By Aaron Hansen, Assistant National Director

Our worlds at Alaska and Southwest Airlines are rapidly changing. Over the years our respective airlines have grown and experienced change, but never at the current rapid rate. Now, it seems like every day that we show up for work something has been updated. Our environment is filled with frequent revisions to our manuals and guidelines, and even our Policy and Procedures Manual grows larger and larger by the week.  Today, many decisions are made without our input and indeed out of our control.

Even though transformation in our companies is inevitable, this constant change affects us and can lead towards uneasy feelings, none more so than leadership changes.   We have been told at Southwest, over and over again, that we must grow to stay profitable, thus changing our structure while trying to hang on to the small Southwest Airlines culture. Many new leaders within the company are not accustomed to the culture that our Southwest Mechanic and Related once relished in, but perhaps there will be a small grain of that culture inserted into the bloodstream of these individuals.

We must do our best to respectfully abide by our company procedural changes even though we may not see the bigger picture of why these changes are happening. There is, however, one thing that we can control, and that is how we treat each other. No matter what changes occur, they should never be able to govern the solidarity and respect that we have throughout our Association.   A continuous awareness of respect and solidarity towards each other in our working environment should be maintained so that we can further our grand tradition of solidarity.

In this issue