Originally Posted by
Buck Rogers
Well Forgotmyhat. That was well written and I agree with most of what you wrote, except for the ultimatum. There is nothing we can do that will save the company, we cannot give enough. It is either going to work out or not. If not, the company will declare bankruptcy and Sleepy Ed will get his pound of flesh. If it does work out, the company will not have the resources to pay an extra 3B per year on a new contract for a long time. With the current losses and projected losses, major gains seem difficult to achieve.
Maybe I missed it but what is our leverage? Who has more leverage, us or the company?
It wasn't so much as an ultimatum as a pointed way of saying, "no". I agree, no matter our give, we will not be Delta's saving grace...or its demise. It's not so much about making major gains at this point, its about keeping the QoL that we do have.
Leverage...it depends. We have the leverage to say "No". That's it...done. However, in line with my original sentiment, actual leverage doesn't matter! It's perceived leverage, and the company (like most big business) is an expert at controlling the narrative. They have people who get paid big money to make it so. Pilots rely on facts and logic. But that's not how the game is played.You make your own leverage. It's not, "well you made $XXB last quarter so we don't want middle seats when we deadhead anymore". That's bush league...who are you trying to convince? It should be more like, "since BK the pilot group has regained XX% of their sacrifice to save the company...while the execs have made XXX% of their give". Once we have swayed whoever needs to be convinced (the public, media, shareholders, whoever), then we talk specifics. But that campaign needs to begin waaaay before actual negotiations. That's were we dropped the ball and why we get taken advantage of...we don't know how to play the game. So now we just sound like whiny pilots instead of leaders who sacrificed 40% in pay and lost a pension. Again, just one noob pilot's opinion. I'm not an expert, but what we've been doing doesn't seem to be working.