Genuine Curiosity

Author Dwayne Melancon is always on the lookout for new things to learn. An ecclectic collection of postings on personal productivity, travel, good books, gadgets, leadership & management, and many other things.

 

Shouldn't a business make money?

A few days ago, I questioned the insanity of airline pricing.  I've been doing some research on the subject, and it still seems today's model is a poor one for the long-term viability of the industry.  A big part of the problem is the "disruptive pricing" phenomenon precipitated, in part, by a lot of the new entries into the air travel market (JetBlue, Frontier, etc.).

These companies have the benefit of smaller fleets and smaller footprints, which means they need much less infrastructure and far fewer people to support their operations.  They are also "buying market share" by offering incredibly cheap seats.  Additionally, these airlines don't have nearly the cost commitment for pensions and other retiree benefits that their more established peers must manage. (And fuel costs just make things worse.)

My gut tells me this is not sustainable (unless we want to accept serial bankruptcies and a perpetual stream of startup airlines as the new reality).

It's bad business to run your suppliers out of businessClosed_1 

In my time as an IT buyer, I always felt it was my duty to negotiate a reasonable discount, but I didn't believe in forcing my suppliers into a position where they couldn't sustain and improve their own business.  After all, I want my chosen suppliers to remain viable and thrive, since the switching process is painful and costly for all involved.

So how do we resolve this in the air travel industry?  I don't have all the answers, but my preliminary research tells me it will likely mean us getting "real" about the price we pay for air travel.  Don't get me wrong - it's not that I want to pay more for my tickets (when my family travels, that means paying for 5 tickets). 

However, if we don't adequately compensate airlines for the benefits they provide in a way that allows them to run reliable infrastructure, we all lose.  I, for one, don't want to lose the benefit of air travel.

Some ideas I've seen that may help:

  • FedEx has been using a "fuel surcharge model" to insulate themselves from fluctuating fuel costs
  • The airline industry needs to get in synch on how pricing is handled (of course, the danger is "price fixing")
  • There needs to be some consistent (and sane) method to allow people who plan ahead to get better prices than last minute purchasers - this fare sale fire sale approach seems to be driving the wrong behavior

What about you - any insight to share on this topic?  Am I missing something here?

Read More

Silence is moldin'

Skip's observations in his recent post of "No news is good news" were both intriguing and troubling to me.  I think his points are spot on, but I can't help but recognize my own tendency to hold back news, particularly good news.

It's not a part of some nefarious plan - it's more a side effect that I do so much internal processing and "self talk" that I often forget to communicate out to others.  I am beginning to develop some techniques to help me improve in this area such as:Silence

scheduling (publicly committed) status updates to people I want to keep in the loop,

calling meetings with key people to create a "forcing event" to remind me to update them and ask for their help and input

adding "Update Jim on xyz project" to my agendas for 1-on-1 meetings

I've also added a tickler item to my weekly review process to remind me: Create actions for updates on top 5 projects.

What about you - are you running a bit too silent?  Have any tips to share on this topic?

Read More

Burned out minds yield burned out results

In one of my periodic sweeps to catch up on my Bloglines subscriptions, I stopped by Phil Gerbyshak’s “Make it Great!” blog today, and found a very insightful article on recharging your batteries.  As I’ve written in the past, I’m one of those who really needs my “recharge time.”

Phil breaks this down into a formul of the “4 R’s.”  They are:  Rest, Reflect, Read, and Relax.  These certainly resonate with me, and I realized that I’ve not taken enough time to Rest and Relax lately.  I’ve been doing plenty of Reflecting and Reading, but just haven’t been making as many “a-ha” connections I usually do.

In other words, I’ve been working hard this week, but haven’t been getting the full benefit of that work because my batteries were a bit run down.  This evening I feel more energized and creative.

Skates_1After reading Phil’s post, I realize I'm reaping the benefits of spending all afternoon ice skating with two of my kids (the third went to Build-A-Bear with my wife).

So, check out what Phil has to say.  And don’t forget to use all 4 of the R’s.

Read More

Danger Quicksand is now on Amazon.com!

Arrow_sign_lIf you bounced here from my old site - search for the topic you were looking for to the left.

Hello, and welcome to my blog's new home.  If you arrived here via a link from another site or a Google search, you can still find your article by using the Google search box on the left hand side of this page (assuming you're using your browser and not an RSS reader.

I've moved over to TypePad, and the address is http://genuinecuriosity.typepad.com

Meanwhile, here's a checklist to get you up-to-date on my new address:

  • Update your RSS reader to find the new feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/genuinecuriosity (autodiscover will find this if you just point your reader at the main pageand if you were already using my feedburner feed, you're fine).
  • Update any bookmarks to reflect the new address.
  • If you are a fellow blogger and have been kind enough to include me in your blogroll or link list, please update the address to point at my new address.

Thanks for your understanding about this migration.

Unfortunately, I wasn't able to migrate comments and trackbacks from the old site to the new. 

Read More