Southwest Airlines

Twenty-five years ago, Herb Kelleher reinvented air travel when he founded Southwest Airlines, where the planes are painted like killer whales, a typical company maxim is "Hire people with a sense of humor," and in-flight meals are never served--just sixty million bags of peanuts a year. By sidestepping "reengineering," "total quality management," and other management philosophies and employing its own brand of business success, Kelleher's airline has turned a profit for twenty-four consecutive years and seen its stock soar 300 percent since 1990. Today, Southwest is the safest airline in the world and ranks number one in the industry for service, on-time performance, and lowest employee turnover rate; and Fortune magazine has twice ranked Southwest one of the ten best companies to work for in America. How do they do it? With unlimited access to the people and inside documents of Southwest Airlines, authors Kevin and Jackie Freiberg share the secrets behind the greatest success story in commercial aviation. Read it and discover how to transfer the Southwest inspiration to your own business and personal life.

"If you look at Southwest Airlines, and I admire what they do, they've been the most successful airline in the industry." --Gerard Arpey, CEO, American Airlines "Through extensive research Jody Hoffer Gittell gets to the bottom of what has sustained Southwest Airlines' positive employee relations and high performance through good and bad times." --Thomas A. Kochan, professor, MIT Sloan School of Management, MIT Global Airline Industry Program In an industry with losses in the billions, Southwest Airlines has an unbroken string of 31 consecutive years of profitability. The Southwest Airlines Way examines how the company uses high-performance relationships to create enormous competitive advantage in motivation, teamwork, and coordination among employees. It then goes further to show how any company can foster these powerful cooperative relationships and explains how to: Lead with credibility and caring Invest in frontline leaders Hire and train for relational competence Use conflicts to build relationships Make unions its partners, not its adversaries Build relationships with its suppliers

Southwest Airlines has a secret sauce, namely its incredible workforce of leaders at all levels. Lessons in Loyalty is an insider's clear, concise and energizing teachable point of view on how to build such a winning team.

Using the words of its own people, this intriguing book provides an in-depth look at the incredibly successful airline that changed the rules of the game with a no-frills business model and innovative corporate culture. Southwest Airlines turns in-depth interviews with the company's leaders, managers, employees, and passengers into a powerful case study of this highly successful, game-changing business. Ranging from the early days of the company to the present, the book covers the history of the airline and its founders, while also detailing the unique corporate culture that attracts employees and passengers alike. Throughout its history, Southwest has championed a culture that puts employees first, creating a productive workforce by hiring for "attitude before aptitude" (because skills can be taught) and allowing employees to be themselves at work. The founders' philosophies of "servant leadership" and a "fun-LUVing" attitude continue to attract employees and influence the company's daily work today. In detailing the airline's inner workings in the words of its own people, this book shows other companies how they can emulate Southwest's powerful business model and strategies, as well as its hiring practices and corporate culture.

When Southwest Airlines made its inaugural flight on June 18, 1971, experts predicted that the company wouldn't last more than ninety days. Some thirty-two years later, Southwest is the beleaguered airline Industry's only profitable major company-Money magazine has named Southwest Airlines' common stock the premier Investment of the last thirty years. Now Southwest's founding president and CEO (1970-78], Lamar Muse, offers a definitive account of the airline's scrappy beginning. The principles and practices that assured the company's success were, largely, Muse's own. Those same winning strategies continue to sustain the company through the market's ups and downs, In Southwest Passage, Muse delivers plain facts and informed opinions that replace convoluted outsider accounts of the company's history. For anyone wondering how the air Industry can renew itself, how Southwest achieved its dominance, or how business really works, this unique story has the answers.

With its low fares and friendly service, Pacific Southwest Airlines (PSA) was one of the most successful regional airlines in American history. Its distinctive orange, red, and white planes, complete with a beaming smile were immediately recognizable to those living on the West Coast. The airline was also known for employing beautiful and sociable flight attendants. Kenny Friedkin, the founder of PSA, started in 1949 with one leased DC-3 and expanded his fleet to serve millions of passengers each year. Although PSA is no longer in operation, its successful business model of low-priced, efficient service was copied by other airlines and today is considered the norm. In addition, former PSA employees still gather annually to relive the camaraderie they experienced as being a part of one of the most unique airlines of all time.

By revealing hilarious tricks of the traveling trade, Flying for Peanuts is the definitive how-to guide for learning to survive the Southwest Airlines flying experience. Filled with inside information from a seasoned traveler, Flying for Peanuts offers an outrageous guide for surviving - and actually enjoying - every flight with Southwest Airlines.

Through extensive research, the author gets to the bottom of what has sustained Southwest Airlines' positive employee relations and high performance through good and bad times.

A look at the origins, leaders, growth, and innovations of Southwest Airlines, the low-fare airline that was founded in Texas in 1967 and today carries more than 100 million passengers annually.

Revealing the secrets behind the success of Southwest Airlines, one of the world's most successful companies, this book expands on the unusual strategies employed. Southwest reinvented air travel 26 years ago with its low fares and zany, irreverent style. These nuts made flying an event. Today Southwest keeps air fares rock bottom by keeping costs low, satsifies customers by getting people and baggage to their destination on time, practices the Golden Rule at workand in the communities it serves and has the best productivity and safety records in the industry.