LEADERSHIP SECRETS OF SOUTHWEST AIRLINE'S GARY KELLY

 Leadership is..."Effectively supporting your team of Employees." --Gary Kelly

 

How important is customer care to a company?

At Southwest, it moves all of its 47,000 executives and employees across America to act as one organism 24/7.

Gary Kelly

   Each and every one of them is empowered to make on-the-spot decisions to please the company's 100 million passengers.

For this Fortune 500 U.S. airline company, with a record of 42 years of annual profitability unmatched in the U.S. airline industry, pleasing passengers is a way of life.

Earlier this month, Southwest Airlines went out of its way to rush a woman home so she could see her ailing son.

When her flight was about to take off from Chicago to Columbus, an airline employee alerted her that her husband called to tell that their 24-year old son was in a coma in Denver.   

Right away, Southwest rebooked her on a new flight home directly to Denver for free.

The airline even went the extra mile by giving her a private waiting area, rerouted her luggage, allowed her to board first and packed a lunch when she got off the plane in Denver. 

But that’s not all.  Her luggage was delivered to where she was staying and even received a call from Southwest asking how was her son doing.

Unbelievable?

Peggy Uhle can only sing praises for the airline.  She told the travel blog BoardingArea.com:  “The care that I was shown is second to none.”  

Her son is now recovering from a traumatic brain condition.

This is just one of the many instances when customers are almost pampered by Southwest to the max.  Anecdotes after anecdotes of great customer care have been reported about the airline.

Like the pilot who decided to wait for a father who’s attending to a dying son but was stuck in traffic; or the plane and ground crews who used their credit cards to help a distressed woman get transportation and hotel accommodation in a strange city. 

Why is this so?

This could be attributed to the culture of great customer satisfaction imbued into the hearts and minds of its employees by the airline company under the leadership of its Chaiman and CEO, Gary Kelly.

Under Gary Kelly’s stewardship, everyone at Southwest is attuned to what the company’s mission is and everyone has

internalized it as almost gospel truth - and it  shows in the individual actions of every employee.

Talk about group dynamics.  Gary Kelly and Southwest have so much to teach us on the subject.   

Who is Gary Kelly?                                                                  
Since 2005, Gary Kelly is the Chairman of the Board, Chief Executive Officer and President of Southwest Airlines Co., the world's largest low-cost carrier headquartered in Dallas, Texas. 

Starting with the company in 1986 as Controller, Gary moved his way up through various positions namely Principal Accounting Officer, Vice President of Finance and finally served as Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer from 2001 to 2004 until he was made the President and CEO. 

Before he joined the company, he served as Audit Manager of Arthur & Young Company in Dallas and Systems Center Inc., a computer software provider.

Aside from Southwest, he also sits in the board as independent director of several corporations and trade associations. A recipient of many awards and honors, he has been honored as one of the best and influential executives in America. 

He is a Certified Public Accountant and received a BBA in Accounting from the University of Texas at Austin where he serves on its Business School Dean’s Advisory Council and Accounting Department Advisory Council. He is also a Member of Advisory Council of its McCombs School of Business.

Gary Kelly's Leadership Style

As his company’s CEO, Gary Kelly has a unique leadership style which is perhaps not found in most of America’s CEOs or at least among those who are in the airline industry.  Very charismatic, his style is so perfectly aligned with the company’s culture of relaxed, happy people. 

For instance, he is trouper enough to come to the office on Halloween in pink dress complete with size-14 high heels.  As one New York Times writer commented:  “It suggest to workers that Mr. Kelly is a little crazy…and perhaps the kind of person others might want to follow into battles”.  

                                                                                                 

Personal and Organizational Values

Gary’s personal values were shaped by the good-old fashioned Southwestern brand of good morals and integrity instilled in him by his father with whom he developed a special father and son relationship.

These qualities he brought along with him at Southwest and manifested in the way he conducted himself in his day-to-day activities.  His values are centered on encouraging a work atmosphere where people are having fun and enjoying their jobs, yet doing their jobs well. 

How Gary’s values impact the organization                    

The four work values of people at Southwest:  achievement, concern for others, honesty and fairness are all aligned with Kelly’s values. Honesty and concern for others are very present in the organization. 

The culture that he has created at Southwest emphasizes a laid back and efficient environment.  

The Main Ingredient of Gary Kelly's Success

The secret to Gary’s success that many people may have overlooked is his intelligence.  Coupled with the ability to use that intelligence to his advantage, that to me is his secret weapon.  

Since his younger days in college, this quality helped him excel in his studies and be among the top of the class when he finished Accounting at the University of Texas. 

This same intelligence led him to land a good job at Arthur & Young Company.  Call it luck but being assigned to the Southwest account placed him in an advantageous position to again use his intelligence to see a future in the company. 

As a former outside accountant of the airline company, he was bright enough to see all the signs that pointed to a bright future ahead of him. 

What he saw nearly 30 years ago is happening now.

Photo Credits:   About Southwest Retrieved from http://www.southwest.com/html/about-southwest/

Some parts of this article were excerpts of a paper I wrote at the study help site likeplum. (now studypool).