Southwest Airlines in Crisis
So, it being the new year and all, I thought a review of the top PR crises of 2022 might make a good post.
Alas, when I googled top PR crises, I found that most of them were about Ye, Will Smith, the FIFA head who was “bullied” for his red hair, Elon Musk, etc.
With all due respect, these were not PR crises. As Omar said in The Wire, “it’s all in the game, yo.” These are just narcissists playing the media attention game…and then the media and public playing the outrage game…it’s a kind of virtue-signaling, in their minds. But the crisis is the goal so it doesn’t count.
Even Prince Harry can fall into that category. If he was trying to bring down the Royal Family, recent research shows he’s done more damage to his own brand. (He’s made himself less popular than his Uncle Andrew).
A Real Crisis: Southwest Airlines
One honest-to-God crisis that happened late in 2022 was faced by Southwest Airlines. This was without question a crisis. Southwest’s brand took a significant hit. The damage was exacerbated by the fact that Southwest had such a good brand only a few years ago, giving it more room to fall, as well as the fact that despite the presence of a winter storm, Southwest was the only paralyzed airline.
Airline brands are all at risk.
An article in Forbes recently said that the era of flying for fun is over. Soon we will be happy for uneventful. As someone who spent eight hours waiting for a flight from San Diego to Detroit earlier this month, I can appreciate that. Between the reductions after COVID and the inability to replace retiring pilots and other crew members, the Forbes article indicates that airlines will be in brand rehabilitation mode for the foreseeable future, probably until people lower their expectations.
Southwest is the first in the hopper. The situation was bad. Employees were arguing with rightfully angry customers who had been significantly inconvenienced by Southwest's failure to keep their promise to get them from point A to point B. The government was looking to get involved. The world was watching.
Most PR Crises Start With Operational Failure
Another aside would be that there are a lot of employee letters and notes on social media that say that Southwest lost its way by moving its focus from operations to profit maximization. Not that anybody is against maximizing profits but there's more than one way to do it. An accounting focus on strict ROI, as opposed to investing in operational excellence, puts brands at risk. That risk probably does not show up on the radar of the risk management team. (For more on building and maintaining reputation, look at our guide here).
Southwest in Recovery Mode
The question for Southwest is: how do you recover? This article will give you some ideas about what they are trying to do. It would seem to me that they are on the right track but with real work to do.
Here is the real-time statement from the Southwest CEO.
Good parts of this you can use
Note the focus on employees. This is the key. This is an inside-out operation. Surely, your customers were harmed. Your employees were traumatized—long hours, angry people, no solutions. Tough. When Southwest was strong their employees were “on board” (sorry) and you could feel it when you were on the plane. That spirit must be rekindled before an impact can be made on consumers.
He expresses true remorse, without qualifying or waffling. He did not say “We have a great track record. I am sorry for letting you down this time.” Or “For all the times we got you where you were going, we let you down this time.”
He explains what happened…succinctly and understandably. The severe weather and lack of hubs were a toxic combination. This also shows why it impacted Southwest especially.
In particular, he explains why they made the most controversial and difficult decision, which was to shut down completely to reset the system.
He explains what is being done for people who are still, at that very moment, impacted.
He lays out what is being done to fix the problem in the longer term.
He demonstrates that there is nothing to hide by saying that he reached out to the government.
He manages expectations…a reduced schedule is going to continue for days.
He provides a realistic timeline for when the problem will be fixed, which is still a week away. (There is a natural desire to make unhappy people happy, and for people stuck in the system, these last two answers were not going to do that. You just have to know they are going to be even more unhappy if you give a date and let them down again.)
Do you notice what’s not in there? Jargon.
External Reviews Help Rebuild Brands
Outside the statement, Southwest does something I see a lot in successful crisis management. They are doing a third-party review of their operations, to be reported to the board and major shareholders, who are literally invested in the success of the airline. It’s not as good as making it fully transparent, but this is a competitive business.
This approach builds credibility with external stakeholders and internal stakeholders because the plain fact is that no one (apparently) stress-tested the no-hub system against a severe weather event…or if they did, they (obviously) didn’t do anything about it. So, the idea that current management could benefit from an outside review is not out of line.
Brand Rehab is a Long Game
Last note. Successful brand rehabilitation is the result of sustained communications. What you do in real-time is an indispensable start, but progress needs to be conveyed over time as you slowly rebuild trust. You’re not going to publish the results of the external review, but a summary or even a simple notification that it was completed puts action behind words. Ditto with the implementation of the new systems. Maybe some highlighting of “heroic” employee efforts during the crisis. A dashboard for delays and canceled flights. (See here for The Ultimate Guide to External Stakeholders.)
You can’t take the position that people will forget or the effects will“wear off.” Successfully completing commitments both rebuilds and builds your brand.