Ian: That's right. I want to speak as a man who has had many years experience working in this industry, but obviously, I cannot speak on behalf of my employer, so they shall not be named - but it is one of the world's major airlines. I can be a lot more honest with you if I don't identify my employer. I work in the corporate communications department, so we handle all kinds of press queries, any kind of incidents, we issue press statements, we talk to journalists whenever there is any kind of news story. So there are two aspects to my job - firstly, it's tying to get both the public and the media to listen to what we have to say. So for example, we launched a new destination early this year and we had a concerted campaign to make the public and the media aware that, hey we're flying to this new city - come check it out. And then, we have to react to events that happen - we listen to what the public are saying about us on social media, what the journalists are writing about us when a story breaks and we have to monitor it, respond to that.
Limpeh: So let's turn our attention to United 3411 - why has this been such a PR disaster for United Ian?
Ian: Okay, this is a fuck up on two levels. Firstly, what happened on the plane was an unmitigated disaster: the staff should have never ever let the passengers board the plane in the first instance then tried to chuck four passengers off the plane. That's a training issue - the staff handled that badly. And they only went as far as US$800 in compensation to get someone to voluntarily take a later flight - they could have offered more money and for crying out aloud, a lot more money that money isn't coming out of the staff's pocket. Hell no. It is coming out of the company's coffers - I'll gladly spend my employer's money to defuse any difficult situation and I've spent a lot more money than that. And you know, that's money well spent. This overbooking situation is nothing new - they stuck to procedure instead of thinking out of the box: there must be another way to get the four staff from Chicago to Louisville that night. That's 300 miles - about a 4.5 hour drive. There are other airlines that fly out of Chicago to Louisville and other cities nearby in the region like Springfield, St Louis, Cincinnati, Indianapolis or Nashville. A bit inconvenient, it'll take longer but get the four crew members say on a flight to Cincinnati on any airline, then it's 1.5 hours drive from Cincinnati to Louisville - it's just logistics. Take a fucking taxi or Uber it, the airline pays for it. My airline solves simple problems like that all the time, but the idiots at United have no clue. They knew it advance they had to get those crew members to Louisville that day, it shouldn't be a surprise yet they didn't plan ahead? This is a simple matter of logistics and planning. Fucking idiots.
Ian: It all boils down to whom the most senior person in charge was, handling the situation and s/he should then have the common sense to say, "oh shit, this is out of control, I had better call someone a bit more senior before I fuck this up and it turns into the PR catastrophe of the year. Hold on a minute whilst I make a quick call." There is always someone more senior you can call for help, at any time of the day. Whenever there's a plane in the sky or passengers waiting in airports, we don't just go home and switch off our mobiles. Now we don't have the details of which idiot at Chicago O'Hare took the matters into his/her own hands and called in the thugs to drag Dr Dao off the plane...
Limpeh: Possibly the pilot? But I am guessing.
Ian: It could be. But the pilot's job is to fly the darn plane, not deal with ticketing issues like that. That's why we have a whole team on the ground at any major airport so you don't expect the pilots to solve every single problem that arises! Surely the pilot could have easily said, "make that phone call to someone more senior to ask for help." But no one did. Then we all know what happened when they dragged Dr Dao off the plane and injured him in the process - social media is going to go crazy, so many passengers took out their phones and filmed the incident. You know, it doesn't matter at that stage that the pilot does have the right to remove any passenger from the plane regardless of the reason - the moment you drag someone off the plane like that, you have opened Pandora's box and that shit is going to blow up in your face. So that's the initial car cash - Oscar Munoz, the CEO of United then issues a statement supporting his staff in the handling of the matter and accuses Dr Dao of being disruptive and belligerent. Yeah the moment he sent that email, that's the moment when the car slips downhill, heading towards the ditch for a second crash. So that's two disasters we're talking about - the first one was down to very poor staff training, I'll sack the dumb fuck who handled the situation so poorly in the first place at the airport. And the second disaster was Oscar Munoz not understanding PR 101 and wading in with that stupid statement, that was pouring oil on the fire. When a member of staff at an airport fucks up, that's incompetence. When a CEO fucks up like that, well, no wonder their share price has plummeted. Stupid mistake, he should have kept his mouth shut and delegated the matter to a PR expert like myself.
Ian: Totally. All big companies, like United, would spend millions every year employing PR experts like myself to handle difficult situations. In any case, a CEO may be good at running a big company, but is he able to understand a complex situation like that and respond in a way that will mitigate the situation efficiently instead of pouring oil on fire? It looks like he offered a knee-jerk response rather than spoken to a PR consultant before issuing that statement. Let your PR department handle such difficult situations so if they fuck it up, you can then let them take the blame. I've seen this happen before - the airline fucks up, the PR department issues an inappropriate statement that pours oil on the fire, the CEO steps in and apologizes for the PR department, claiming that the person who issued the statement was a junior member of staff who has a lot to learn and whilst it sounded a bit lame, at least the worst offence in that case was allowing a young, junior member of staff handle something too complex and the public are a lot more willing to forgive a junior member of the PR team whilst the CEO is protected from the fall out of that fuck up.
Furthermore, the most offensive part of the video which has pissed off so many people on the internet is the sight of Dr Dao being dragged off by security staff who worked for Chicago O'Hare airport. Now the crew messed up and handled the situation badly, but they weren't the thugs who beat up a 69 year old doctor - the nasty thugs who resorted to violence with a 69 year old man were not United employees. There was a golden opportunity to point the finger of blame at the Chicago O'Hare airport staff who clearly crossed the line and fucked up - gosh, they fucked up so badly by treating a 69 year old man like a dangerous armed terrorist. Again, shocking lack of training on the part of O'Hare airport, these staff members should not only be sacked but both United and O'Hare should be facing huge lawsuits from Dr Dao given the way he was treated. If I worked for United, I would subtly point the finger of blame at the airport security police. The public can boycott United as there are plenty of other better airlines to choose from, but the public cannot boycott the police or boycott O'Hare airport - it is one of the most major airport hubs in America.
Limpeh: So to make it clear, these are police officers. Not some private security firm hired by the airport or United.
Limpeh: Do you think the crew - upon witnessing this - could have stepped in to say, stop, this is wrong.
Ian: Could've, would've, should've. Hindsight is 2020. It is a question of training - if say a third party like a police officer assaults one of you passengers and you stood back, silently witnessing the incident, doing nothing whilst being filmed, how is that going to look? You're going to look pretty awful when that video goes on Youtube. Common sense should have prevailed - it didn't. They could have easily said something and even if the officer insisted on handling Dr Dao that way, then at least they could say, "we saw what was going on and we tried to stop him but sadly, we couldn't."
Ian: We do have a problem. But here's the thing: it isn't United's fault. Gosh, I hate to sound as if I am defending United at this point - but clearly, the biggest mistake of all was not committed by United staff. The moment they called airport security to handle the situation, they took a step back and allowed the Aviation police to take over the matter - it was the police who fucked up, it was police brutality. And then they had the bloody cheek to claim that Dr Dao fell and hurt himself, trying to absolve themselves from any responsibility in causing the injuries that we could see in the incriminating video. But you see, the Chicago police doesn't have a share price - United does. The Chicago police doesn't invest in expensive PR, United does. Why didn't United point out the obvious and let the Chicago police take the heat for this? Why is the vast majority of the hatred on social media targeting United and so little targeting the Chicago police authority then? United handled the overbooking and PR situation poorly, but we're talking about police brutality against an innocent 69 year old man here - I know which I find more evil. A lot more evil - but we can make United feel the pain by hitting them where it hurts, with a boycott. But the police? What can we do about it? This has been a huge problem for years, for decades. Fuck it, just pin this on the Chicago police, throw them under the bus - call it what it is, a nasty case of police brutality which has nothing to do with United. This is simply police brutality.
Limpeh: I have encountered corrupt figures of authority whilst traveling in the third world - it's the same story, the police and border officials are paid peanuts, so they turn to extracting bribes from rich foreigners to make ends meet and it becomes a way of life. But these power crazy, volatile security staff at O'Hare airport who beat up Dr Dao - surely there must be some kind of checks and balances to ensure that at least these maniacs are aware of the rules? I accept that you're not going to get Harvard graduates working as security staff at an airport but surely passengers have the right to be safe when passing through these airports. So what is the solution then Ian, is there even one?
Limpeh: But such is the capitalist world we live in - if you wanna start employing more highly educated staff in such roles then you gotta pay them a lot more. If invest in a lot more training to ensure that they do a much better job, then it is gonna cost everyone who passes through an airport a lot more. Are the passengers willing to pay a lot more money for their airline tickets each time they fly, just to make sure that the security staff are of a much higher calibre? No - they just expect good service whilst refusing to pay more and something has got to give. I think some countries have been better at this than others, I travel a lot and ironically, my experience in America has been pretty okay so far and my worst experiences have been in third world countries where obviously the staff are paid very, very little. So okay, this is just one instance where things went badly wrong but on the whole, the system isn't broken.
Ian: Yes, but United could do better. O'Hare airport can do better.
Limpeh: Turning our attention to Oscar Munoz, the CEO of United. This guy has won awards for his skills in PR - quite specifically, he was named 'communicator of the year' by PR Week. Yet even the BBC has called his handling of this incident a PR disaster. Where do I even begin with Oscar Munoz? "Reaccomodating"? Really? Can you explain this?
This is actually really blatant - take two articles that appeared in heavy.com: they did a really nasty article on David Dao where they dug up his personal history, down to every allegation ever made against him as a doctor. And then, they did another on Oscar Munoz - it was a cock sucking exercise where they praised him as if he was the fucking Messiah. Now the journalists behind heavy.com must be pretty desperate for United to spend some of that marketing revenue on their pathetic website. They practically slandered Dr Dao whilst worshipping Oscar Munoz, this was just so poorly put together, so blatantly one-sided that they have totally discredited themselves. The passenger's name is David Thanh Duc Dao. The convicted doctor's name is David Anh Duy Dao. He's a licensed MD in New Orleans, not Kentucky. It's not the same person. This is downright character assassination - slander and Dr Dao should do the American thing and sue the ass off heavy.com. Much has been said about fake news in the press of late - well, it doesn't get more fake than this when journalists are so fucking stupid. How can anyone choose to defend United?
I look at a website like that and I think, holy shit, who's ever going to take this kind of website seriously? Would any airline - United or otherwise - actually want to advertise with someone like that after they try to slander Dr Dao and get it wrong like that? Holy fuck. What a bunch of fucking retards heavy.com are. I'm never advertising with incompetent fools like that, they have no credibility after this. They got the wrong Dr Dao! Regardless of what Dr Dao has done in his life, this smear campaign isn't going to turn public opinion against him - no one deserves to be treated the way he did, to be subjected to police brutality like that. So when someone like PR Week gives someone like Munoz an award, you have to understand that they probably have as much integrity as heavy.com. Ironically, they have just ran an article criticizing Munoz's handling of the situation. Such is the nature of the PR industry - it is ugly, it is about money, merit barely comes into the picture. The top PR gurus hide behind the scene and are like directors of a movie - you see the result of their vision but they never appear once on the screen unlike the famous actors playing the leads.
Ian: I can't read his mind - the guy's an idiot who has said some unbelievably stupid shit. But what I can say is that there are numerous incidents of difficult passengers on a daily basis with any airline, at any major airport. Look, passengers can be unruly, drunk, disruptive and plain unreasonable. The staff have to deal with such crap on a daily basis and there are many occasions when they do need the moral support of the management, when they have dealt with a very difficult passenger. Oh boy there are so many stories I could tell you about unreasonable customers you just wanna punch in the face but the staff on the ground have to be polite and patient. They do a terribly hard job and deserve the support of the management, of course. However, I must stress that this is not always the case: sometimes the staff can get things wrong and in this case, they did. Munoz should have not rushed in and offered his support without considering the effects of his words - hindsight is 2020 of course. The man's a fucking moron.
Look the bottom line is this: employees of a company are paid a salary to add value to the company, we earn our keep. But when someone or a group of idiots made a series of catastrophically bad decisions which led to a PR disaster that led to over 100 million dollar being wiped off the value of the company's stock, this is not the time to offer your moral support for the idiots who fucked up. You don't reward and protect people who fuck up - you blame them, name and shame them, chuck them under a bus as soon as you can. You only hope is to play the "every barrel of apples has one or two bad ones" card, as you effectively chuck out the bad apples into the dustbin. But if you protect and reward the bad apples for a catastrophic fuck up, then the public are going to think that every apple in your barrel is rotten as you have no concept of quality control when it comes to staff training. Now that's HR 101 meets PR 101, it isn't a complex concept to understand - yet Munoz somehow was totally oblivious to it. That's just fucking unreal.
Ian: Simple. The emperor's new clothes. He is the CEO of a big organization like United - he is a multimillionaire. If you were a junior employee or middle-management there, you would think twice before saying, "Mr Munoz I don't think the statement you're about to release is appropriate. Could I edit it for you please?" No, you'll probably be too afraid to do that - if Munoz had enough common sense, he would have realized that others around would be too afraid to criticize him and he would have then asked someone for help. And even then, the employee may be too afraid to say, "sir, I think the statement you're about to release was poorly written and would offend a lot of people. You can't say that." No, the employee might get cold feet and say, "sir, I think you wrote an excellent statement and I agree with the sentiment you have expressed there." Thus nobody stopped him from fucking up like this and just like in the story, the emperor walked out into public totally naked and now the entire town is laughing at his tiny, pathetic little dick.
Ian: Why did nobody at United's corporate communications department stopped Munoz from making a bad situation so much worse? You see, this goes way beyond bad PR or "how to write a press release" - you need an environment where your PR team can feel free to do their job, which may involve stopping the CEO from making an utter fool of himself to the world's media. That's why good CEOs hire experts to create a good team, rather than micromanage.
Limpeh: This story has gone viral and people are talking about it all over the world today - on Facebook, I've got friends in Canada, Australia, Singapore, the UK, Germany, Colombia all talking about it. But imagine if you worked for United Ian, I know you don't - but suppose you did, how would you advice them what to do next then?
Ian: They need to apologize. Oscar Munoz needs to fucking grovel like that Japanese politician who couldn't stop crying. But he can also throw a few people under the bus whilst he's at it - the public will be baying for his blood over the PR fiasco, but he could easily sack a number of people who were on the ground at Chicago O'Hare airport then - those individuals fucked up when they mishandled the situation, let them lose their jobs and that would appease the angry public. Then he could also point out that it wasn't the United staff who beat up Dr Dao and injured him - that was the Chicago police who were guilty of this nasty episode of police brutality. Throw the Chicago police under the bus and let them deal with the blame! The public might actually applaud him for holding the Chicago police to account for police brutality because if he kept silent on the issue, he is then silently condoning police brutality of this nature.
Limpeh: How much do you think they should pay Dr Dao?
Ian: Ooh. Depends. They would be a negotiation process. They would come up with a figure, Dr Dao's lawyer would probably tell them to fuck off and they would then come back with a new figure, there'll be a lot of bargaining. But then again, Dao's team should accept a compensation offer sooner rather than later, whilst the story is still making headlines around the world and United is still desperate to make ammends. Remember the story about the boy who was molested at the airport? Well millions were outraged by the video, but has there been any significant follow up? Has the molester been arrested yet? No, he's still working in the airport, molesting other children and we've not heard from the mother in the news since 29th March. The public got bored and moved on - the TSA got away with it. But in United's case, it is in their interest to fix their public image before their share price falls any further as a result of this - just today, their stock fell 1.13% and that wiped US$255 million off their market value. At one stage the stock price was down 4.4%! Now they're feeling the pain! If they had offered Dao US$10 million - that may sound like a lot of money, but if it would buy enough goodwill to stop the share price falling like that, well, then I say it is money very well spent.
Ian: No, the short answer is no. All airlines do this. Last year, United forced 3,765 people off oversold flights and another 62,895 United passengers volunteered to give up their seats, despite all that no one got dragged off the plane quite the way Dr Dao was. The problem on United 3411 was down to a lot of incompetent idiots fucking up, not knowing how to handle the situation. The industry won't ban or change this practice just because of what has happened - what they do need to do though, is to review their policies on how to deal with a situation like that. Selecting four passengers at random to chuck off the plane? For fuck's sake. How stupid is that. Do you wanna fly United knowing that this is their official dumb ass company policy at resolving such a situation? Fuck that shit and fuck United. You increase the amount of compensation until you get someone say, yeah that's a lotta money, I want that money I'll take it. Everyone, every passenger has a price at which they will say yes to and it is the job of the airline to get to that point. Money is the solution to this problem - do you wanna pay out a few thousand dollars or do you wanna wipe 225 million off your market cap overnight instead? It's a fucking no brainer, duh.
Limpeh: How are other airlines reacting to the United 3411 incident then?
Ian: Well technically speaking, we are not making an official statement on it because it has nothing to do with us and pouring scorn on United would be unethical - even cruel at this stage given it is clear what a monumental fuck up it has been for them. But everyone has been asked for their opinion on this, even Sean Spicer has been asked if the president has seen the video of Dr Dao being dragged off the plane in Chicago. It is extremely rare for any kind of incident of this nature to be so major that it gets the White House's attention but United have done just that. In private, we are gloating of course, but we're not going to say that in public. Less business for them, more business for their rivals. We are directly benefiting from United's monumental fuck up. But on a more serious notes, most airlines are taking this as a wake up call to review their policies and training to ensure that such an incident doesn't ever happen on one of their planes. It is essentially a training issue at the end of the day, like so many things in this industry.
Ian: No, thousands of people fly through American airports everyday and thankfully airlines are by and large a lot more competent. Fucking up like that costs the airline a lot of money. One thing I can tell you about American companies is that they want to make money and none of them want to lose money like that - they may not care too much about customer service but they care about losing money and the social media backlash has shown the industry the high price they have to pay for fucking up. So by that token, no, please, travelers have nothing to worry about.
Limpeh: So, boycott United?
Ian: Yes. Oh yes. You don't wanna make that asshole Oscar Munoz any richer than he already is. There are so many airlines, go on Skyscanner and have a good look around for alternatives, they are usually not the cheapest one anyway. United have had a bad track record of mistreating their passengers as stories are now emerging in the press of other passengers who were treated badly by United as well. Really, as consumers we have to stand up to these airlines and tell them, this is not acceptable. We need to remind them that we can make you feel pain - their whole attitude initially had been so arrogant and any CEO like that needs to be taught a lesson. Fly anyone but United because not only are you teaching them a lesson, other airlines will look at the boycott and realize, oh shit, we don't wanna end up like United. The airlines will try harder, service will improve and the public wins. The only way the public will lose if they forget about this too soon and United just goes back to their old ways within weeks or even days.
Limpeh: Ian, many thanks for talking with me today.
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