nowinyow

Maybe Jazz/Chorus will buy a bankrupt Air Canada. Fold it into their own. Fire the entire board and senior management of the current AC. Maybe even start up a true FF plan.

I hear there are a few 757's that may be available to get some routes going during the transition process.

ivanhoe15

Not as far fetched as some may think.

That's pretty much what happened with CrossAir and Swissair

Santander

Then AC would finally be run by a management team which knows how to do business and actually work with the unions. We can only hope this happens!

Mustang Sally

We need leadership - not a CEO and a board that seems to be asleep at the proverbial switch. Waiting to pick up the pieces shouldn't be a consideration.

nowinyow

This mess has been going on for years. It's foolish to even think the current structure can be re-molded. The stink in the AC boardrooms necessitates the need for a complete rebuild. It's akin to removing the smell from years of cigarette smoking from drywall and carpeting. Impossible. Rip it down and start anew.

Stranger

Of course, the possibility that the replacement might be worse is very real. At least the current crowd was aware of the customer satisfaction issue. In that respect they did good work.

Unfortunately, they comfortably installed themselves within the side of the corporate culture that sees labor as the enemy.

I continue believing that the real problem at AC is the hiatus between top and front line. Layers of paper pushers whose main goal is to protect their own existence. Unfortunately, current management did not deal with them early one when they could have. And now they have apparently bought into the BS that these people serve their masters.

Santander

Well said. ^

RCyyz

I agree.

That said, what's the point? Will they resturcture? If so, restructure what? I know many people feel that dumping the pension liability will go a long way to fixing things. Objectively I can see this as the financial impact will be undeniable. But how will "screwing" the employees address "sick-outs" and the other shenanigans we've recently been held hostage to?

At the recent KivaDo in SFO, we had a half-day with Virgin America. It was clear that this airline has an edgy feel to it, much like WS does and that their attitude towards pax is radically different than AC's. The Virgin staff we interacted with repeatedly referred to pax as "our guests" and from the way they said it, they really meant it. It wasn't just some made-up marketing buzz. And at their headquarters you could tell that these folks were there to do serious work but have fun at it too. At the airport, it seemed clear that even the staff at the check-in desks were having their own bits of fun sending people on their way.

All this to say, that IMHO a mere "restructuring" of AC won't be enough to recast the airline into the entity it probably needs to be in the years and decades to come. It would be nice to think that an AC on a strong financial foundation will flourish, but I truly think the issues go much deeper than that.

Mustang Sally

I'm not clear how much more dissatisfaction I can express at the moment.

If they were vaguely aware of customer satisfaction, I'd have thought they'd have made attempts to resolve this:

I've woken up this morning watching more chaos and more flight cancellations.
I've cancelled my plans this weekend because of this ongoing circus.
I've received no reassurances from Air Canada, despite writing directly to Rovenescu who's office told me they're "working very hard to resolve this..." How they didn't / couldn't say.

Customer satisfaction? In my view it's about on par with Rogers. And that ain't good.

ffsim

This.

Changing their attitude / corporate philosophy is easily the most difficult challenge they face.

ridefar

And that sums it up. They are systemically broken. Are the pilots "right" in thinking they deserve a bunch more money? Probably not. Are they right that the management bonuses are an embarrassment? Definitely. But they seem to conflate the two publicly, which means they can't win.

Many front line people (in particular the FAs) are really good these days. Particularly domestically. Even great in many instances. But beyond this there are so many examples of broken systems, relationships, structures, attitudes, etc. that it is really difficult to see how a simple bankruptcy fixes anything.

Your discussion of Virgin makes me think that a purchase by another airline significantly larger than AC is the only real hope of having a good, healthy AC in the long term (larger, because if WS bought them, which culture wins? AC or WS? not hopeful on that score!). Again, way too much cronyism for the government to let Virgin or any other foreign owner buy them--just listening to Calin's speech at the 75th/787 event in YYZ made that clear--but that is what should happen.

And yes, unequivocally, Canada needs more than just folksy ol' WS with no J and limited international connection. It is critical to our economic future. It is too bad AC takes an incredible opportunity and screws it up so catastrophically.

airbus320

I was at the same functon with Virgin America.....in fact I asked the question about how much WS influenced their culture. I was told that two of their VPs came from WestJet.

I was very impressed with the airline.

airbus320

In the present situation folksy is fine with me....gets me there safely and on time...and without wondering if the airline flies that day....and living in the middle of the country, I don't need J for domestic....as for international connecting either in ORD or MSP opens up the world for me.

fin 645

It has long been the situation that AC "management" has no idea what it is really like on the front lines. In fact, their pampered travel means that they don't actually know what it is like to be a real passenger going through the vagaries of pricing, availability, upgrades etc etc.

"Managers" manage people and processes without any understanding of what is actually involved. They are quick to criticize and blame when something goes wrong, and rarely praise when an extra effort is made to try to facilitate solutions when problems occur.

This blame culture includes flight delays - someone is assigned the "blame" when a flight leaves late, so each separate management silo does it's best to shift such blame. The best interests of the passengers do not enter into this equation.

Having said all that, there is obviously also such a "hiatus between top and front line" in the AC unions as well, witness the several rejected tentative settlements.

upgradesecret

Someone is a little mixed up.

The two VP's had a history with Air Canada, Canadian, ZIP and Eastern Provincial.