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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...

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

 

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....

 

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....

 

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.