Developing Effective Consulting Skills on Example of Southwest Airlines Co

Part 1

Southwest Airlines Co. (SWA) was incorporated in 1967, as a passenger airline carrier within the US and other near-countries. The airline gives point-to-point services through its Boeing 737 aircraft and in approximately forty states, the District of Columbia, and other nine countries. In addition, SWA provides ancillary service offerings like the EarlyBird Check-In as well as providing carrier services to unaccompanied minors and pets. The EarlyBird Check-In service allows clients to check-in automatically before ordinary boarding positions are made available and are intended to improve the seat selection options. Under the pet policy, clients are allowed to travel their cats or dogs in the cabin. Further, SWA gives their clients satellite-based wireless fidelity (WiFi) service on all their planes giving customers an exceptional travel experience, especially through the Southwest's live and on-demand television. The TV product consists of nearly live channels and more than seventy-five on-demand recorded episodes of movies and television series.

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The Rapid Rewards frequent flyer program rewards clients with redeemable points for money spent on fares. The number of points awarded through this program is calculated from the fare price and class that a customer buys where the higher the fare, the more the points earned. Consequently, customers are allowed to redeem their earned points anytime and they can also earn the points from purchases made from the company's partners.

The organization's Internet Website, Southwest.com, helps clients to buy their tickets online as well as to manage their travel plans. Under the "My Account" feature on the website allows customers to view their travel and loyalty activity as well as giving a detailed account of the organization's information regarding fair prices and their ancillary products. The web page has also been translated into various languages like Spanish. Further, the internet option is available through mobile phone applications both for Android and iPhone operating system (iOS) which allows customers to transact 24/7 with the company. The organization's strategy about terminal usage is either through leases or cash payment at each of the airports it uses. However, for purposes of maintaining its aircraft, SWA leases land and infrastructure on a long-term basis in major airports around the US and also for its flight training center which is located at Dallas Love Field. Further, to support its operations, SWA leases engine facility, and warehouses and customer support and services call centers although it owns some of these facilities. Its biggest competitors are Delta, American Airlines, Delta Air Lines, and United Airlines.

Regardless of these strategies at the company, it has been noted that the morale of employees is on the decline and this is negatively affecting the company. As a result, the management has planned to conduct a need analysis before taking action.

Part 2

SWA intends to improve its operations, and as a result, they plan to undertake a need analysis to understand which areas require further training of employees. To this effect, several theories will be applied to ensure that the exercise is successful.

The Tuckman's Theory

With the rise of innovative project teams, individuals need to contribute their competencies, skills, and willingness to work cohesively for project success (Shalley, 2004). Hence, one of the crucial factors of project management is converging individuals with diverse points of view and thought to collaboratively solve challenging issues (Wannenmacher, 2016). This group of individuals must develop into an efficient team (Clear, 2011). Thus, teams have unique team dynamics which progress within the timeframe of a project (Dawson, 2010). To create an effective team requires the project managers to understand the stages of development that teams follow, and facilitate the team through those stages (Dyer, 2013). Typically, project teams go through team development processes to evolve from a group to a team (Tuckman, 1977). As we can see from the table below, team development consists of forming, storming, norming, performing and adjourning stages (Lussier, 2015). However, Tuckman's framework has severe limitations, such as not be linear but cyclical and being modeled on teams who are new to each other (Smith, 2007).

Herzberg's Theory

Today, leadership involves influencing behavior to get people to do things they would not otherwise do (Pfeffer, 1992). Hence, one of the crucial factors for project management success is motivation, commitment, and productivity of employees. Consequently, leadership that shared by project managers has become a powerful way to motivate each other to achieve higher levels of performance, ultimately "project management success" (Morris, 1994). However, where there are low commitment and lack of motivation, shared team leadership practices can have negative consequences, such as increased conflict and decreased team performance (West, 2003). To minimize these adverse outcomes, project human resource management is integrated into organizational bodies to manage and motivate people effectively (Clear, 2011). Consequently, teams may have the necessary technical skills in project life cycles, but team motivation is an essential element of a successful project (Schmid, 2008).

Herzberg challenged the basic assumptions about satisfaction and motivation employees by discussing that humans have two different sets of needs: Hygiene needs and Motivators (Herzberg, 1971). The first set emphasizes the basic maintenance factors: the hygiene factors (Clear, 2011). These factors are not related directly to the job rather they are concerned with the conditions that surround employee performances such as work-life balance and working relationships and conditions (Bassett, 2005). The second set of needs is the "motivators," also known as "growth needs" (Lundberg, 2009). Recognition of a task completed, the feeling of personal achievement and autonomy are primary ways to boost satisfaction and in so doing facilitating employees motivation.

The effectiveness of a team is enhanced by the commitment of the team to reflect and to conduct evaluations continuously. Further, apart from evaluations on the accomplishments of the team, regarding the realization of specific goals, the effectiveness of a team is enhanced by the ability to understand their development as a team. According to Tuckman, teams progressively pass through various developmental stages namely; forming, storming, norming and performing and they all help in the evaluation of the team's effectiveness. Each developmental stage has its identifiable behaviors and feelings all explaining why things are happening as seen by the team and subsequently allowing the team to reflect on their actions.

Thus, these four identified stages establish an essential framework where the team's behavioral patterns can be recognized. Besides, they are significant in enhancing communication within the team rather than transform a team to a diagnosis. Nonetheless, it should be noted that team development is a linear process since each team and activity poses unique challenges. It is, therefore, important to identify and recognize that causes for changes within the team can support the team to maximize its practices and productivity.

Reflection on the Herzberg's Theory

The general organizational setting has on many occasions exemplified the relevance of the Herzberg's Theory. It is the primary responsibility of every leader to ensure that the hygiene factors of their employees are catered for and that appropriate motivators are affected as a means to increase job satisfaction. However, by standardizing motivation, the theory fails to account for the fact that employee's happiness does not out rightly lead to their productivity. Further, that a motivator for one employee can be a de-motivator for another employee, and finally it fails to account for personality traits which may deliver a varied response to a hygiene or motivator factor. For this reason, the theory is inadequate about the conceptualization of the inter-relations the manifest among the identified motivators. For instance, an employee may have adequate job recognition; however, they may be unsatisfied with the level of responsibility. In such a situation, the value of internal motivational derived from job recognition would be questionable. Besides, even within the motivator or hygiene categories, one dependent upon the level of professionalism might be more or less sensitive to either one or more factors. Thus, incorporating other related theories in the application of the Herzberg's Theory of Motivation would be more efficient than using it independently.

Employee Training Program

Training Needs Analysis and methods for identifying performance gaps

Training Needs Analysis (TNA) is a strategy applied when companies want to implement a training program. TNAs originate from a gap analysis which identifies key areas within an organization that requires change and or use of new strategies for purposes of increasing profitability. Specifically, the assessment identifies gaps that may exist between skills, knowledge, and attitudes that employees in the firm currently have and those that they require having to achieve the objectives set by the company. The best timing for a TNA is before the training budgeting, designing, and actual training. Accordingly, the outcome of a TNA is a report outlining the why, who, what, where, where and how regarding the training (Rajan, 2015).

Training Needs Analysis Methods

Surveys can be conducted through questionnaires which are distributed among employees targeting the identification of specific needs and tasks of the employees and the company.

Managers can also observe employees during the normal working environment and consequently collect information identify performance gaps.

Through interviews with employees either directly or indirectly (formally or informally) the managers of training planners can gather information on existing performance gaps.

Customer feedback is another method that can be used to gather information regarding performance deficiencies. Customers are best placed to evaluate the quality of services they receive from the organization and the inefficiencies that they would want to be addressed. However, to get specific data, the feedback form should be directed toward a specific service or performance.

Performance analysis can also be used to identify skills, knowledge, and competencies that are leading to poor performance at the workplace.

In summary, training need analysis performed with the ultimate intention of identifying areas of knowledge, skills, and competencies that need to be addressed in training to enhance the performance of the employees. The analysis, therefore, focuses on the outcomes that the company needs from the employee trainees, the type of skills and knowledge the trainees presently have and finally identifying the skills that the employees lack and that needs to be learned during the training (Rajan, 2015).

A customer service training implementation plan and the method of training

At SWA the management has noted that the level of employees' performance has reduced and this is attributed to leadership styles. To address this issue, it has been decided that all managers should be trained on their leadership styles with the intention of increasing performance. The following steps were followed to successfully plan and execute the training program.

Step 1: Identifying performance gap

The significance of this step is to identify current situation (skills, knowledge, and competencies that the employees have) and compare them to the desired situation. The difference betwee...