Southwest Airlines’ Positive Organizational Change

Additionally, positive change, including fostering a culture of excellence and staying up-to-date with advanced aircraft maintenance technologies, can also help the company sustain its ability to compete in the global market by preventing reputational and financial losses from technological disruptions causing flight cancellations. In recent years, Southwest Airlines has had a series of mass flight cancellation events, including over 1300 flights canceled on April 2, 2022, as a result of “intermittent technology issues following routine overnight maintenance” (NBC Chicago Staff, 2022, para. 2). Organizational change and fostering the workforce’s readiness for taking responsibility and sharing their incident prevention ideas could be helpful (Umut & Aslan, 2019). For Southwest Airlines, such strategies may result in the minimization of technology-related issues caused by outdated working practices, thus improving its global reputation as a reliable carrier that fails to provide transportation services only if encountering extraneous factors that it cannot control, such as weather conditions or changes to global air traffic caused by other carriers. These reputational gains will solidify the company’s competitive advantage on a global scale by affecting foreign customers’ preferences and levels of trust.

References

Deabler, A. (2018). Southwest baggage handler recorded throwing ‘living fish,’ fragile items at airport. Fox News. Web.

NBC Chicago Staff. (2022). Southwest flights delayed, canceled nationwide due to technology problems. NBC Chicago. Web.

Umut, U. Y. A. N., & Aslan, A. (2019). Promoting readiness for change: A systematic review of positive psychology in organizational change context. Yönetim Bilimleri Dergisi, 17(34), 349-370. Web.