Southwest Airline CEO: Gary Kelly

The instability of macro-environmental forces and their impact upon the effectiveness and profitability of airlines indicates the need for a multi-dimensional, flexible and responsive management structure able to operate effectively and efficiently manage people, machines, financial, and domestic/international situations (Shaw, 1988:2). The new CEO of Southwest Airlines, Gary Kelly, has made his mark on the airline by encouraging a competitive strategy and expanded operations to further entrench the company as the industry leader (Zellner, 2005). Formerly CFO of the company, he is one of the new CEOs in the industry that have a background and experience in the Finance department. Southwest CEO Kelly sees the industry's deregulation as a poor excuse for the extent of its current problems. "We've been deregulated for 25 or 26 years," he observes, and it's long been clear that "the number-one criteria customers use to select their airline seat is price, so you'd better have your costs under controlö (Harris, 2005). Kelly is a graduate of the University of Texas at El Paso in accounting; he went to work for Arthur Young and Company, who were the accountants for Herb Kelleher and Southwest Airlines. He became familiar with the people and the company through company friends working on the account, and ultimately went to work for the company. He started out as company controller and worked his way up to CFO for the company. He was pivotal

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ast 10 percent this year, and to add 29 planes to its existing fleet of 417 aircraft. Like other airlines, it pulled back after 9/11 and the recession of the early century: it grew by only 4 percent in 2003. However, the external environment is changing, people are traveling again and with improving opportunities, it is looking for and jumping on opportunities as other airlines struggle to be simply profitable as fuel costs rise and fares shrink. Kelly also faces significant threats: low-cost carriers JetBlue and AirTran Airlines are also looking to expand in the same markets. To do so, he is asking for more productivity from already efficient employees and asking pilots to fly as many as 70 hours a week for less money than they could make at other carriers. KellyÆs strategy to link up with ATA stunned the market and the industry. ôFor $117 million, Southwest got six more gates, bringing its total to 25 of Midway's 43. It also will get a 27.5% ownership stake, which it says it will unload over time. And in a move previously unheard of for Southwest -- except for an experiment with Icelandair in 1996 -- it is code sharing with ATA, which means it will market tickets for some of its flights. Southwest's customers can easily c
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Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 1912
Approximate Pages = 8 (250 words per page)