How does SVP IT guy get to keep his job?
 

Delta Leadership Committee | Delta News Hub

Well, I guess I kinda answered my own question when I saw his bio "Rahul Samant" esp. vs the other SVPs....

But still...2 MAJOR IT meltdowns (neither of which made any sense: "The back up to the double redundant backup caught fire" huh?...and APRILGEDDON...)...

Of course then there's the lovely QCQ2 quarterly training flail...."remain calm, all is WELL!"

Which all begs the question is this guy the best we can do?

Of course corporate comms says all the right things..."We're addressing these issues..next time we'll be ready...etc...." All of which I've heard before...none of which turns out to be true....

If I'm Eddie B. I'm at Davos/Bilderberg (or wherever those guys hang out) trying to poach somebody from Google, Amazon, or Apple's IT to bring aboard a team that can address these issues. Since I know he's on here reading everything we post...:D

PS: Bombay U? Thought the PC term was Mumbai nowadays? :confused:

The last meltdown had much less to do with the IT infrastructure than the use of subpar software (Eds choice) and the complete lack of staffing in scheduling and crew tracking.

Scheduling runs with a skeleton crew on a good day. I had never waited on hold for a scheduler at the old, crappy regional. Here, it's the norm, which is indicative of the staffing levels on a normal day.

The last one was all ops and little to do with IT.

used to be at delta it took ceo approval for any expenditure more than something like $10K.

I'm sure that level has been elevated...but in any budgetary proposal of significance its pretty safe to assume there were expenditure level options integrated for consideration.

Hopefully there were also explanatory risk analysis to the operation for each of those levels of economic investments. Understanding this business and managements fanatical reluctance to spend anything on stuff that doesn't directly put butts in seats, or bucks in their wallets.....could be the IT guy is only dealing with the reality of which option was selected for IT infrastructure investment.

OTOH....he could just be a Homer....:D

I don't get how it makes business sense to spend billions upon billions fixing LGA and LAX and then spend even more billions on worthless stock buybacks when our own house isn't in order. It's like some guy who earns $40k/year and has $50k in credit card debt running 22% interest who thinks it's smart to buy lottery tickets. I get that to Bubba this is a smart way to run a household, how do Harvard MBAs think the same thing?

You don't get it, or you don't agree with it?

Maybe the business sense is the goal of strengthening key revenue sources, and lowering the cost of capital. The "to do" list at Delta has several items. The prioritization of those items might be different to us as pilots than it is to others who're accountable for all items on the list.

If you believe the corporation's primary purpose is to make shareholders happy, then describe how the company's current prioritization of the "to do" list doesn't serve that purpose. Show your math.

It's not like that at all. The "guy" in this case is making between 5 and 6 multiples of his debt. He's taking some of his profits...after paying his employees industry-leading profit sharing...and buying far-from-worthless stock back. The "lottery ticket" analogy is bad because the billions you reference being spent in LAX and LGA represent investment far more certain than the odds involved in lottery games.

Not so fast. Stock buyback schemes are controversial. Frontline employees see exactly where money could be spent. And I don't mean in our pockets. I could start a list, but it's the same as yours.

Blame it on the philosophy-majored McKinsey consul"ticks" in the front office. Hope they enjoyed their liberal arts studies at Dartmouth and Brown. You pay McKinsey $10 million to solve a $5 million problem so the Board has someone to blame when the $hit hits the fan.... :eek:

Few things aren't.

There are some good reasons to buy back a stock. To get rid of unfriendly investors (Icahn, et al), or because you believe the stock is undervalued are two of them.

According to my reps at the time, Delta made stock buy backs part of the effort to make the stock investment grade. Corporations deemed investment grade have access to cheaper interest rates for debt, typically better bond ratings, and the ability to issue shares for equity without causing alarm.

I agree. We can see the thin spots. It'd be great if my personal priorities ruled.

Instead of specious analogies, I'd like to see the discussion focused on the potential financial benefits of their priorities, and the cost of them.

I'll start: I'm glad my investment in life insurance has been waste of my income so far. If our corporation spends profits on "money insurance" we can call it a waste of money...unless we need it.

Where that ranks on the "to do" list is good fodder for debate. 2-hours into my being on hold with Crew Tracking last April would not have been a good time for me to rank them. :)

As for the title of this thread...I have the same question.

Karn,
Of course you know almost 90% of Mr. Ed's compensation is tied to stock. Just saying stock buy backs help who? Unfortunately, I checked flight officer on the application.

Cheers

Things really went south when we contracted out Deltanet -- our own employee website -- about 2 years ago. I'm ok with iCrew being outdated and DOS-like. What I can't stand are links that lead to nowhere, or a temperamental website that likes Chrome one day and Safari the next.

It needs to be fixed.

Heyyyyy... my degree is in philosophy! :p

At least one of us read a book!

Deltamatic

I'm not.

Our IT actually got the Delta app right in a lot of ways and we should have something comparable. As much time as we spend on interfacing with iCrew, there's no reason it shouldn't be brought out of the early 90s.

For those new to the discussion, this article from 2015 is worth a read.

http://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/usa-buybacks-cannibalized/

Click on the banana.

It's some of each. Perhaps you could explain how long it will take to earn back $4B dumped into LGA. In addition, you'd have to subtract any profit we'd have earned leaving things as-is and just use the added revenues when calculating how long it takes to earn back that $4B. I have no math to show you since I don't know what a typical flight in LGA earns us and how many years is suitable for a company like Delta to see a profit on a $4B investment. Meanwhile, I saw a single day's worth of storms hit the bottom line for $150M. I saw a power outage cause similar havoc. Then there's the passengers who will never fly DAL again because of these mishaps, how much more is that?

In regards to stock buybacks, seeing how these guys run IT I only hope they're better at managing business. I have no idea if they have any clue what they're doing or if management is lining their own pockets. Reference the financial meltdown of 2007, proof positive that all these Harvard MBAs really know how to do is line their own pockets without any regard for the country or their employees. If left to their own devices they'd do it again.

My analogy wasn't supposed to be a direct comparison of situations but a mindset. In both cases, both Bubba and Delta have far more important spending priorities but instead chase something shiny.

Wait? So you all are saying lotto tickets arent a sound investment?

Daanng!

I can't explain it. That's why I never suggested it was a misguided business decision. If I was criticizing it, I'd provide some facts to support my claims. I'd use reasonable analogies, or cite analysis from others with more expertise in large-scale capital expenditures.

There are a lot of variables. Maybe the best place to start is how much of that $4B will come from Delta. My guess is not all of it. Then we'll have to figure out how to measure any competitive advantage it gives us over the other airlines serving LGA. When we get a range of numbers representing the value, let's see if we can estimate the cost of not addressing the problems with the 3 terminals there.

No clue. Maybe they'll go to United, which has never had a storm- or IT-induced problem. Or American. No disruptions there. :rolleyes: Maybe the number of "avoid Delta" passengers who missed flights due to our current terminal layout is similar. Maybe the number of passengers coming to us because they've vowed to never fly on "_____" again is a wash. Do you have any of that data?

There's a bit of irony in criticizing Delta for investing money in making something slicker and more efficient for our customers, while asking them to invest money in a slicker and more efficient suite of IT functions for us.

Don't get me wrong, I think investment in IT should be a very high priority, but I don't presume to think my ranking or relative emphasis should drive the decision.

Maybe a good place to start could be profitability and performance relative to peers?

I hope to heck they're lining their pockets! I'm here to line mine! I'm not a hypocrite who thinks we should be the highest paid pilots, but our CEO shouldn't be at the top.

I'm not well versed in the involvement of our executives in bundled mortgage debt packages or credit default swaps back then. Any connection you can provide would be appreciated.

Good to know! Your analogy started with Bubba owing more than he earned. That made it the exact opposite of Delta's situation.

Change "far more important" to "many" and I'll agree. Here's hoping they can get us a shiny new IT system!

He joined Delta in Feb of 2016, the groundwork for some of these disasters was in place before he arrived. I'm still cheering for his success, because it matters to the success of the company. His accomplishments within Delta will build a solid foundation for the rest of the company. It is somewhat different than cheering for the SVP of Flight Ops, because his objectives include reducing pilot costs and improving pilot efficiency.

As for the QCQ2 disaster, I suspect there is some Flight Ops influence. Does our IT department fully control the method of content delivery for training within each department?

It is if you win!

Recall one of our pilots in the erly 90s winning i think about $20M in the lotto....im pretty sure he kept working.

Yeah, but both his ex-wives were no longer a factor after that payout. He was working for his new toys again!:D

Onwards and upwards....
 

X ohhh, about 100. X100...there, fixed it.

14,000 pilots bid their schedules each month and the monster machine combobulates the permutations, PCS runs 4x/day and 1000s of schedules are changed, 2 hours of rain blow through Atlanta and the wheels come off...?....for days?

I'll bet a fix would cost less than Eddie's condo in FL ($7.3m if you're too lazy to google). Didn't some kid hack the first iPhone in a basement for nothing with a case of Red Bull? Let's get him to start and offer him 2(!) cases of Red Bull. :)

Then again, I'm not holding my breath...like I said, heard it all before...guess we'll all get a chance to see what the next IROP looks like when it happens.

But I got my surface....which likes to freeze when it hears a 10 leg taxi instruction...in ORD...at night....in the rain....and my update took care of it: now it freezes even faster! :D

Not to worry, the cows in the CS HUD will lead you to the proper runway......

18 pages of printed instruction just to get in to QCQ, which doesn't work...again.

I have been waiting for somebody to say this!!! What a joke our IT dept is!! si:ibmaccess was still better than this $hit!!

Had Rahul on a jumpseat before the first meltdown. He was new to the company and taking it all in. Seemed like a very nice guy, asked lots of questions. But he had zero understanding of airline ops. His background was in the banking industry and even he said he was surprised that Richard and Ed wanted him.

If only Deltanet worked like my bank website. Or my mortgage, or Fidelity, or Facebook, or my credit card...

not wells fargo....I hope.:D

Hmmmm
 

Funny how this weeks FlightOps comm has a burble about "addressing IROPS"...I guess they ARE reading these chat boards! :D

Sneak preview: "Get an UBER and go to your hotel, wait to be contacted, this tape will self destruct in 5 seconds."

Hey, didn't I just read UBER isn't an approved transportation service?
:cool:

LOL - now that is funny!