Herb Kelleher's Case Study Of Southwest Airlines, Inc.

In 1996, Rolling King, an entrepreneur who owned a small commuter air service, approached Herb Kelleher’s law office about a plan to start a low-cost/low-fare airline that would transport passengers between San Antonio, Dallas, and Houston. Southwest Airlines, Inc. (SWA), was founded in 1971, in Dallas Texas, flying Boeing B737 aircraft, is one of the largest airlines in the United States (Eroglu, O, 2015). Southwest together with AirTran and forty-one plus years of profitability covers more than ninety destinations throughout the United States, the District of Columbia, the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, Mexico, Jamaica, The Bahamas, Aruba, and Dominican Republic (Southwest Airlines Co, 2015). Combined with AirTran the company operates approximately

Kelleher set the tone from the beginning he had a history of telling things like they were, with no sugar coating and as a result of this Kelleher experience a high degree of credibility. Outstanding business leaders find ways to demonstrate that they care about their people individually. Caring about the well-being of people was demonstrated by the fact that the company had no layoffs even during turbulent times of the airline industry. Kelleher was also known for offering help to employees dealing with personal issues. Kelleher was known as both a helper and listener (Gittell, J., 2015). Stories have been told about how the CEO would help flight attendants serve food during flights, sing at company picnics, wear costumes on holidays, play pranks, and rap during press conferences. Although these stories may or may not be true they are an important component of the Southwest culture

The strategy has been to interest travelers not from other airlines but from trains, buses, cars by providing with the fastest as well as the less expensive service. In order to support the strategy the company decided to fly only one type of airplane, the Boeing 737, and to substitute linear flying for the hub-and-spoke model. However the largest contributor to the success at Southwest is its culture and employees. “Your spirit,” says Mr. Kelleher,, is “the most powerful thing of all.”

Given the success of Southwest Airlines CEO, I think the assignment would be difficult due to influences that the founder has on the Company. However, “If you are the chief executive of a company that is sailing with the wind and leading in its competitive race, that’s a sign that your culture is in sync with your strategy. This makes your company much more likely to deliver consistent and attractive profitability and growth results”(Katzenback, J., & Aguirre, D.,