also have many of their employees

cross trained wherever possible which helps the company maximize the utilization of their work

force. The company’s flights are also relatively short and they use a lot of what are referred to as

secondary airports which keeps their operational costs down.

Southwest is successful because they have taken logical steps to keep their costs down while giving the

customer what they want— getting to their destination without paying a lot of money for it. Not only

have they taken the steps necessary to keep going in a time when the airline industry wasn’t doing well

but they have stuck to it.

Tesla would do well to borrow from Southwest is its Human Resources philosophy. Tesla needs to make

sure the people they hire have the proper experience and have the personality to work at Tesla for the

job they are hired for. Tesla also needs to cross train their employees as much as they can except where

safety standards prohibit it. This will cut labor cost efficiently and make sure the employees are

qualified for their jobs, which is a big problem, particularly with the quality checks.

Reference:

Srinivasan, M. (2014, September 1). Southwest Airlines operations – A strategic perspective.Airline

Industry Articles. Retrieved from http://airline-industry.malq.net/southwest-airlines-operations-a-

strategic-perspective

Student 2

Southwest Airlines is a very large and successful airline. They use a very smart and unique strategy

which plays a major role in the airline’s success. According to Srinivasan (2014), Southwest Airlines

began with one simple strategy, “If you get your passengers to their destinations when they want to get

there, on time, at the lowest possible fares, and make darn sure they have a good time doing it, people

will fly your airline” (para. 1). This strategy offers lower costs, higher efficiency, and more convenience

as well. Other competitive advantages of the airline includes award winning customer service, human

resource practices and work culture, and lower operational costs and higher operational efficiency

(Srinivasan, 2014). The client company that I am using for my OIP is Nike Inc. I believe that it would be

advisable for Nike Inc. to learn from Southwest Airline’s strategies and processes. Southwest vales

customer satisfaction and uses strategies that not only benefit the company, but the customers as well.

Nike Inc. could implement such strategies in order to improve its overall operations management.

References

Srinivasan, M. (2014, September 1). Southwest Airlines operations – A strategic perspective. Airline

Industry Articles. Retrieved from http://airline- industry.malq.net/southwest-airlines-operations-

a-strategic-perspective