My Learning from the Westjet Case Study

WestJet became one of significant air transportation companies since its birth in 1996.After conquering all Canadian destination, WestJet have chance to compete in the international scene. Today it has not that many destinations outside of North America,

WestJet’s executive compensation program is administered by the People and Compensation Committee on behalf of the Board. Its executive pay practices are designed to be prudent and well-aligned with our culture and

Launched just 8 years ago, today, the Jetstar Group consists of a network of value-based air carriers that deliver high quality air passenger services for budget-minded travelers across Australia, New Zealand and the Asia Pacific region. Beginning with just 400 employees, the company currently employs more than 7,000 people and carries about 20 million passengers a year. To gain some insights into how the Jetstar Group achieved this impressive growth in such a short amount of time, this paper provides a review of the relevant literature concerning the air passenger industry in general and the business strategy used by the Jetstar Group in particular. A summary of the research and recommendations for this company are provided in the paper's conclusion.

Air Canada has been in the business of air transport for an extended period of time. Due to the experience and the exposure of the carrier in the field, it has made a commendable progress through many strategies as well as customer proximity. One of the approaches taken by the airline involves the identification as well as an implementation of cost reduction initiatives in a bid to increase revenue from its operations (Air Canada, 2016). It is also attempting to connect with the existing carriers across the world to connect the current customers to the international world. This approach has been adopted to increase its competitive advantage over other existing airlines.

Westjet came into the air travel business in 1996, offering fares up to 50% cheaper than there competition. They strived for an excellent relationship between the employee and the employer by creating an ecstatic, friendly work environment. Westjet is one of the most successful airlines as it did start out with the most start up capital any airline has ever experienced, as well as keeping their debt to a minimum. With such commercial success, Westjet was questioned with their actions towards Air Canada as one of the founders employed a travel agent to find out certain information about Air Canada which gave them a competitive advantage so they knew exactly what price would be a noticeable difference, which would attract

Air Canada’s early strategy was to grow the business, with minimal concern about their staff members and customers. Without any benefits or rewards their staff felt underappreciated. Their customers felt as though their feedback wasn’t being heard but in the eyes of Air Canada as long as their business was expanding, they were satisfied.

• WestJet views its employees as its most valuable asset. Therefore, it aims to ensure that employees’ work experience is fun, challenging and rewarding. Encourages employees to interact positively with customers to try to earn repeat customers.

WestJet develop their IT operation early and force them get the lead in the aviation businesses. However, as the global economic and the change of people’s demand, the strategic plan of WestJet need to be change to follow the change of the world. Compare with other aviation business, the IT structure of WestJet is small and keeps running on their pervious operation before Smith join into the organization. There are some risks coming out if WestJet continue these IT operations.

r market by entering into strategic code-sharing agreements with international carriers, such as Cathay Pacific , and American Airlines

Air Canada is Canada 's largest full-service airline and the largest provider of scheduled passenger services in the Canadian market, the Canada-U.S. trans-border market and in the international market to and from Canada. In 2010, Air Canada improved its reputation as one of the world’s leading international air carriers. Significant progress was made on executing and delivering on its four key priorities and this, coupled with improving economic conditions, allowed Air Canada to record operating income of $407 million in 2010, a $677 million improvement from 2009. Air Canada’s financial strategy is to continue to improve both the level and sustainability of its

“Customer care” is what WestJet Airlines says in their ads. WestJet entire corporate culture has been built around caring for their customers, by providing a great

WestJet is also facing a strategic problem, the longer term impact that growth is having on WestJet’s culture. WestJet’s success and competitive advantage have been a direct result

➢ Unique Corporate Culture: The main competitive advantage that WestJet had was their unique culture. Even the executives and pilots help the customer whenever necessary; encourage employees to share suggestions for improvement. They maintained the policy of Care for People.

One of the first things that Cheryl Smith did when she start to work at WestJet, was to bring two performances expects to carry out a benchmarking study with similar companies in the transportation industry. The objective of this study was to compare WestJet’s IT cost, resources and budget to the industry standards. With the results of the study, Cheryl was able to find out that the IT group of the company was technically competent and mostly were since the

Although communication and translation of strategy occur at the executive level, effective IT and business alignment must go beyond executive-level conversation to permeate the entire IT organization and its culture. Successful executives typically align by establishing a set of well-planned process improvement programs that systematically address obstacles to achieve full and meaningful engagement with the business1. Each organization has its own unique IT alignment needs and there are many areas in which executives can seek alignment, however, the following areas are the most important: