Geraint Harvey

Greening the airline pilot: HRM and the green performance of airlines in the UK

This paper investigates the potential for human resource management (HRM) to influence the green performance of airlines. The focus is on the management of airline pilots, in particular, who have unparalleled opportunities to affect green performance through their control of the machines that directly impact the industrys carbon footprint. As a result it is vital that the HR function finds ways to engage them in the greening of the organization and works to reduce the triggers to actions that have the potential to sabotage the green aims of the airline industry. To this end, the paper discusses first the indirect effects of HRM in terms of its influence on employee job satisfaction, commitment and involvement in the airline, which can reduce the propensity of pilots to engage in actions detrimental to the green performance of the airline. Second, it explores the nature and purpose of direct green HRM initiatives and airline pilot responses to these. It concludes that the role HR managers can play via their management of the employment relationship on the green performance of airlines in the UK is crucial but that they face considerable challenges.

On the Go: walking the high road at a low cost airline

Low cost travel has proved to be extremely popular in the single European market and low cost airlines have flourished. To meet the challenge of these low cost airlines, several ‘legacy’ or full service carriers (FSCs) around the world have created their own low cost subsidiary. The most notable example in the UK was Go, initially a low cost subsidiary of British Airways (BA) that was subsequently sold to its senior management team and then bought by easyJet, the UKs leading low cost airline. For low cost subsidiaries to survive and prosper, ‘matching’ models of human resource management (HRM) predict that they need to create a low cost employment system, which will be very different from that of the parent company. However, cost is only one variable in the competitive equation. In a ‘customer facing’ industry such as civil aviation a minimum level of service quality is also required and there is clearly scope for ‘low frills’ (e.g. Southwest Airlines) as opposed to ‘no frills’ (e.g. Ryanair). Moreover, there is always the danger that (well organized) employee groups will take umbrage at walking the ‘low road’ of employee relations, especially when their colleagues in the parent airline are walking the ‘high road’. Although competing head on with well-established low cost airlines such as Ryanair and easyJet, Go was able to forge a distinctive management style that combined low cost operations with high road employment relations. The airlines flight crew appreciated this style of management and ‘bought into’ the companys business strategy, unlike their counterparts at other low cost airlines or indeed the parent company.

Management in the Airline Industry

1. Introduction 2. Civil Aviation and the Airline Pilot 3. HRM Content and Style 4. The Study 5. HRM Content and Style in UK Airlines 6. HRM and Job Satisfaction 7. HRM, Organizational Commitment and Commitment to the Union 8. Pilots and Partnership 9. Discussion

Working out: aesthetic labour, affect and the fitness industry personal trainer

In this article, we identify the importance of aesthetic labour to the self-employed fitness industry personal trainer (PT), detailing the ways in which the PT trades on their own physical capital. We examine how these discussions relate to the aesthetic and material dimensions of body work (that is to say, enacted on and through bodies) and the ways in which affective labour, inherent to this type of service work, intersects or delimits physical capital and the embodied competencies of the PT. We argue that the work of PTs helps to deepen emerging discussions and provides a more nuanced and contextualised understanding of affective and aesthetic labour. We assert that the confluences and contradictions between the affective and aesthetic dimensions of work in a fitness industry setting demonstrate that excessive physical capital is perceived as negative for the professional identity of PTs. In conclusion, implications for further research and management are discussed.

Can labor arrest the “sky pirates”? Transnational trade unionism in the European civil aviation industry

In a single European aviation market that is open to innovative new business strategies, most notably the (ultra) low-cost model developed by Ryanair, nonterritorial forms of sovereignty have been used to redefine employment relations, exert control over labor, and extract surplus value. Although aviation unions recognize the need to shift scale from a predominantly local focus on their national (flag) airline, they have yet to develop effective strategies at the supranational level as low-fare airlines continually extend their geographical reach in the open skies over Europe and beyond. Union strategies are considered at different levels (national and EU) as well as the different processes to enact these strategies (technocratic and democratic). Unions need to develop a Euro-democratization strategy if they are to arrest the anti-unionism and social dumping of European “sky pirates” such as Ryanair and Norwegian Air Shuttle.

Neo-villeiny and the service sector: the case of hyper flexible and precarious work in fitness centres

This article presents data from a comprehensive study of hyper flexible and precarious work in the service sector. A series of interviews were conducted with self-employed personal trainers along with more than 200 hours of participant observation within fitness centres in the UK. Analysis of the data reveals a new form of hyper flexible and precarious work that is labelled neo-villeiny in this article. Neo-villeiny is characterized by four features: bondage to the organization; payment of rent to the organization; no guarantee of any income; and extensive unpaid and speculative work that is highly beneficial to the organization. The neo-villeiny of the self-employed personal trainer offers the fitness centre all of the benefits associated with hyper flexible work, but also mitigates the detrimental outcomes associated with precarious work. The article considers the potential for adoption of this new form of hyper flexible and precarious work across the broader service sector.

Trade union participation in CSR deliberation: an evaluation

Whereas there has been considerable interest in the concept of political corporate social responsibility (CSR), trade unions have been largely omitted from such scholarly discussion. This article explores the potential of trade unions as the other in political CSR and the contribution of trade unions to deliberative democracy with the firm. We discuss the importance both of the legitimacy and the efficacy of the other in political CSR. We proceed to assess trade unions as legitimate and effective deliberative partners with the firm towards CSR, evaluating the contribution of trade unions to deliberative democracy and also the potential outcomes for trade unions in adopting this role.

Employment relations in liberal market economy airlines

Purpose – This paper aims to evaluate the institutional complementarity thesis, which anticipates that the institutional context of the firm will have a considerable influence on the choice and success of employment relations strategies. Focusing on two liberal market economies, the paper presents analysis of secondary data from the US airline industry and primary data from UK civil aviation to assess the power of the institutional context on employment relations.Design/methodology/approach – Secondary data were drawn from trade journals, newspaper reports and other civil aviation information sources such as the Civil Aviation Authority database. Primary data collection involved interviews with airline management, officials at the British Air Line Pilots Association, and pilots. A large‐scale questionnaire survey of pilots was also conducted.Findings – In both liberal market economies airlines have adopted a range of employment relations strategies, which demonstrates the robustness of strategic managemen...

Power in the Skies: Pilot Commitment and Trade Union Power in the Civil Aviation Industry

This chapter discusses the power of trade unions within the UK civil aviation industry, focusing specifically on the British Air Line Pilots’ Association (BALPA) that represents flight crew. The deleterious effects of the contemporary legislative and competitive environment of air transportation on the ability of BALPA to exact concessions from airline management are discussed as are the changes to the nature of work of flight crew that impact on the structural dimensions from which BALPA derives its power. These are weighed against the associational dimension of BALPAs power base, in particular the willingness of pilots to engage in active militancy. The chapter also considers possible organizing strategies for BALPA in order to challenge managerial prerogative in the industry.

Speaking of Contradiction

Whereas McGovern calls for a moratorium on the ever increasing (ab)use of the word ‘contradiction’, principally because scholars of work and employment fail to connect different levels of analysis and/or demonstrate how and why contradiction(s) lead to widespread instability and upheaval, it can be demonstrated how both can be achieved through the ‘system, society, dominance’ framework. In what follows, the empirical focus is on the safety-critical work of airport ground service providers (GSPs), where key elements of the employment relationship embody contradictions that can be traced to the (sub-)system (mode of production) of a Single European Aviation Market (SEAM) that is now dominated by low fares airlines (LFAs). Instead of a moratorium, scholars of work and employment need to reconnect with society and theoretically ground their analysis in a (capitalist) system beset with contradictions between the forces and relations of production.