Herb Kelleher may seem a far cry from the lives of many travel managers. He was an ex-lawyer Texan who became a billionaire by building an airline.
But his mantras are well worth reviewing.
In launching Southwest Kelleher effectively founded the low-cost airline concept. Southwest's business model became the template for all its successors — low fares, no unnecessary services, using a single aircraft type, avoiding the hub-and-spoke system and focusing instead on secondary airports and building point-to-point traffic.
These tactics may sound specific to the aviation market but Southwest became an enormously successful, and consistently profitable, business because of Kelleher's management philosophy. It is as relevant to corporate travel managers as it is to their partners and suppliers. Here are three examples:
1. The importance of company culture
Travel in one company may be a formal, planned affair while last-minute decision-making is the norm in others. The best travel managers are acutely aware of their company culture and, most importantly, their travellers' culture. A successful travel policy in one company could very well be a formula for failure in another.
But there are also sub-cultures of different age groups or departments. Kelleher knew that a positive culture could be infectious. Messages from travel departments that can exude positivity may be better received by both senior management and travellers.
2. Managing in good times to be prepared for bad times
Kelleher didn't have one philosophy for bull markets and another for more sluggish times
In many companies travel is seen merely as a cost that should be controlled and, if times are bad, dispensed with and replaced by alternatives such as web conferencing.
If value for money is consistently the backbone of the department's objectives, downturns such as that of 2008 don't bring big shocks and changes.
If travel is thought of as integral to a corporate strategy and a necessary component of revenue generation and customer retention, it ceases to be an optional extra cost.
3. Prioritising employees over customers
Kelleher believed that if employees were treated well, they would treat customers well. This is analogous to thinking about travellers' needs and welfare first and budget targets second.
If travellers are treated with respect, they will treat customers with respect. This should improve potential outcomes of business trips.
Travel managers are on a constant vigil to identify new trends and disruptors. It might be worth all of us noting what Bill Taylor wrote in the Harvard Business Review:
"There's one final (and overlooked) piece of Herb Kelleher's legacy that deserves emphasis, especially in an era filled with talk of transformation, disruption, and change. As revolutionary a force as Southwest has been, and as large a shadow as Kelleher cast over the airline business, his company won big, and he became one of the great entrepreneurs of all time, because of a commitment to simplicity and consistency rather than nonstop innovation."
Kelleher never lost sight of his objectives.