SkyTeam has followed rival groupings oneworld and Star Alliancein establishing a central management team with its own managing director, but sees it as a smaller team than those operated by the other alliances.
The SkyTeam grouping has since its inception in 2000 been run with a governing board, comprising chief executives from its member airlines, and a steering committee made up of representatives from its members. In the past, initiatives agreed by the steering committee have been handed to working groups, comprising members from some or all of the airlines. This work will now be taken over by a newcentral management team.
The team will be led by Air France-KLM executive vice-president internal control and audit, Marie-Joseph Male, after all members were invited to put forward candidates. He is now embarking on putting together a team, based in Amsterdam, which should be in place before year end.
"This was not something we just started looking at yesterday, we've been looking at it for a while," explains SkyTeam steering committee member, KLM senior vice-president, strategy and corporate development Hans de Roos. It reflects the increasing size of the alliance, which now has 10 full members and three associate members, and aims to both free resources for member carriers while enabling the alliance to become swifter in market developments.
"We expect it will enable a shorter time to market," says Roos. "It will not be in place of, but in additon to the governing structure, with the aim of taking some of the burden off the members." He notes, for example, that decisions on the recruitment of new members remains the perogative of the governing board, butthe central management team would do "a lot of the leg work".
"Of course we took a glance at what Star and oneworld are doing," Roos adds, but notes he expects the SkyTeam central team to be smaller than those at the other alliances. "I don't think it will go over 20 [staff]," he says.
The central maangement will handle SkyTeam's marketing, sales, airport synergies and transfer product, cargo, advertising and brand, alliance operations, finance, corporate communications and alliance administration functions.Roos stresses revenue creation remains "first and foremost" as the main role of SkyTeam for its members and cites new member recruitment and airport co-locations among the toppriority areas for the new managing director.
"Recruitment is very high on the list," he says. "It's no secret there are still some major airlines that are not alliance members ...or where the geographical spots are. It's not a very long list and we are not the only ones. The major white spots and airlines are limited in number and SkyTeam intends to play its part in this." It has just taken a step to fill a gap in south-east Asia with Vietnam Airlines, inking a deal to begin formal discussions with a view to it joining the alliance in 2010.
It also hopes to use its first SkyTeam-dedicated lounge facility at London Heathrow's Terminal 4 as a model for other co-location projects. The first level of the lounge opens in June, to be followed by the second level and check-in area before its last members move over to T4 in October.
Rival alliance oneworld meanwhile in April held an inaugural meeting of a new "heads of cost-reduction group", bringing together senior executives responsible for such activities to examine the potential for cost-reduction across the group.
Source: Airline Business
