Originally Posted by
satchip
I agree with your philosophy on business in general, but in the airline world where seniority is everything and is not portable, our ability to vote with our feet is severely limited. As long as they don't go below the price point that you can make more doing anything else than you can flying you will stay. Your professionalism and your self preservation instinct will keep you doing the job to the best of your ability. You may be surly, but pilots in general have very little contact with the customer.
Where you see the impact on poor relations is in the lower rungs of the employment ladder. At JFK we hired rampers, got them trained then they promptly left for JB for higher pay.
It matters for pilots too. Here's one of the most credible experts in business management talking about this exact philosophy using pilots as a specific example:
YouTube - LEADERSHIP: American vs Southwest
One of the real tragedies of LM's "proactive engagement" strategy is that we have shielded our management from the normal consequences of this critical business mistake. It's helped them in the short run (although I would submit probably not in the long run), and it has hurt us immensely to date.