Analysing the Quality Culture: Emirates Airlines

Analyzing the Quality Culture: Emirates Airlines Name: Institution: Analyzing the Quality Culture: Emirates Airlines Introduction Corporate culture is the behavior of people who work together in an organization with a common goal for the organization. This cultural behavior includes values of the organization, visions, customs, norms, beliefs and systems of work that help bring together people with different backgrounds into working towards a common goal. In many organizations, organizational culture defines how people interact internally and externally. Internal interaction refers to relationship with each other at the work place while external interaction is the interaction between the organization and its clients, suppliers and all other stakeholders who contribute to the organization’s success. Different organizations have different corporate cultures that make them unique and which defines their level of performance. In order to understand the importance of corporate culture and its effect on the performance of the organization, this paper will investigate the corporate culture of Emirates Airlines, one of the best performing airlines in the world. The study will not only help define corporate culture, but will also help to understand quality culture for an organization. By using Emirates Airlines as case study, this paper will detail the requirements of a corporate culture and how organizations manage their workforce through incorporation of quality culture. The paper will give clear understanding of the challenges faced by corporations in maintaining effective corporate culture and how this helps in achieving quality culture (Lawrence & Robbins, 2006). There are advantages and disadvantages in adopting certain corporate cultures. This paper will in particular investigate the pros and cons of the corporate culture at Emirates Airlines and how they have affected the organization’s general performance. Finally, this paper will offer recommendations on how to improve corporate culture in the organization. Recommendations offered under this section may be applicable in other organizations. Main Body Emirates Airlines: Background Information Emirates Airlines is an air travel company based in Dubai in the United Arab Emirates. It is a subsidiary company of the Emirates Group and it is the largest airline in the Middle East. It manages about 3000 flights in one week connecting more than 130 cities. These are cities distributed in 77 countries found in six continents. The Emirates Group is fully owned by Investment Corporation of Dubai, which is a government of Dubai’s corporation. Emirates Airline handles passengers while cargo projects are handled by another division of the Group known as Emirates Sky Cargo. Emirates Airlines was established in the mid-1980s and has continued to grow in terms of revenue and number of passengers handled by the airline per year. Growth of the company was however realized in 2005-2006 years as the company became consistent in financial growth owing to the high number of passengers that used the airline. The company grew in the following years due to the economic growth of Dubai as an emerging economy. The company invested largely in producing quality advertisements that created interest among potential passengers as well as cargo carriers. Currently, the airline is ranked among the top 10 best airlines in the world in terms of coverage, revenue generation and quality of services offered. In fact, in 2011, the airline was ranked as the fourth largest airline in the world. It is one of the few airlines in the world to operate a large number of huge planes such as Boeing and Airbus. Emirates Airlines operates from its main terminal, Dubai International Airport. The airline has now stabilized in the market and renowned for its quality services and efficient customer care services. However, the company became well known for its incorporation of different cultures across the world in its employee database. There are more than a hundred nationalities represented in its employee database. Company’s Vision Emirates Airlines aims at becoming the best airline in the world through its commitment in providing quality services to all its customers. The organization is focused on maximizing profits as it develops mechanisms to become the leading airline in aviation innovation. However, as the organization gears towards creating efficient systems for its clients, it places great value on maintaining corporate citizenship and social responsibility. It envisions a culture of respect for its employees and all stakeholders in the airline industry in their unique cultural diversity. Company’s Mission Emirates Airlines aims at expanding its network in serving its clients across the world. The organization intends to create systems that are more efficient and create consistency in delivering quality services to its customers. Emirates Airlines will continue to expand the customer base through acquisition of more airplanes and recruitment of more qualified employees. The organization aims at upholding competency and fair competition with its rivals in the airline industry. Company’s Objectives Emirates Airlines aims to achieve the following: To ensure that all its customers are satisfied with its services To provide quality services to its customers To maintain steady growth in terms of revenues and number of passengers handled by the airline To maintain high quality employee profiles. Engaging in social responsibility through social projects Cooperation with other willing airlines for mutual benefits and unlocks potential markets across the world. Maintain competitiveness in the global market through competitive advantage. Culture and Society An organizational culture is the pattern of beliefs, norms, values and behaviors embraced by employees in an organization. These characteristics of the said patterns are deemed fit and suitable for the organization’s success and therefore become part of the organization’s running programs. Precisely, a culture in any organization defines its internal and external working strategies. When the organizational culture is deeply rooted, it becomes a practical requirement in the management of the organization. For instance, if an organization sets the reporting to work time as 7:30 am, all the employees will follow this schedule which after some time becomes a norm for the organization. This implies that management structure of an organization depends on the culture that has been inculcated into the organization’s system. An organization’s culture influences its quality management practices. In other words, the quality of management in all levels of the organization largely depends on the culture of that organization. This eventually influences the quality of products and services offered by that organization. Understanding quality culture helps to conceptualize the whole idea of the influence of quality culture on the performance of the organization. Quality culture refers to the organizational diversity in culture that makes it acquire competitive advantage in the market. Diversity in culture implies that there are different people from different backgrounds, skills and experience, who can work together to solve common issues and problems that would not have otherwise been solved. It involves the practices in the organization that promote quality management in order to produce exemplary results and competitiveness in the industry. The type of culture in an organization influences the behavior patterns among employees in the organization. Behavior patterns are ways in which a certain group of people reacts to a specific situation. When people are left to work together as a group, there are certain behavioral changes that occur enabling the group to either work together to achieve a common interest or engage in arguments and conflicts. Naturally, when people are grouped to achieve a certain target, a leadership in the group is a prerequisite. Logically, people may not move together unless there is an able leader among them. Different groups within the same organization tend to compete against each other in their different designated duties. When such competition sets in, each group works to outdo the other and members develop a common interest in achieving their goal. In this case, the organizational quality culture helps to build norms and values that promote cohesion and teamwork among different groups. It is a process that involves pooling of skills, knowledge and experience from different cultures to achieve the set objectives. Emirates Airlines is one of the well managed organizations in the world, being one of the most successful airlines. The airline’s culture has been centered at enhancing employees’ welfare and offering good working conditions. The company attracts high quality employees by offering highly attractive benefits. In addition, the airline has invested well in training the staff to equip them with crucial skills required in the industry. This has been the airline’s custom, which enables it to maintain high quality staff that can efficiently handle its customers’ needs. In addition, through the Bright Ideas scheme, the airline encourages employees in improvement of services by introducing them to new trends in the markets. In addition, the airline has another scheme known as Mabrouk (Congratulations) which rewards exemplary performance by specific employees. During its recruitment exercises to acquire new staff, the airline has set certain standards that have to be met by the candidates. They have to be cheerful, confident, understanding and flexible. They must also exhibit excellent social and communication skills that enable them to interact with customers of diverging cultures and originalities. The airline’s staff comprises of more than 110 different nationalities who then work in various multinational groups. This indicates the cultural and ethnic diversity of the Emirates Airline’s customer base. The airline has managed to uphold professional and organizational culture that helps it solve those problems that would otherwise prove difficult to solve. The airline’s career website shows that there are over 160 nationalities in their employees’ database, bringing in diversity of cultures, religion and ethnic backgrounds. This composition augurs well with Dubai’s cosmopolitan and multicultural structure of the population. Pros and Cons of Quality Culture Emirates Airline’s diversity of culture has both positives and negatives on its management and performance in the airline industry. On the positives, quality culture brings forth a wide range of talent from different areas of the world. The organization’s career website says that talent is not nationality exclusive but a value that needs to be shared. In addition, diversity among employees brings new ideas, innovations and rationale that help the organization to solve a wide range of problems. For...