In the recent times, the aviation industry has reached a crossroad. The economic slump as a result of the September 11 attacks has created severe impact on the airlines viability. While the European and U.S. airliners were severely wedged, the airliners in other parts of the world have been striving to make improvements in terms of profitability and operating costs. The initiatives to improve the customer relationship in the aviation industry needs to be fostered with an augmented focus on the competitive advantage and profitability in long-term. As a matter of fact, the improvement strategies by the various airline companies had adopted CRM for aiding customer relationships (Shaw 2016). The report aims to critically evaluate the possible extensions which can be made in the CRM strategy of Emirates. The study has further suggested the improvements of the customer knowledge and competitive advantage which can be gained in terms of the organization. Some of the other section has discussed on how the eBusiness strategy has been conducive in the aligning the activities to deliver effective and efficient process at Emirates. In addition to this, the discourse has also included frameworks which are most suitable for analysis of the business environment and justifying the same to make it most effective with the strategic direction of the organization. The latter part of the study has highlighted the characteristics of the data, knowledge and information and difference among the tacit and explicit knowledge which may benefit Emirates in the long run.
Improvements which can be made in extending CRM system and improvements in the customer management
To manage the customer relationship process in a more efficient manner, Emirates needs to follow a mileage-based segmentation strategy which will guide the investors to get a better insight of the high-value customers. In addition to this, Emirates needs to follow CRM initiative development which will be able to differentiate the competition among the airliners such as Flynas, Saudia, SaudiGulf and Nesma Airlines. Emirates needs to abandon the approach of fast follower and integrate the CRM development initiative for higher returns. The organizational management and design process needs to be instilled as per the service mentality among the employees empowered with a complete view precisely articulated with the role of the employees. The implementation of the suggested steps needs to be depicted with consumer centric approach along with the appropriate relationship management positioned to retain, develop and acquire a better competitive position in the long run. The implementation and development of the customer analysis along with the decision support may start with the utilization of the customer information not only to differentiate the services as per the customer value and driving the important operational decisions. The CRM program at the end needs to be achieved as per operational efficiency, growth and long-term management (El Khatib, Bin and Uae 2014).
Emirates needs to further identify the relevant impediments faced by the global airlines industry which are related to create an economic slowdown along with the aftermath of the event on September 11. This has led to decrease in the passenger traffic, decrease in the load factors, burgeoning fleet, labor costs and insurance. This needs to be identified on a global basis which is considered with the operating loss and government bail-outs. The CRM strategy can be also improved by focusing on the economy-cost carriers especially in the areas having low customer ratings. In addition to this, Emirates can introduce the competitors to determine the initiatives taken to determine the value contribution among the customers. At present there are not only increasing number of frequent flyer programs but also the flight notifications to improve the commonplace among the customers. The primary goal of the CRM program needs to be depicted as per personalization which can be distinguished among other airlines (Tubigi and Alshawi 2015).
Emirates needs to take a learning lesson as per fast follower approach and experience of the competitors aimed to reduce cost. For instance, it has the scope of claiming for the spending of the airlines based on a similar check. Additionally, the increased technology capability may improve the access of the technologies pertaining to the introduction of the new services which will be able to create a sustainable differentiation. Emirates needs to take the appropriate strategy which are aligned with concentrating on the relationships of building an effective CRM (Zaei and Zaei 2014). Moreover, it is not mimic in the competition to offer the identical services. Therefore, the airliner needs to be particularly cautious in understanding the customer requirements as per the specific initiatives such as evaluating the ROI and driving customer insights. The adoption of the new initiatives taken by the airliner will improve the customer insights, value and return from the CRM program. This will allow the company to act in a more competitor driven manner thereby focusing on the key customer segments (Adam 2017).
The differentiation pertaining to the CRM initiatives needs to be implemented in a more effective manner by understanding the value and needs among the customers. Moreover, the effective segmentation of the customer is vital for the success of the CRM strategy. Despite of this, customers may be grouped in value-based segmentation which is important for understanding the profitability of the individual segments (Barros and Wanke 2015).
The recent activities pertaining to Emirates can be seen with introducing three new destinations across the global network. These areas are mainly included in the Newark via Athens, Phnom Penh and Zagreb. In addition to this, Flydubai and Emirates have announced about the expansive code shared agreement along with network optimization initiatives. Some of the latest installments by Emirates is depicted with updated Emirates A380 onboard lounge. The airliner has further taken several initiatives which are based on the opening the most advanced flight academy training center. Emirates is considered with one of the Best Airline in the world with dedicated and secure provision for pharmaceuticals. The introduction of the new network by the airway is identified with countries such as Yangon, Hanoi, Yinchuan, Zhengzhou, Cebu and Clark. In 2015 Emirates had took major initiatives to provide 24-hour customer support in English and Arabic via social media (Lewis-Pryde and Evans 2016).
The implementation and development of the customer information needs to be differentiated with the appropriate service as per the customer value which is beneficial for the operational decisions. This is required for both long-term and near-term relationship growth strategy of the management. The data claimed for the similar technology has been further described as per the introducing the services to the sustainable differentiation. However, distinguishing factors pertaining to the technology needs to be understood in terms of customer value. The customer behavior and technology usage need to be aligned with the employees for providing the employee with better knowledge pertaining to the interactions of the individual customer enabling the travel experience (Qasim and Zafar 2016). It needs to be further seen that IBM institute for the business value is developed with the fact-based strategy insights pertaining to the cross-industry issues and industry specific issues. The member programs of the IBM business value are considered with the in-depth consulting with the IBM strategic advisors. The employees need to be evaluated as per better knowledge about the interactions with the technology enabled changes. The implementation and development of the customer information and is not only used to differentiate the service levels based on the crucial decisions of operations. In the end CRM program was also considered as the platform for the operational efficiency, long-term relationship management and growth (Leong et al. 2015).
The increasing technical capabilities of the airline is depicted to be conducive for taking increasing technological capabilities. This has allowed the airline to gain access to similar technologies and reducing the ability to introduce sustainable differentiation. The improvement in the present e-business strategy have allowed the companies in determining the customer value. Emirates has developed the e-business strategy which have allowed to determine the airline recognize the high-value frequent flyers and proactively offer special. This has further included the differentiated services in the event of cancellation of the flight. Technology incorporation has allowed the employees in having a better knowledge about the customer which has added to the overall travel experience. The high level of service has ensured the employees to exceed the customer expectations (Nieves, Quintana and Osorio 2014).
Therefore, it can be seen that the incorporation of technology in the organization will start with the use customer information and it will not only be able to differentiate the customer values but also essential operational decisions. CRM program has been further considered as the main platform for driving the long-term relationship and growth (Mardani et al. 2015).
UAE is depicted to maintain a free and vibrant economy which is significant with the proportion of the revenues originating from the exports of oil and gas. The successful efforts have been further conducive in diversifying the industrial base created together in the services sector. In addition to this, the suitable framework for business environment for the operations of the airlines is also evident with the establishment of the free zones which is an important feature as per the diversification policy. In 1971, the country has been able to enjoy a degree of political stability which is unequaled in the region. This has permitted the company to reinforce the social structure to work as one of the most secure, prosperous and tolerant organization in the world. The presence of the special economic zones and free zones has allowed the business to operate with 100% ownership. This is further evident with the repatriation of the profit and capital as well as tax exemption. The significant nature of the incentives offered to the corporate governance and investors have been able to ensure the governance provisions for ensuring accountability and transparency (Joglekar, Davies and Anderson 2016).
It needs to be further inferred that the corporate taxes are reserved from the branches where there is presence of oil producing companies and foreign companies. The airliner needs to pay a 5% tariff on the goods which are imported from the countries listed under “non-Gulf Cooperation Council”.
The present framework guiding the operations of the airlines is considered with IFRS financial statements. This has been able to consider all the companies listed under the UAE stock exchange. The companies are needed to provide the report for annual activity which are needed to be audited by Ministry of Finance and applicable for the Emirates. Moreover, the companies listed under the stock exchange are needed to submit their accounts to the “Emirates securities and commodities market authority” (Mutuku 2018).
The effectiveness of the business needs to be depicted as per greater access of the business in the strategic location between Asia, Europe and Africa. Moreover, the infrastructure of UAE is considered as second to none. The telecommunications services including the fixed telephony and internet access is conducive for uninterrupted communication in the airport authority. Moreover, the road network is identified to be constantly upgraded by maintaining world-class standards in all the airport terminals. Till date the overall investment of the government has been seen to be evident in terms of the various type the facilities in line with the utilities and other infrastructure. The business environment of the country has been also useful for the investors for providing the benefit pertaining to the human resource skills, courteous professionals. Some of the other factors conducive for the business environment is evident with strong economy in all the regions by 4.4%. Moreover, the increasing spending on the economy will be also able to contribute to further expansion of the business (Hafeez et al. 2016).
Some of the other contributing factors of the business relates to the fact that capital gains are not applied for taxation unless they have been derived from the sales of the company. The significant legislation is also ensured that the deductions are determined as per the accounting principles and other tax decrees pertaining to Emirates. At present, the deductions may not be considered to be relevant as most of the companies are exempted from CIT in UAE. Some of the exceptions for this relates to upstream oil and gas companies and various branches of foreign banks. Additionally, the relevance of the financial statements and operational integrity is maintained by professional accounting bodies such as “UAE AAA” and “UAE National Accountants and Auditors Association”. These bodies ensure that the financial statements are prepared annually and the same is inspected by “State Audit Institution of the United Arab Emirates” which is recognized as one of the major audit organizations of the country (Redpath, O’Connell and Warnock-Smith 2017).
The global expansion along with increasing complexity in the business process especially in the airline industry have led to the need of incorporating knowledge management by the managers. Managing knowledge in Emirates airlines needs to be encompassed with multiple aspects of the business which originates from designing of organizational strategies along with making improvement in customer experience. The critical evaluation of knowledge management strategy needs to be identified by some of the other eminent leaders of industry. Knowledge can be brought into practice in an organization to support the existing systems. This can be also applied from personal experience or experience of others. The relevance of knowledge management system can be seen with organizations such as the police, the way courts and Emirates airlines (Saeida Ardakani et al. 2015).
Previous studies have shown that the knowledge management of Emirates airlines is focused with software and hardware features and also managing and retaining of tacit knowledge. Emirates airlines uses varied nature of activities like collaboration tools. These tools permit the employees for creating a virtual web-based workspace in which they can easily share information via electronic means. This allows other employees to benefit from previous collaboration which is conducive in improving the present services of the company. The collaboration further optimizes and improves the innovation by incorporating decision making and problem-solving techniques (Shams 2015). The Emirates airlines was successful in making the best use of knowledge management with the support of top management. However, there is scope of significant improvement which can be brought into this system by and developing variety of tools which will allow their employees to communicate among each other. For instance, better use of intranet can be done by allowing the staff to discuss day-to-day issues in each department. This will be conducive in providing helpful sources of knowledge for their employees. Additionally, e-learning modules will ensure that tacit knowledge is available for all the employees which will be conducive in making internal communication strongly supported by the executives (Law and Breznik 2018).
Emirates airlines and further introduce social networking applications developed by Yammer enterprise which is supported by Microsoft 365. Such a social networking platform is already tried and tested by British airlines. This allows the employees to connect across different working to platforms to support project management decisions. Some of the most significant KM features of this tool allows individual profile and group creation, collaboration on documents along with several other useful features. Moreover, the adoption of this technique will allow the airliner to increase its inbox space in compared to regular emails. Using such a tool by BA was confirmed after the analyzed how social networking platforms were much more effective than in-house communication platforms. The adoption of this knowledge management technique allowed several staffs of BA to share their expertise. This included frontline employees and cabin Crew directly communicate with the engineers, pilots and managers for sharing their knowledge and reaching to an optimal solution (Laudon and Laudon 2015). The adoption of this tool will be further conducive for A380 airplanes used by the Emirates as the employees will be able to share their first impressions and experience with the co-workers. Therefore, the application of such a tool will allow the internal communication become more effective. The use of such a modern technology will allow Emirates airlines to speed up their technological controls and build a strong knowledge to support the customers. In addition to this, some of the other initiatives needs to be taken by sending customer surveys which will allow the airlines company to know about the reasons of discontentment in the present knowledge management system (Beik and Galbraith 2016).
Conclusion
The organization has the scope of improving the CRM system by abandon the approach of fast follower and integrate the CRM development aimed with higher returns. The overall findings for this section suggest that CRM program needs to be achieved as per operational efficiency, growth and long-term management. E-business strategy and technology aligned with the organization’s activities is depicted with updated Emirates A380 onboard lounge. The airliner has further taken several initiatives which are based on the opening the most advanced flight academy training center. Furthermore, the implementation and development of the customer information needs to be differentiated with the appropriate service as per the customer value which is beneficial for taking the operational decisions. Suitable framework for business environment suggests the airliner enjoy a high degree of political stability which is unequaled in the region. The significant legislation is also ensured that the deductions are determined as per the accounting principles and other tax decrees pertaining to Emirates. Characteristics of the KM evaluation with Emirates can be identified with managing and retaining of tacit knowledge which will allow their employees enhance communication process among each other. This needs to be done by collaborating with Yammer enterprise.
It can be concluded that Emirates airlines can look forward to strengthen the KM system which will allow the company to reward its employees who are active in complication applications. Emirates airlines will be also able to benefit their employees by sharing of various types of non-managerial ideas with the use of bottom-up knowledge process. The company also has the scope of introducing a new scheme for encouraging increased contribution of staff ideas in the bottom-up knowledge process. This needs to be incorporated by a special KM tool for allowing the frontline employees to express their opinion on varied range of ideas on how customer service can be improved.
References
Adam, S., 2017. The effectiveness of knowledge management towards organisational performance of internet business in Malaysia. Malaysian Journal of Business and Economics (MJBE).
Barros, C.P. and Wanke, P., 2015. An analysis of African airlines efficiency with two-stage TOPSIS and neural networks. Journal of Air Transport Management, 44, pp.90-102.
Beik, N. and Galbraith, J., 2016. Fan identification and the perception of the sponsor-team fit: The case of Emirates Airlines and Arsenal FC.
El Khatib, M.M., Bin, H. and Uae, D., 2014. Knowledge Management System: Critical Success Factors and Weight Scoring Model of the Technical Dimensions.
Hafeez, K., Foroudi, P., Dinnie, K., Nguyen, B. and Parahoo, S.K., 2016. The role of place branding and image in the development of sectoral clusters: The case of Dubai. Journal of Brand Management, 23(4), pp.383-402.
Joglekar, N.R., Davies, J. and Anderson, E.G., 2016. The role of industry studies and public policies in production and operations management. Production and Operations Management, 25(12), pp.1977-2001.
Laudon, K.C. and Laudon, J.P., 2015. Management information systems (Vol. 8). Prentice Hall.
Law, K.M. and Breznik, K., 2018. What do airline mission statements reveal about value and strategy?. Journal of Air Transport Management, 70, pp.36-44.
Leong, L.Y., Hew, T.S., Lee, V.H. and Ooi, K.B., 2015. An SEM–artificial-neural-network analysis of the relationships between SERVPERF, customer satisfaction and loyalty among low-cost and full-service airline. Expert Systems with Applications, 42(19), pp.6620-6634.
Lewis-Pryde, J. and Evans, R.D., 2016, August. A social networking strategy for improving knowledge management and communication in the travel industry. In Proceedings of the The 3rd Multidisciplinary International Social Networks Conference on SocialInformatics 2016, Data Science 2016 (p. 24). ACM.
Mardani, A., Jusoh, A., Zavadskas, E.K., Khalifah, Z. and Nor, K.M., 2015. Application of multiple-criteria decision-making techniques and approaches to evaluating of service quality: a systematic review of the literature. Journal of Business Economics and Management, 16(5), pp.1034-1068.
Mutuku, C., 2018. Positive Impact of Adopting Information Technology in Enhancing Organizational Behavior of Emirates Airline.
Nieves, J., Quintana, A. and Osorio, J., 2014. Knowledge-based resources and innovation in the hotel industry. International Journal of Hospitality Management, 38, pp.65-73.
Qasim, S. and Zafar, A., 2016. Information System Strategy for Total Quality Management (TQM) in Aviation Industry. International Journal of Computer Applications, 135(3), pp.37-42.
Redpath, N., O’Connell, J.F. and Warnock-Smith, D., 2017. The strategic impact of airline group diversification: The cases of Emirates and Lufthansa. Journal of Air Transport Management, 64, pp.121-138.
Saeida Ardakani, S., Nejatian, M., Farhangnejad, M.A. and Nejati, M., 2015. A fuzzy approach to service quality diagnosis. Marketing Intelligence & Planning, 33(1), pp.103-119.
Shams, M., 2015. Elevating the perception of the strategic use of design for an airline through the design management conceptual framework (DMCF) (Doctoral dissertation, Brunel University London).
Shaw, S., 2016. Airline marketing and management. Routledge.
Tubigi, M. and Alshawi, S., 2015. The impact of knowledge management processes on organisational performance: The case of the airline industry. Journal of Enterprise Information Management, 28(2), pp.167-185.
Zaei, M.E. and Zaei, M.E., 2014. Knowledge management in hospitality and tourism industry: A KM research perspective. In Information and Knowledge Management (Vol. 4, No. 9, pp. 114-122).
Essay Writing Service Features
Our Experience
No matter how complex your assignment is, we can find the right professional for your specific task. Contact Essay is an essay writing company that hires only the smartest minds to help you with your projects. Our expertise allows us to provide students with high-quality academic writing, editing & proofreading services.
Free Features
Free revision policy
$10Free bibliography & reference
$8Free title page
$8Free formatting
$8How Our Essay Writing Service Works
First, you will need to complete an order form. It's not difficult but, in case there is anything you find not to be clear, you may always call us so that we can guide you through it. On the order form, you will need to include some basic information concerning your order: subject, topic, number of pages, etc. We also encourage our clients to upload any relevant information or sources that will help.
Complete the order form
Once we have all the information and instructions that we need, we select the most suitable writer for your assignment. While everything seems to be clear, the writer, who has complete knowledge of the subject, may need clarification from you. It is at that point that you would receive a call or email from us.
Writer’s assignment
As soon as the writer has finished, it will be delivered both to the website and to your email address so that you will not miss it. If your deadline is close at hand, we will place a call to you to make sure that you receive the paper on time.
Completing the order and download