KansasMike

This is a very insightful comment.

United needs entirely new, fresh management from top to bottom that will manage according to the "From Good to Great" principles. If you got a Mullally, issue would be to get the frontline employees and unions on board who have been burned, over and over, from these guys who couldn't run a corner grocery store w/o consults, et cetera. And, I wouldn't blame them. Still, he is the type of guy the airline desperately needs.

rufflesinc

These jokers on the executive team should be playing russian roulette with their bonuses Double or nothing.

jhayes_1780

The recovery and win for this would be to announce this was a misunderstanding and say this was *in addition to* the current bonus program. But that will never, ever happen

HKG_Flyer1

This is so completely insane. Kirby should be fired.

cerealmarketer

This board is hilarious...

"Manage from good to great - that'll fix it" (using a book to run a company...)

then...

"Consultants are bad...need someone who can manage with common sense (because someone who needs a book to run the place is going to do better than one who needs consultants)

and...

"this is a terrible decision - it will ruin the company"

only to see it reversed incredibly quickly

now...

"we can't complain about the policy now that's fixed, so let's make sure they show the guy the door..."

Good grief.

I don't know the guy. Didn't care much for HP or AA as airlines, whatever hand he had in decisions at those places. All I can judge is he's a shrewd scheduling and pricing guy who knows he needs well lubed ops.

Maybe over his head with the front line management / consumer product piece.

But in no place for me to judge his ability to do his job from the outside.

Looks to me they had a cost cut they were trying to solve for. This was the poorly received attempt from HR.

Yet another chapter in the 30+ year UA saga that transcends *every management team that has tried to touch it*.

Even Gerald Greenwald, the epitome of 'good to great' type CEOs that gave them a few good years after the Steven Wolf era was smart enough to know he couldn't keep it up, and left UA at the peak in 1997, only to have it descend into chaos just a few years later.

Ber2dca

That one tweet seems to imply that bonuses were and I suppose now still will be automatic. Automatic bonuses are basically worthless in terms of encouraging good performance because they just end up being considered to be a part of people's salaries i.e. something people feel entitled to regardless of their personal performance. That sense of entitlement certainly came through in a few of the more outraged posts about it.

UA might keep hiring the wrong CEOs, but maybe it's because trying to manage a company with an entrenched union workforce full of 40+ employees that will place their personal benefits and perks above anything else is like trying to catch a greased up pig.

rufflesinc

Why is it that cost cuts never involve executive bonuses?

milepig

I think we know the answer to that. Cost cuts equal higher profits which in turn lead to higher executive bonuses.

JBord

Well, that doesn't really make sense. It's pretty clear if you replace a bonus program with something of less value to employees (as a whole), it was to save money. Putting in a new program on top of the old one would just make that savings goal even harder to achieve. Now it's mainly an employee relations issue.

I totally agree with the book comment. Business books are a dime a dozen, and most are fads. Bethune was a perfectly fine CEO, but he didn't have any special timeless insights. People wishing for UA to manage the business in a totally different industry environment just likely have fond memories of CO back in the day, but perhaps haven't managed at a high level within a major corporation. I'm not being critical of anyone here, you can get an idea or two from a book, but you just can't base your whole business model on it in a rapidly changing world.

And of course it was a cost cut goal. Every single decision made in a large corporation is tied to either revenue or cost. Regardless of all the stories (or of wishes by posters here), these companies are not altruistic, concerned about the environment, etc., unless it is first rationalized with a cost or revenue number. Since there would be no tie to revenue by changing the incentive program, by default they had to look at cost savings before announcing the new plan.

Because that's kind of an impossibility. When your bonus is based on cutting cost or hitting a specific margin, you can't make that very bonus part of the equation. What you're suggesting is that executive bonuses should be decreased or removed to reach cost goals. But then what incentive does a CEO/CFO/COO etc. have to meet those goals??? They're not like the average employee who cares about keeping their job, as the lifespan of these roles is typically around 5 years anyway, and usually have golden parachutes.

WineCountryUA

The quarterly performance bonuses varied depending on the operational performance metrics set by the company. So there was/is a correlation between performance and the size of the bonus. They were on a regular time schedule.

Karl-MDW

How can a company as big and complex as United announce something that has not been well thought out? The effects of this stupid plan - and its "pause" will have an extremely negative impact on United's already delicate public image - just as it was beginning to recover from last year's dragging incident. What stupid self-inflected mess! Not to mention even more CRJ 200!

Why can't this company get it right?

bocastephen

I would suggest giving it a read before dismissing it - From Good to Great is not a dime a dozen business book nor a fad, but a common-sense framework for better leadership that has been a staple in many a business school and corporation for many years. Its guiding principles would make a huge difference to everyone's experience at United - and the difference between such leaders as Jack Welch, Alan Mullaly and Herb Kelleher vs Smisek, Immelt and Whitman. Recruiting the best people, treating them well and empowering them to do good things is not rocket science, unless you really only have one customer - someone on wall street who will measure your metrics and help deliver your personal bonus.

It's obvious we have a leadership problem at United, or really a lack of leadership, and the result is obvious everywhere from our plates to our crews, especially when the person we thought would be a leader is now busy hiding under an umbrella and whose only significant public statement as of late is "de nada".

Ber2dca

So were these metrics counted per person, per unit or per company?

jolan560

Might've honestly just been an attempt to reduce the amount of sick time taken by the front line, hard to see what else this would accomplish. The bonus is a nice way of allowing employees to share success given the lack of stock options at a lower level. Lottery chips away at Munoz's attempt to build a culture which has been trying to give the front line more support and reason to feel proud of the work they do.

Miles Ahead

They've "paused" the lottery system. Have they actually said they are reinstating the old program?