Late Tuesday Ralph Hunter, head of the Allied Pilots Association (APA represents the pilots at American Airlines) issued yet another one of his thoughtful takes on the situation that now exists between the pilots at the airline and management.
His message: shared sacrifice is dead.
No surprise, given recent actions by management at American Airlines — not the least of which was the recent article in the New York Times that we cited here last week. Throw in some salary increases, more stock options for management team members, but more importantly — an attitude from management now that basically says, “Screw you” to its unions (said with a strong sense of entitlement) and well, you get the message.
I’ve always been a fan of Ralph’s measured approach — unlike the usual heated rhetoric and threats we tend to hear from other union leaders. Re: the recent predictable public rantings from both the America West pilot union leadership and US Airways‘ pilot leadership in regard to negotiations between both groups and US Airways — after US Airways posted a nice profit for the second quarter.
Having watched, and well, at one time, having been involved in, the relationship between APA and American closely for more than 13 years — I understand that writing “shared sacrifice is dead,” was extremely hard for Ralph. Ralph and his team have worked tirelessly to try and work with the airline to better the previous negative relationship that had existed at the airline between management and labor.
A lot of other people on both sides here have also invested hours, days, weeks, months and years working to improve the previous situation. A situation that was all confrontational — all the time.
Those who are not familiar with the history here will be quick to say, “Oh, the pilots just want more money now that the airline is making money.” Or, “This is just your typical, ‘Unions don’t think management deserves raises’ problem.”
But this meltdown goes much deeper, as I have discussed in PBB for months. For whatever reason, the management bonus payment issue that went to arbitration earlier this spring became a “personal” issue for CEO Gerard Arpey. If that sounds familiar, it should. It is exactly what happened to his mentor, Robert Crandall.
Someone on the American side, or with the Overland Group, should have stepped in at that point this spring and put the relationship between management and labor back on track. Forced the issue.
But obviously there is no one in the AMR “inner circle” with the balls to do so. In fact, my suspicion is that there was pressure — but it was pushing Arpey in the opposite direction.
This is not a good omen going forward for the airline, as Arpey has now effectively blown any positive credibility he had succeeded in building up with labor over the last three years.
What a waste.
As a result, Ralph had no choice in writing what he did on Tuesday. And that is a damn shame.
A round of the PlaneBusiness kazoo dirge for the death of shared sacrifice.
Makes me sad. I had feared this would be the end result after the spring fiasco. I might be wrong, but I think if that had been handled better, a 23% adjustment in the salary of the CEO to correct the fact that the CFO makes more money might’ve not gotten much press from other than the die-hards.
I really had much higher hopes for Gerard. I supose there’s still hope, but I’m not feeling it.
I agree with you. But I think a number of news articles today have totally missed the big picture. They are basically following the airline’s talking points and making this into a typical “union doesn’t want management to have raises” story. For those of you who are involved, you know it’s much more complicated than that.
But yes, the “spring fiasco” is a good way to describe it.
As I wrote in PBB earlier this spring, I think one person who had been close to all the mess said it best when he told me he felt both sides needed marriage counseling. The trust that had been built up had been broken. The credibility was gone.
The question was — how do we get back to where we were before all this and start talking again?
Clearly if one partner is oblivious to the fact there is a problem in the first place, what caused it, or they are clueless to the ramifications of that problem — it makes it a lot harder to try and work it out.
And that seems to be the case here.
Not only that, but there now appears to be a huge “spin” campaign in full force on the part of the airline to try and position what has happened in the classic ugly union/management mode, i.e., it’s not their fault. None of it.
It’s a shame it has come to this. Relating back to what you said, yes, it makes me sad too.