I’m hearing from an inside source that United Airlines has embarked upon a major reeducation course (they call it “training”) for front-line employees, focusing on improving customer service.
Trainings are routine and ordinarily not newsworthy. But in light of the Dao controversy and the public spotlight on United, I do think the emphasis of this training is interesting…in a good way.
United has defined four core principles (“core4”) it will focus its training on. These include:
- Safe
- Caring
- Dependable
- Efficient
These are ranked in order of priority by United. It’s almost an admission of guilt that caring comes before dependable and efficient. Oh, we’re sorry your flight is late and we took two hours to turn the plane, but we care…
But I actually think United is onto something. United’s improved operational performance has shown that for the most part, it is dependable and efficient. That’s expected for any airline. But what’s not expected for United, at least the way I see it, is “caring” service. You often get it…but gruffness and rudeness are also unfortunately common.
United understands that it must deliver outstanding customer service to make United a leading global competitor. This conception of service is invariably linked to such small things like whether a FA smiles or snarls or whether a gate agent is empathetic or apathetic. I don’t know if that will be the “care” focus, but I sure hope so.
CONCLUSION
Without being too cynical, it is indeed the case that the “safe” priority is a trump card…anything can be turned into a safety issue with the right spin. But come on…it’s not realistic to expect anything else. We can also just say that FAs are too set in their ways, unions are too strong, etc…but that is counterproductive. When Oscar Munoz took over for Jeff Smisek, morale (and with it, service) notably improved. There is no reason to sell people short. Let’s see if United can improve in 2018.
image: United
I’d read ‘caring’ as more elastic approach to customer issues which would be otherwise be trumped by efficiency and dependability that serves United.
I like that interpretation. Basically saying, you can sacrifice in other areas to make sure that clients feel cared for. Since this a foreign concept to most American carriers, it could be a nice differentiator if properly implemented.
That would be a great sign.
Blah blah blah…United….
Very insightful commentary here folks.
“Actions speak louder than words” – Oscar Munoz
Back in the 90’s they had a program called LAST. Listen, Accept, Solve, Thank. Guess they need a refresher course.
I’ve been at United for 34 years, spending some of that time training. Never heard if LAST. Must not have made it to the front lines…
OK I’m partial or is that biased toward the United Classic (pre-merger) crews. Staying positive for this review I will say that I fly UA frequently domestic & international. I know the difference between the crews (CO & UA work groups). Classic UA crews are just friendlier and will go the extra mile. CO crews are more “just get the job done” attitude – for the most part. I just find the UA classic crews more “seasoned” and professional. Also, the CO lead FA – or “Inflight Services Coordinator” works the Econ cabin, while the lead UA Crew – or Purser – works the Premium cabins. Maybe UA can shed some service light on the other work groups. CO – was after all the successor to Peoples Express !
Yes!!! Ric! I notice the exact same thing! I can tell immediately when the crew is United Classic vs. Continental. It’s amazing.
So true about CO crews just getting the job done. They’ll disappear after they “get the job done.” Last year, I took a pic of a flight attendant sleeping! in the back galley when I went back to try to get some water after the service. It was a CO crew. I guess they are still bitter about the merger or that’s just how they always did it at Continental. Hopefully this new customer service will help.
I’ve been on two Delta flights in the past few months and it was night and day compared to Continental. They genuinely cared about the customer experience and I really enjoyed both flights even without Economy Plus or extra leg room.
I feel a little trapped with my million miler and 1K status so hopefully things will improve.
I used to stand next to a coworker who would just talk about and point to what the customer had to do on the kiosk…….this while he sat on a stool and made no effort to look at what the customer needed or was doing. He weighed about 300 pounds by the way.
Oh, yes, I would then jump in and help the customer first proving to anyone else who cared or was observing that Mr. stool sitter was useless. Fun times.
United can have all the “training”, “re-training”, “core values” pyschobabel they want…..
Until you have employees who are happy and satisfied with all contractual union issues and their local and highest management people, this will spin itself out in a short period of time. I know from experience (35+ years). When you have management and even coworkers in place who are stubborn and don’t want to budge in their way of thinking or have a personal gripe or agenda against someone or the company as a whole, they will take it out on the customers or simply neglect to do what’s right which means lying, embellishing, not caring, etc.
This is not to say that the majority of United’s 80,000 employees are disgruntled but even one flight attendant, one gate agent or ground staff exhibiting a non-caring or lazy attitude per day can still affect an awful lot of people.
Also, I have worked around basically 2-3 groups of workers –
1. Those that are efficient, caring and use common sense.
2. Those that do the basics but are uncaring, do not use common sense and cannot think out of the box.
3. Those that are uncaring, lazy, cannot think out of the box but lie and give away the store just to get someone out of their face.
Hint: The majority of workers today (including many other businesses) are numbers 1 and 2.
@JoEllen, thanks for your insightful comments.
Correction —
Hint: The majority of workers today are numbers 2 and 3……not 1.
YES! Whenever I hear “flight service coordinator”, I know that my flight will only go downhill from here. pmUA FA’s were always professional and courteous. pmCO FA’s were always just there doing the bare minimum if at all … and not having a clue on how to do anything even a little bit better. My most recent HND-SFO flight was staffed by the LAZIEST pmCO FA’s I have ever come across. And what a let down when all my pmCO-staffed UA flights are horrible, and then this HND-SFO flight goes even lower. One of many things that were below average was that there was NO FA in the galley between dinner and breakfast in business class. The snack cart was out, but there was NO FA in sight. And, I was watching …
Or “International Service Manager” (ISM). The CO side…
“International Service Manager”……I’ve hated CO lingo/terms since the merger. They could have just kept “PURSER” – an appropriate title that UA and most airlines have used for decades. A “Manager” is basically a person that is sitting at a desk in an office. There are many more terms and titles CO used that were “forced” on UA employees. Took us ages to know what they were talking about (eye roll x 1000).
So….I just flew DCA – SFO in first on a pmCO-operated crew and have to say I was VERY impressed. The lead flight attendant (really young) and I had a nice conversation and he said that the in-flight service managers now DO work the premium cabin as he did. Both FA’s were super friendly and very attentive – a stark contrast to my usual experience with CO crews as I stated earlier. He also said that October is the “magic” date that the work groups should start to integrate (that’ll be interesting).
What is with a of these new genders popping up?
I’ve always known about male and female and I learned about intersex, which is caused by a duplication of
chromosome pairs 23, but then there’s other things.
Pronouns as well, i never knew there were so many,
like zir and xe, someone explain what they are and what it means Alot of people identify
as a gender apart from their sex. They see it as a part of their identity,
or as a part of how they present themselves. In societies there
are often sexual roles that are associated with the sexes and if those roles have a
grip over more than just basic sex-based nature (or similar), then genders will be more
than just about their sex. That’s probably why a third label was born to just acknowledge the concept of gender and identify within it.
Gender is just that social framework for those who were initiated.
It’s vague in nature. It’s nothing you want in an identity, unless you fragment it or something.
With gender dysphoria we see dysphoria about the sex and often what that sex is related to in gender dynamics.
Since sex influenced their development in identity due to dysphoria, the gender is
most likely part of their identity. While it’s reasonable,
there are trends that follow some extravagant (in my
opinion) ideas over it. Gender isn’t loose enough of a term to group all of their conceptions of it.
A lot of those following those trends have relevant traits that will always
be present. Some people seek those inane categorization and identify with them to feel relevance, growth, identity or sometimes passion. Some just like categorizing themselves when they find ways to
do it. I do think it can be fun to make up a good idea
in your head of who and what you are, or want to be, in relations to your society or culture, but it should be limited and monitored wisely when the labelling
isn’t helpful or when the traits aren’t needed or sought in development.
Understanding and analyzing your patterns and yourself doesn’t require words,
even if concepts like terms. Some subjects aren’t relevant
to coping or formation. As for intersex, it’s sometimes
a trisomy like you said, but it’s not a sex in itself: it’s an anomaly from the two human sexes.
Usually one is assigned regardless, depending on many factors.
Nothing wrong with acknowledging the gray area.