-------VOLUME 44 NUMBER 22 OCTOBER 26, 1981 Response Line: . Some Revealing Questions The Question and Response Line tele­ phone system, set up recently to deal with rumors rampant in the airline, has been humming busily at a steady rate of several hundred calls a d'ay. It is not only tu~ng up grapevine whispers ranging in accuracy from the reasonably well-founded to the wildly twisted, it is also unearthing some revealing employee attitudes based on im­ perfect knowledge or understanding, if not on some curiously hostile, deep-seated mind-set. One caller, for example, demanded to know why the September 28th Skyliner feature titled "Business as Usual?" left out of its chronicle of extraordinary 1981 de­ velopments any mention of the fac_t that "TWA had second-quarter earnings of $57 million, in comparison with Delta's $47 million, and double American's $27 mil­ lion." The implication,of the question, and the tone in which it was posed, was clearly, "Who are you kidding with ~ll tluit gloom Under pressure of an FAA deadli~e, TWA's scheduling people worked rou~d the clock to finalize the December 1 schedule in and doofr!? Why are you painting the pic- accordance with FAA guidelines. Here, schedule planners work with their bible, the "Time by Station Report," to coordinate some ture blacker than it really is? What are you -- . 500 daily arrivals and departures. Burning the midnight oil are, from left: Colin Mackenzie, .director-current schedules; Nick setting us up for?" . Schaefer, manager-intermediate schedule planning; Chris Frankel, senior analyst-intermediate schedule planning; Julie Smith, The caller's skeptici~m might be owing, senior analyst-future schedule research, and Bob Fornaro, manager-current schedule development. The November 9 Sky liner will at least partly, to the facithat he read those carry a follow-up story. - second-quarter results incompletely and, able third quarter. The PATCO disruption tional." By invoking "tradition" in the As for the question of labor and produc­ in fact, incorrectly. soon dashed that hope. current era, he seems to be missing a cru­ tivity - has anything else been discussed Setting his error straight requires some In short, cheering is definitely prema­ cial point: regardless of what took place in so much this year? The company has re­ d~gree of explanation which, however te­ ture, and nooody is trying to con the Ques­ the past,_the conditions TWA must respond peatedly tried to make its position clear: dious, is necessary for an accurate compre­ tion Line's caller for any ulterior purpose. to today are the ones that exist now - the hension of TWA's financial perfoilnance. 1) TWA spends more on a per-employee What's been feeding his suspicions is his world that's out there.in 1981. basis for the total amount of work pro­ In the second quarter of 1981, it was not own misreading of the facts . Still another caller says the content of the 1hms World Airlines but 'frans World Cor­ duced than it used to, more than the Misses the Point Response Line messages seems to be all · average paid to workers in American poration - the airline's parent col]lpany about "finances and equipment, but :- which showed total earnings after taxes Another caller takes the company to task industry as a whole, more than its tradi­ for what he calls "TWA's traditional posi­ nothing about labor-the financial aspects tional competitors,-andfar more than its of $57 million. That bottom-line figure of labor," and thinks it" a little bit pompous included the combined pre-tax profits not tion _of retreating, rather than facing new new low-cost competitors. competition." He doesn't say how he mea­ to think we would know about schedules 2) For TWA to become more cost-effec­ just from the airline but also from the cor­ and big financial arrangements. " poration's food-service, hotel and real es­ sures advance or retreat, but an assessment tive, and therefore more competitive and of TWA according to some commonly ac­ Since the Response Line answers what more profitable- and particularly ifit is tate service businesses - less corporate it's given, apparently cepted standards doesn't seem to square some people know at to preserVe the basic employment oppor­ payments for administrative expenses, least enough about those matters to ask taxes and other items. with his opinion. tunity. it offers and go on to achieve its In terms of post-regulatory route ac­ questions dealing with them. Why is it fleet and growth objectives '-- it must The portion of those earnings contrib­ more pompous to expect the caller to care tions, TWA's posture has been, in fact, the reduce its labor cost for a given amount uted by the airline alone was not·$57 mil­ about "big financial arrangements" in the lion, but $38.7 million. That might seem most aggressive of any of the traditional of output or produce that output with a industry leaders. Subtracting markets airline's life than to expect her to pay atten- · smaller work force - or do both. fairly healthy - especially since during tion to such questions in her own affairs? that same period of 1980 the airline put abandoned from markets entered, one Yet another caller scoffs at what he ternl.s only $6.2 million into the corporate pot. finds that TWA has made a net addition to the "morale-building propaganda" articles· But one hardly gets a reliable reading of the its domestic ·route system of 17 cities, In Middle of Muddle he sees in the Skyliner about people who airline's financial well-being by_looking at while United is down 41, American is "love their jobs," then comments that a single quarter's results in isolation. down 28, Eastern is down 13, Pan Am is 'frans World Corporation Chairman Smart TWA's only shot at making money in­ down 13, Braniff is down 24 - and so OJ}. and TWA President Meyer "don'tlove this stead of losing it during a given year comes Even mighty Delt~ has pulled out of 67 airline or they'd stop all this shrinkage in the second and third quarters; earnings in cities while entering 80, for a net gain of 1J going on." As a final shot, he adds, "Sure, that six -month period have to offset ·the - four less than TWA's. The big net­ ' we love our jobs - but we'd move to losses it regularly incurs in the first and last gainers are Air Florida (up 19), USAir (up another airline in a minute!" 33) and North~est (up 38) - but no major quarters of the year for TWA just to bre·ak No Sentimental Journey even. carrier in the ·industry has a record that shames TWA's~ . One of the unfortunate aspects of the Misreads the Facts Does one ~asure "advance" vs. "re­ "shrinkage" the caller describes is that it's · For that reason, it's unrealistic to look at treat" by an airline's fleet acquisition pro­ often such cynical, tough branches which what seems to be a bang-up second quarter gram? TWA's relatively conservative air­ remain when an organization is repeatedly and start cheering. To get a sense of the craft orders, in light of its need to show forced to piUile away its eager, enthusiastic broader picture, for example, one has to· stronger earnings, have proved far more young shoots- those who actually do love look back at what happened in the first sensible than the buying binges which their jobs and aren't ashamed to. say so without adding the qualifier about their quarter. This year in that quarter, TWA lost some overextended airlines now regret. "Why the give-away fares?", you nearly $72 million. The second-quarter Maybe the caller has. in mind furlough ready mobility. ask. It's a wonder, too, for pricing Aside from that, though - why is it earnings made up for only about half that actions, but TWA is hardly alone ·in trim­ staffv.p. John Heilner, why some loss, so that at the mid-year point TWA was ming -its work force during the recent acceptable for an employee to love his job airlines are behaving so irration­ but be ready to move elsewhere, while still some $33 million in the hole. To over­ economic and traffic downturn, aggrava­ ally. In a Q&A on pages 4-5, he · senior management is required to love not come that deficit - and the inevitable ted by the traffic control problem. So what, hopes for the restoration of logic in just their jobs but the entire airline? Is a losses which will come in the fourth quarter exactly, is he complai~ng about? airlme competition. - TWA would have needed a very favor- A·cluemaybehis use of the word "tradi- (topage3) - .___ - Write Is Right Recently Seniors member Mel Warshaw wondered aloud whether Box605. ' writing Orte's congressman over the issue of taxing fringe benefits would do much good, he having received a w,.sn't the Aim lfeasury certificate with an equivalent ma­ non-commital "bed-bug" letter in re-· turity. ply. Maybe it isn't election year in Mel's While the established airlines must The program began slowly in its start-up Q ' break their backs and beat their year, fiscal 1979, but soon gathered mo­ district, because the experience of Los brains to make a buck these days, it is mentum as a number of smaller airlines Angeles based flight attendant Agnes Chattin was far more gratifying. She numbing to read in theNew York Times that began to tap the program as an adjunct to write to Sen.