This is not a random conversation: there is another forum about whether AF executives experience competition, in which it emerged, from various sources that part of the AF 'machine' was not used to doing that at all and in fact many expressed disbelief at AdJ's desire to try the competition. This was compared to many other airlines which have a far more systematic policy of executives trying other airlines to add a layer of benchmarking by experience. The question was then raised of whether this was AF-specific or saying something more general and the moderator, most wisely in my view, decided to move that part of the discussion to a separate forum so that it would not clutter/skew the existing thread. However, most of us read it as directly discussing the background of AF's attitudes towards competition direct experience and characterisation which is the way in which it historically emerged. So now, whichever the quantity of jam, you have the identity of the fruit it is made of