Southwest Airlines

SOUTHWEST AIRLINES CASE

a) Indicate the major HR objectives that will have to be achieved in the next six months.
As we can see in the case, success in the company comes from their particular way of dealing with the employees. Not only rewards are needed to motivate employees, but also make them feel a key part within the company. The selection process is the most important part whenrecruiting new people and this can be damaged if the company does not control it in a proper way when adapting the company to new services.
This new challenge has to be carried out with precision and not in a rush because it is important to make things carefully so the company culture is not directly affected by the increase in the services given to customers.
Their main objective should be toimprove recruitment efforts as they acknowledged workers as their resource of competitive advantage. Although it will be more difficult for them due to the expansion, recruiting process should remain as it was and they may have to give some extra training to people that may not be as prepared as some others, but who, through an intense training in the corporate culture, are potential employees atSouthwest.
As Southwest is moving towards success, this can be an extra motivation to their people. Their commitment should be continuously increasing and the environment created in the company will be an inducement for young people looking forward to work in an organization like Southwest Airlines.
b) Prioritize the top five HR objectives associated with expanding operations into a new state.
Themain steps that the company will be facing when expanding the operations to a new state are summarized in the following:
- Restructuring the people working in the different areas and try to calculate the people that will be needed for the new positions. This will help them to organize their people in order to relocate them in the most efficient way. Southwest could use some of their old employeesto guide their new ones in the new location. They could propose it as a promotion in their job and it could be a change either for some months or more time for those employees that wanted to try a new experience in a new place and have more responsibility.
- Recruiting and selecting new people. As we said previously, Southwest will have to make a big effort in the recruitment process. If this iscarried out properly it can prevent from many costs, not only monetary but also in terms of time. A key part in the recruiting step is the job description. Southwest Airlines should include all the duties and responsibilities performed in the job as well as a detailed list of personal characteristics. This will help them to interview people really prepared for the position, or at least people whohave the characteristics the company is looking for more rapidly, since people who are not the profile for the position will not apply.
- Training, development and education of new employees. When giving your employees the opportunity to develop their skills through an intensive training program in which they will learn the company’s value and way of doing things, you are not only creatingloyal, knowing of the business employees, but also motivating them to share their skills and join them to the business model of your company. As said before, employees who have been in the company for a long time may teach the new ones and learn things from them as well, as they all have freedom to apply their best techniques in dealing with customers always within the standardization required. Thiscould be a good way of doing things quicker without losing efficiency. The training promotes employee satisfaction and retention in the company. They key to success is finding right people in the right place just at the right time.
- Controlling. In this part it is important to develop some key performance indicators that will pay attention to what is being done and what needs to be changed in...