Can the Reputation of United Airlines be Saved?

Not Your Normal PR Nightmare
United pilots request the resignation or removal of CEO Glenn Tilton, and United sticks its head in the sand.

There are any number of times I've looked at crises for this column and thought of the poor PR person who just gave up any chance of a decent night's sleep for a month because of some boneheaded thing management has done. But generally, at least in the olden days of the 20th Century, those boneheaded things would be reported on by reporters whom you knew and could trust to at least throw in your side of the story.

But all bets are off in this era of consumer generated media. This isn't your normal airline company nightmare: Not just customers, but pilots are listing all the boneheaded things you've done on a website with your CEO's name on it.

That's exactly what the pilots of United Airlines did last week when they launched www.glenntilton.com to point out to the world their grievances with United CEO Glenn Tilton. The site's headline is "United Pilots Request the Resignation or Removal of Glenn Tilton." And the copy says: "This website bears the name GlennTilton.com as a daily reminder to everyone invested in a positive future for United Airlines exactly where the source of our problems lies."

First of all, shame on United for allowing the highjacking of the boss's name. If nothing else, it reveals a stunning lack of appreciation for the realities of a social media and search-dominated world. What were they thinking? (All you PR and communications managers reading this right now: Run out and register the web address of your boss's name. You never know.)

But even worse is United's canned and formulaic response. Dozens of passengers, pilots and crew members have now posted hundreds of damning diatribes on the web site that pretty much back up the pilots' argument that Tilton should go.

(And by the way, this is not the first website critical of United to be created. For example, www.untied.com began in 1996, growing from one customer's unsatisfactory experience with customer service.)

Finally, are the members of the Board of Directors so unbelievably clueless and Web un-savvy that they think they can ignore this? Don't they realize that when you now search for "United Airlines CEO," the first or second site that pops up is the Tilton Must Go site?

Thanks to this website and the nature of social media, I have no doubt that Tilton's name will go down in the annals of bad CEOs, no matter what he does from here on out.

But the far bigger issue is the long term impact on the airline's reputation and its ability to survive. At a time when you're trying to charge customers more for things like food and luggage, and when you have brands like Virgin, Southwest and Jet Blue sucking all the love out of the skies, do they really think that ignoring the pilots and letting this viral sh__tstorm of hostility proliferate thru cyberspace is the way to go?

As a Premier Exec frequent flyer with United myself, I will tell you -- having read many of the www.glenntilton.com entries --I'm a lot less likely to fly United. I can put up with a lot, but when pilots are talking safety issues, as well as efficiency issues, I tend to listen.

The reality is that companies like Southwest and JetBlue are constantly and actively listening to CGM conversations and participating in those conversations. They are the ones that will survive because they earn the trust and confidence of myself and their other customers. -- KDP