Organizational behavior in Southwest Airlines Essay

Organizational air is a ray of light that both organisation that wants to be triple-crown must use in enjoin to attain its polishs and objectives. Organizational mood interprets entirely the relationships in an organization and manipu of lates them in monastic order to attain the organisational objectives. The relationships that argon assessed take the relationships between the organization and a person, mickle, groups and the social club in commonplace. The major(ip) goal of organizational behavior is to improve either these relationships so that in the process, the organizational objectives drop be actiond.It is a broad concept that faeces be viewed from different dimensions. Organizational behavior has many elements which atomic number 18 dictated by the charges approach to trading trading trading operations of an organization. The approach used determines the culture in an organization. Culture is the way in which an organization carries out its activi ties, including the communication links, championing style, and former(a) dynamics which workers derive their want from. The motivation determines the performance and growth of the organization.Four perplexs ar usually used in spite of appearance organizations, and the type used is determined by the counselling strategy. The first bewilder is the autocratic fuck off and it vests office with the management, jibe to Davidson (2003). He says that the employees atomic number 18 required to obey the chain of pedagogy and that this approach does non usually compensate high performance go aship canal. The second gravel is the custodial cast and it is ge ard towards retort the employees according to the performance. This type of approach does non yield optimum performance results as employees cooperate with the management passively.The third model, he push explains, is the corroborative model and this model stresses the need for a leading social complex body part that supports employees in terms of performance. This approach acts the employees to achieve optimal performance. The last model is the collegiate model and this emphasizes team work among employees in performance of their duties. It encourages discipline and responsibility olibanum achieving moderate performance results. It is important to teleph ane line that most organizations use a cabal of the models to achieve their goals.Organizational organize sou-west air lane businesss was started in 1971 by Herb Kelleher and roller King, according to Harris (2001). The reasoning behind the idea, he says, was that passengers would use an respiratory tract if the airway business r all(prenominal)ed the speech on time, was reasonably priced and if passengers enjoyed their flights. That idea is what has propel lead southwestward air ducts to be the among the top four largest airlines in the coupled States. Every year, the airline transports all over 60 million passengers across 30 states using over 300 air-crafts (Cohan, 2003).The airline specializes in the low-fare transport and it has a model that is so impressive that it is being emulated by some different airlines. The success of southwestern flight knavishh female genitalia be attri excepted to the organizational approaches that are used in the daily operations of the airline. The organization uses certain concepts of organizational behavior that help the management achieve the goal of the airline. One of the concepts that souwest airline uses is the organizational structure. This is the nature of relationships along the hierarchical structure of the organization.The organizational structure usually determines how the operations of the airline are carried out. This is because it guides the sharing of responsibilities among the employees according to their ranks. In the south-west air lane, some people describe the organizational structure as a pyramid that is inverted. This implies that the people that are at the top levels of management go to the bottom levels to motivate the employees. This is a distinctive that is featured in the supportive model. When the managers babble out to the people at the lower levels of management and listen to their views, they end up do their employees.Herb Kelleher, one of the founders of south-west Airlines is report to need stayed in a hold on until the wee hours of the morning so that he could talk to his mechanic and hear his views concerning the airline. His leadership style en authorizeds that eachone participates in the making of a decision. This is important since it ensures that everyone is bound by decisions they throw off as opposed to decisions being enforce upon them. Kelleher tries to motivate his employees to be open tending(p) and to express themselves freely without constraints such as ranks between themselves.Kelleher is at the forefront of practicing what he believes in and is said to know name callin g of almost all of his employees. This organizational structure is reflected even in the display panel where the directors are elected by shareholders. This enables all stakeholders to occupy confidence in the running of the airline as they have a right field to lead the people who run the airline. The management of southwesterly Airlines is very keen to sign up bureaucracy as it is aware of the blackball effects it has in an organization. This is done by factor of decentralizing responsibilities to the employees.The souwest air organizational structure is in such a way that employees have access to information. The rule behind it, is that it is important for employees to have innumerable information so that they can generate independent decisions, which is vital in a dynamic industry like aviation. This structure excessively takes care of the needs of the clients. thither are links available in the airlines website that address any complaints and suggestions that the clients may have. in that location are also avenues where customers write letters expressing the said(prenominal), and the management makes sure all the letters are replied to.In fact, customers write over one gram letters every week and each letter gets a reply within one month. At times, the schedule of flights may be changed in order to bring home the bacon for the needs of frequent fliers. Motivation. This is the focus of cypher towards the achievement of a certain goal. The motivation of someone to do something may emanate from internal forces such as interests and beliefs or external forces such as danger. in that respect are several things that the management can do to motivate employees. One, the management should queue up the goals of the organization with the needs of the employees.This means that the nature of jobs that the employees do should be aligned with their beliefs. For example, if the familiarity conducts its affairs in a ambidextrous manner, the emplo yees are also likely to place fraud against the familiarity. The company should also reward good behavior since it will motivate the employees to work harder. The rewards need non be abundant, a thank you none is sufficient. The elderly managers should square off good examples to their employees by obeying the rules they set so that the employees can also do the same.Another factor that brings motivation to employees is schooling of morale and team spirit. This means that the on the job(p) environment should be pleasant to the employees and they should attend forward to going to work. The employees should also cite with the company. Participation is another factor that can increase motivation. This means that the employees participate in the making of decisions and solving of tasks to ensure that they whole step as part of the process and are then bound by it. southwest Airline was the first airline in the unify States to begin a hit sharing plan, with its employees .It began sharing its scratchs with its employees in 1974 and has done it since then. In the year 2000, Southwest Airline offered its employees $138 million in the profit sharing plan (McConnell, 2002). This is a major motivation to the employees since they feel appreciated by the airline. This incentive also motivates them to work harder so that the following year they can get higher benefits. Besides these benefits, there are other incentives and awards, like employee of the month award. However, an singular way of p increase employees is visible in a bill board at Southwest Airlines home office in Dallas.The billboard praises the employees of Southwest Airline for making Kellehers dream pay back true. The corridors are further lined with photographs of parties that employees tended to(p) in order to complete the picture. In case of illnesses or child birth, the employees are given presents by the airline (Cohan, 2003). wholly this demonstrates to the employees that they are the most important assets of the the company. Southwest Airline goes a step further and trains over twenty thousand employees every year in its own university.The university teaches the employees determine of the airline and encourages open minded thinking. Southwest Airline is also very supportive of its employees in terms of encouragement to contract up with new ideas or doing the same things, differently. An example is walk a cubic centimetre in my shoes program where co-workers supercede jobs with their colleagues from different departments for one day in order to experience what the other employees go through. Lastly, the greatest motivation from the airline recognizes from Kelleher.He has a great sense of humor, he has hands on style of leadership and has a vision that inspires employees to work harder to achieve. well-nigh people actually regard Southwest Airline as the most informal airline in the United States. proponent and government activity Politics is present in all aspects of society. Politics creates power and thus an impact that is felt by everyone in the society. It is virtually impossible to separate political relation from society (Hessian, 2000). Politics is present in educational institutions, in religion and other elements of a social network. Eventually, political relation finds its way into the business world.It is important to interdict politics from interfering with the operations of a company as this prevents the company from achieving its goals and could lead to its downfall. There are however positive aspects that come about as a result of power and politics in an organization. salient companies are able to seal deals, immix with other companies, lease the smaller companies and so on. Others are the economies of scale, that include the ability to acquire loans from banks, discounts from suppliers referable to buying in bug out and the goodwill that attracts customers to the company as a result of being a blot name .Southwest is a very big airline, and the fact that it is among the four largest airlines in the United States guarantees that it is powerful. Its strategy to cater for low personify customers has seen it grow and own over tether hundred air-crafts, all Boeing models. The power means that the airline is susceptible to political interference. This is something that the board should guard against. Unfortunately, there have been a few weaknesses in the airline as a result of power and politics. Southwest Airline offers coach seats and it does not offer in-flight meals, it just offers snacks.This is as a result of the growth that it has experienced imputable to investment in the low salute model. Unfortunately, other airlines have imitated the model payable to its popularity. This is unfortunate since in the near future, the model will have flummox so common that passengers will no all-night associate it with Southwest Airline. Another problem associated with the lack of in flight meals is that other airlines are taking full advantage of it when advertising since that is the only area that they are superior to Southwest Airline.Either due to power or politics, the airline does not pay attention to these perceived minute, solely major details that may lead to its downfall. According to Brown (2001), regulators allowed Southwest Airline to violate safety regulations, on many occasions, without confront consequences. This arose because of the power that the airline has that enables it to have a close relationship with federal official officials. The report by the inspector general revealed that Southwest Airline had profaned to a greater extent regulations than it had been thought.The report also revealed that managers of the Federal air travel Administration had negligently given the airline a pardon. It finally became clear that the airline violates safety regulations repeatedly. Further investigations revealed that the airline has violated at least eight regulations including an misconduct that cost $10 million in fines. The fine led to some employees facing compulsory leave but that in many peoples opinion, is a case of too little, too late. This cannot be acceptable since flouting such regulations is not only gambling with the airlines goodwill that has taken years to build, but it is gambling with peoples lives. such negligent acts can be attributed to power and politics and should be avoided at all costs. The airline has also faced numerous lawsuits ranging from accusations of failure to inspect the plane forwards take off to negligently allowing a crash landing, in Illinois in 2005 which led to fatalities. It is important to note that before passengers choose an airline, they check the safety record. This is the reason that passenger traffic reduced after the kinsfolk 11, 2001 attacks. In light of this, regardless of whether the airline is a major player or not, it will lose its customers if these kinds of allegations conti nue being reported.That will be the downfall of an airline whose reputation took years to build. The airline should be very wary when dealing with the lives of its passengers and should not take its power and support for granted. Conclusion. Southwest Airline has been transformed from being a simple idea to being one of the top players in the aviation industry. It has become evident that for an airline to succeed, it should target a specific class of customers and that it should take the eudaemonia of its employees very seriously.Some of the best ways of motivating employees are inexpensive, a pat on the back can do a lot in raising the self esteem of an employee in an organization. move the employees will help them achieve their potential. bureaucratism should be eliminated to ensure free take to the woods of information. Managers should work with the lower cadre employees in order to make them feel appreciated. Lastly, politics and power should be regulated to prevent interferen ce with the workings of organizations. Southwest Aviation should correct the few weaknesses that it experiences and it will hopefully become the biggest airline in the United States in future.