EasyJet in the United Kingdom - Case Study Example

Individual Report Insert Date Individual Report Introduction The United Kingdom has seen a number of enterprises grow from grass to grace within short time duration. Among these enterprises is the no-frills airline company EasyJet that is based in London. This airline company was established in 1995 and within five years in the intensively competitive airline industry, it had grown at an impressive rate from a sales of forty-six million pounds in 1997, to a sales of three hundred and fifty-seven million pounds in 2001 (Koenigsberg, Muller & Vilcassim 2008, p. 280). At the moment, this company is viewed as the largest United Kingdom airline in terms of the number of passengers carried. Furthermore, this company operates over two hundred aircrafts with nineteen basses all over Europe. The success of this organisation is attributed to its innovative strategies that involved utilising new technology and e-commerce avenues. This paper is report on issues relating to e-commerce and new technology facing EasyJet and what the management of this enterprise can do to address these issues. Background of EasyJet Koenigsberg, Muller and Vilcassim (2008, p. 280) describe EasyJet as one of England’s most successful short-haul and low-cost airlines. This company was established in March 1992 and started its operations in May with two wet-leased Boeing 737-200s, which operated from London Luton Airport to Glasglow Airport in Edinburgh. This company was incorporated in 1995, but its aircrafts were operated by Ait Foyle and GB Airways, since it had not yet received its Air Operator’s Certification (Koenigsberg, Muller & Vilcassim 2008, p. 280). In 1996, this company took a delivery of its first wholly-owned aircraft and goes international with an initial service to Amsterdam from London’s Luton airport. Within a span of twelve months after the first delivery EasyJet pioneered the use of the internet for booking and travels and further introduced low-cost air travel. This low-cost air travel strategy has fuelled the growth of this firm through a combination of base openings motivated by the consumer demand for low-cost air travel and through acquisitions. Presently, this company operates over two hundred aircrafts, has nineteen basses all over Europe, and has been ranked the second-largest low-cost transporter in Europe. These company’s strategy are; (1) strong corporate structure, (2) commitment to customer service and safety, (3) a simple fare structure in which clients book online early for low prices, (3) low unit cost, (4) strong branding, and (5) multi base network (Rae 2001, p. 330). New Technology and E-commerce Issues Despite its tremendous progress; fuelled by innovative ideas in the airline industry, this airline enterprise is not immune from the common issues that face majority of organisations today. According to Laudon and Laudon (2010, p. 342) these management issues in relation to new technology are the loss of management control, organizational change requirements, security, scalability and reliability, ethical and legal issues, inhibitors and barriers, and other implementation issues among others. Turban et al., (2008, p. 147) outlines the other issues in relation to e-commerce as; data security ethics, privacy, legacy data, data delivery, cost-benefit and justification issues, and systems development and integration. Among these issues, EasyJet is currently faced by questions of reliability of its new technologies and data delivery issues regarding its online travelling strategy. 1. New Technology Issues According to Rae (2001, p. 330), EasyJet has come under criticism from a number of European nations; Germany being on the forefront about its inability to adhere to its promises. EasyJet had initially promised its customers; as a means of gaining their confidence and loyalty, that it would be offering compensation and partial refunds to them. This is especially in cases where they have been denied boarding, or have experienced delays or cancellations of their tickets. Unfortunately, EasyJet has not been prompt in their reimbursements of cancelled tickets and have additionally not been doing it in a timely fashion. Rae (2011, p. 330) argues that passengers have been forced to wait for longer durations before they can be reimbursed their expenses. 2. E-Commerce Issues The other issue which is in relation to e-commerce is EasyJet’s online travelling which has enabled it to keep an online database of customers. EasyJet’s database or client booking portal is limited in its data delivery; for example, it cannot handle complicated itineraries like a plan travel that combines a trip to the zoo, lunch at a restaurant, and a bus trip (Janic 2009, p. 179) Additionally, special needs specifications like request for a wheelchair, or the addition of an infant to the plain ticket are not provided. Viable Options to Tackle the Issues Laudon and Laudon (2010, p. 342) have asserted that the best way to deal with issues facing management or enterprises is through developing a strategic network plan, or through managing changes. The strategic network planning involves coming up with a comprehensive plan that covers; critical assessments of the needs or goal of the organisation, the needs of the end users, integration of systems, and availability and reliability of networks among others. Managing changes on the other hand, involves coming up with a plan to manage the change. This plan should consider and addresses organizational issues and reengineer the business processes among others, depending on the present need of the enterprise. The first issue that EasyJet is being faced with is its inability to satisfy its clients by not fulfilling the promises they made to them. This is seen in the inability of this organization to reimburse its clients as it had earlier promised to be doing. The second issue involves the limitedness of the customer booking portal for the company’s online travelling services. In the first issue, EasyJet could be trying its best to satisfy its clients and to some extent the customers were having their needs met by this company. The issue of customers complaining for not being served could actually be caused by the fact that this company’s customer base has increased and somehow they are overwhelmed by the present large number of consumers. In solving this situation EasyJet need to adopt Ishikawa’s Quality circles. According to Mehra and Ranganathan (2008, p. 915) the quality circles will involve coming up volunteer groups of employees from the customer service department. This quality team will be meeting together to discuss on how to enhance the customer experience in EasyJet. With these circles in place at EasyJet such issues of customer dissatisfaction will be unheard of since this circle will be working tirelessly to bring about quality improvements. The second issue; which is about the limitedness of the consumer online travelling portal, can be resolved though the application of the structural-functional systems theory. According to Asif, Fisscher, and Pagell (2010, p. 152) the structural-functional systems theory tackles the intricate aspects of communication and information networks together with the various levels of command that make up the organization’s communication system. This theory further identifies the flow of information in the organization as networks that are made up of members together with links. In applying this theory, the management will realize which information is vital to the consumer in his decision making process concerning whether to purchase the tickets or not. Application of this theory will lead to the setting up of a database management system that reduces inconsistency and data redundancy that limited the earlier systems’ functions. In addition there will be a proper profiling, quality management and augmentation of the present client information through the online travelling client portal (Chan & Swatman 2003, p. 400). Reflection on Lesson Learnt 1. Implications of Choices Made One aspect which comes out clearly in this report is that all firms are prone to issues that can create problems in the management if they are not handled in the right way. Each issue that enterprises face requires different theories and measures to handle. This is because they are unique to the various organizations. Management issues that relate to new technology relate to the loss of management, control, organizational change requirements, and ethical and legal issues among others. Issues related to e-commerce include data security, cost/benefit and justification issues among others. EasyJet’s issues which are; the loss of customer confidence and the limited features of their customer online booking portal can be solved by the application of the theories of quality circles and structural-functional systems. The quality circles involve coming up with quality teams that are tasked with enhancing quality and output of every department (Mehra and Ranganathan 2008, p. 915). The implication of implementing quality circles within EasyJet’s customer service department is that there will be an improvement in the work performance of the organisation, improved motivation and an enrichment of the work lives of the employees (Lee & Park 2008, p. 218). This quality team will address more issues apart from the customer satisfaction situation, like improving the customer deliver services among others. This improvement will be realized because this quality groups use analysis techniques like lot sampling, brainstorming, reverse engineering, and cause and effect analysis in addressing problem issues the organization may be facing (Lee & Park 2008, p. 218). The implementation of the structural-functional theory within EasyJet will lead to the upgraded of the online booking portal to include more important features that will enable the consumers make more prudent decisions before purchasing tickets. Furthermore, this online booking portal will form part of the database management system which can be integrated in to the enterprise system of EasyJet for increased efficiency, quality, profitability, and productivity. 2. Options that Could have been Considered Differently In instances where, the theory of quality circles, the structural-function system, and the ideas they support, do not match the situation in EasyJet; then a reengineering process (BPR) could have been settled for in the first issue. A complete overhaul of the existing enterprise resource planning could have been put in place for the second issue. In BPR an option of employing new staff and changing the goals of the customer service department could be put in place to ensure they are in agreement with the plans of the organization. In situations where there is a matchup between the theories and the situation in place, then the ideas discussed above will be settled for. In instances where the methods are 100% correct there will be no need to change anything, 3. Avoiding Making Wrong Decisions Wrong decisions can be avoided through a number of ways. First of all, one should avoid relying on past experience tat seemed useful whenever he or she is making a decision. Though past decisions or experiences are helpful, they have proved to be dangerous given that situations are bound to change and what worked successfully in one situation might not auger well as such in the next situation. Secondly, decisions are not to be made with self-interest in the heart, self-interest tendencies are hard to be recognised given that they operate at the subconscious. Thirdly, to avoid making wrong decisions there is a need to avoid prejudgments since a number of managers have made prejudgements about their businesses which have apparently turned out to be wrong. The fourth way of avoiding making wrong decisions involves being sober when making decisions and not making any decision in a rash or under coercion. Conclusion In conclusion EasyJet just like most enterprises is not immune from the common issues that face majority of organisations today. These issues are categorised as relating to new technology and e-commerce related problems. EasyJet is faced with an issue of failing to satisfy its consumers by showing unreliability in satisfying its promises. In addition it’s online travelling client portal which enables it to keep an online database of customers is unlimited in its features and cannot handle complicated itineraries. These issues can be solved by the implementation of quality circles for the first issue and the development of structural-functional systems theory in the second issue. The lessons learnt from these two issues are that the issues enterprises face requires different theories and measures to handle given that they are unique from organization to organization. In addition the quality circles used in handling the first issue involve coming up with quality teams that are tasked with enhancing quality and departmental output. The implications of these choices are that different organizations require different measures and theories in dealing with their issues and problems. The quality circle methods involves coming up with quality teams that enhance output and quality. The implication of implementing quality circles within EasyJet’s customer service department is that there will be an; improvement in the work performance of the organisation, improved motivation and an enrichment of the work lives of the employees. The structural-functional analysis on the other hand tackles intricate aspects of communication within the enterprise. The implementation of this theory within EasyJet will lead to the upgraded of the online booking portal to include more important features that will enable the consumers make more prudent decisions before purchasing tickets. In summary, with the changing trends in technology and in the administration of organisations, the future of these topics will take a different course of action. There will be a need for new management theories to be put in place for effective and efficient operation of organisations. References Asif, M, Fisscher, AM & Pagell, M 2010, ‘Integration of management systems: a methodology for operational excellence and strategic flexibility, Operations Management Research, vol. 3, no. 3, pp. 146-160. Chan, C & Swatman, P 2003, ‘International examples of large-scale systems systems-theory and practice’, communications of the Associations for Information Systems, vol. 11, pp. 394-412. 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Mehra, S & Ranganathan, S 2008, ‘Implementing total quality managmentt with a focus on enhancing customer satisfaction’, International Journal of Quality & Reliability Management, vol. 25, no. 9, pp. 913-927. Rae, DM 2011, ‘EasyJet: a case study of entrepreneurial management?’Journal of Strategic Change, vol. 10, no. 6, pp. 325-336. Turban, E, Leidner, D, McLean, E &Wetherbe, J 2008, Information technology for management: transforming organizations in the digital economy, 6th edn, Wiley, San Francisco, CA. Read More