Communication Plan

Dongxu Xie

Esteban Mosqueira

Josh Blankenship

Maddie Ryan

Tristan Giles
 Table of Contents
Executive Summary. 3

Introduction.. 4

Investing in Our Stakeholders.... 4

Team Members Are a Priority..... 4-5

Consumers Are Disappointed...... 5-6

Theres a Disconnect with Shareholders.... 6

How Should We Invest Our Money to Satisfy Our Stakeholders?...... 7-9

Conclusion..9

References...10-11

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Executive Summary
Introduction
As a company, American Airlines has been performing better than it has in previous years.
However, there is a disconnect between us and our stakeholders because of how we invest our
time and money to them. Currently, we are working to find a balance between satisfying our
shareholders, customers, and team members. This report will highlight the difficulties American
Airlines are facing right now and suggest recommendations on how to fix these problems to
maintain satisfaction and growth.

Investing in our Stakeholders

Based on our weeks of research, we have identified the following three major stakeholders for
our company:

These stakeholders are impacted by all of American Airlines business decisions, making it hard
to strike a balance that leaves all of our stakeholders happy. Using the information we found on
each stakeholder group, we have created the best recommendations that will create the most
overall satisfaction.

Stakeholders Analysis
How we choose to allocate our time and money affects each stakeholder group in a different
way. American Airlines chooses to put our team members first by giving them a 38% pay
increase. However, shareholders would rather have the money invested in making the company
more profitable. Lastly, when we try to become as profitable as possible, we neglect the
consumers wants. As a company, it is our job to implement the recommendations that will
allocate our time in money in a way that creates the best balance between stakeholder groups.

How Should We Invest Our Money to Satisfy Our Stakeholders?

All of the recommendations we have provided aim to create the most satisfaction with our
stakeholders. To do so, we have developed three recommendations to increase investing in our
team members, create a communication plan with our shareholders, and increase our public
appearance via advertising. If we implement these changes, we can achieve our goals and
become to best overall airline company.

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Introduction
This communication plan will explain the problem American Airlines is facing, provide the
background and analysis by each stakeholder group, recommendations to help minimize the
problem, and the related response. Throughout the semester, we have had the opportunity to be
interns at American Airlines and research about the company. We are one of the largest domestic
airlines in the US with the highest market share. This year we have been performing well
financially, but we cannot seem to keep our customers and shareholders satisfied.

Investing in Our Stakeholders

The major problem American Airlines faces is how we distribute our time and money to our
stakeholders. We take pride in how well we treat our team members when it comes to salaries,
raises, and benefits. However, shareholders believe that when we invest in our team members,
we are neglecting them. Our shareholders expect that we are using our business to make as much
revenue as possible, stay profitable, and increase our share price. When we make decisions that
cut out opportunities to increase revenue, our shareholders become unhappy. One way this
happens is when we listen to our customers wants and needs. We want our customers to be
satisfied so, if they do not like any changes we implement or plan to implement, we will try to
accommodate to them. Ultimately, this creates a rift between our stakeholder groups leaving one
or more unsatisfied.

Team Members Are a Priority

Background
Employee satisfaction plays a very important role in our company, therefore we are constantly
working and investing on our team. We are proud to say that our team is operating at its best
because of their satisfaction with our company. This chart illustrates how the amount of team

members changed before and after the merger between U.S. airways and us.

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Due to this, we faced some challenges with our team member satisfaction and work environment.
In order to achieve positive reactions from our team members, there were a couple of strategies
and investment decisions we have made to address their issues.

Some of the basic needs our team members have are benefits. There should not be a team
member in our company who is not getting these. Healthcare benefit, insurance benefit, spending
accounts and disability insurance are some of the benefits our team members have. Pilots and
flight attendant crews noticed some differences in their wages and the wages of our competitors
staff. It seemed like other airlines had better benefits, salary, and bonus payments. So, our team
members started to feel underappreciated and from there, the complaints begun. In order to
address this complaint we developed a 38% average pay rate increase per team member.

One of the most important issues we focus on is employee satisfaction with their work itself and
their work environment. In response to this focus, we implemented a new Human Resource
team to assist our team members and customer service program training to increase customer
service. We believe this not only makes our employees happier and more satisfied with the work
they are doing, but also we helped them improve customer satisfaction. This years, we are proud
to be awarded the 2017 ATW (Air Transport World) Airline of the year. We would not have
earned this without the achievements of our exceptional leadership and team members this past
year.

Analysis
Team members in our company are one of the most important stakeholders. Without them, we
would not be able to perform as a company, which is why we take care of them so much. It
would be hard to operate as a company if our team members have issues. Listening and paying
close attention to them is how we are able to identify their wants, needs, and concerns. So, after
all these strategies and investments we have made, we stand in an excellent position with them.
Team members are proud to be part of our company and we are proud to have them as a part of
our company.

Consumers Are Disappointed

Background
We have identified consumers as a key stakeholder as they are the reason we are a business in
the first place, they are our revenue stream. In order to increase our revenue, we have to take into
account our consumers and their wants and needs. Looking at what people are saying about
American Airlines on social media and forum sites such as AirlineQuality, it is apparent that our
consumers are unhappy with their experiences with our Team Members.

Recently, we have been very responsive to our consumers wants, needs, and opinions. With the
devastation from hurricanes Irma and Harvey, we thought it wise to try to increase our prices
during the time of high demand. However, as negative publicity came through accusing us of
price gouging and not helping those in need, we listened. We capped our prices and instead of
trying to make a profit we tried to help our fellow Americans (INC).

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Analysis
Increasing consumer consumption is critical for any for-profit businesses. As one of our most
important stakeholder groups, consumers allow us to generate revenue and in turn, invest where
we see fit. Some investments have been made to build a better relationship with our consumers,
but still we find them unsatisfied. Our recommendation will focus on how to build a better
relationship with our customers.

Theres a Disconnect with Shareholders

Background
Our shareholders are a very important stakeholder, as they allocate many resources and money
into our company. We have had a very up-and-down relationship with our shareholders.
American has prioritized other stakeholders in the past which has caused some tension and
uncertainty within the shareholders. In April, American distributed our raises to their pilots and
flight attendants which will total to 1 billion dollars over the next three years (LA Times, 2017).
This caused an outrage for shareholders as they saw potential revenue decreasing right before
them. One analyst went on to say, This is frustrating. Labor is being paid first again.
Shareholders get leftovers (LA Times, 2017). Seeing frustration and distrust in shareholders is
not something any company should settle for.

As of recent, we have been able to increase our stock and future outlook with our shareholders.
We have promised a fleet modernization which has been a main reason for our stock price
increasing. We plan to be 10% more fuel efficient by 2021 and to have more seats added in our
aircrafts. One analyst in particular had this to say about the fleet modernization and its potential
effect on American Airlines, I believe revenues at Fort Worth-based American to grow about 4
percent over the next five years (Hethcock, 2017). We must encourage our shareholders to see
the longevity of our company and the potential in investing in our company. We must allocate
more resources to our shareholders in order to maintain a positive relationship.

Analysis
Maintaining a positive and conducive relationship with shareholders is detrimental for our
success. By allocating resources and time to other key stakeholders, we have put our
shareholders on the back burner for quite some time. By modernizing our fleet to create more
revenue, which will increase profits for shareholders and maximize their satisfaction; we have
recently made efforts to repair our relationship with our shareholders, and create a positive
outlook for the future.

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How Should We Invest Our Money to Satisfy Our Stakeholders?

Recommendation #1 - Increase Investing in Team Members

The first plan is to follow our initial investment of approximately 2.5 million dollars in wage
increases with continued investment in our team. We can do some investment through increased
profit sharing like Delta has been doing which led them to being in Fortunes top 100 companies
to work for. With an increase in profit sharing, we increase the incentives for our employees to
work hard and provide the best customer service possible.

Investing in our team further will be advantageous for us as the happier our Team Members are
the more likely they are to provide the best service they can, this option does come with some
downsides, our investors are the ones to be hurt from this. The investment is a long term one that
would increase Team Member and Customer satisfaction but prevents us from meeting the
expectations that our investors have for us.

Recommendation #2 - Communicating our Plan

The plan is for the long term and that is where there is a disconnect with our shareholders. Our
shareholders are feeling as though we are putting them on the back burner but that is not the
case. In order to avoid our shareholders withdrawing and questioning our ways, we need to
communicate what we plan to do, and work with the shareholders to find a middle ground that
works for everyone. The communication plan will include information about where our
investments are going, how that is going to affect future revenue and market share, and why do
we need to do this.

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By communicating this to our investors, we will both be on the same page and there will be no
questions about where resources are being used. We will also communicate our long-term plans
and goals with our shareholders. This will outline our current plan and show our shareholders
where we plan to be in the future and why what we are doing in the present is working towards
the longevity of our company. Below is a time and action chart we have come up with to
implement our communication plan with our shareholders.

The proposed time and action plan we have come up with is a way to keep our high level
executives organized. We have come up with a plan to communicate with our shareholders on a
weekly basis. We will send our investors weekly emails updating them on our weekly progress
and plans for allocating our resources. Every two weeks we plan to hold a presentation for our
shareholders and hold a Q&A for them. Every three weeks we plan to have a press interviews
and discuss our budgets and goal progress. We will design a calendar every month that we can
share with our investors that shows our planned events with them.

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Recommendation #3 - Increasing our Public Appearance
This Recommendation includes a plan to increase the advertising of our efforts to better the
relationship between us and our consumers through internal investments. The biggest complaint
we get from our consumers is our staff. We are currently making efforts to increase the customer
service our Team Members are providing through Human Resource trainings and if we go
through with our 1st recommendation, and increase in incentives for our Team to provide our
consumers with an outstanding experience.

Our strategy is to reinstate a thought that American Airlines cares not only about the profits but
cares more about our consumers experience. This will allow us to position ourselves in a way to
increase the public opinion of our company.

Conclusion
In conclusion, we have presented three recommendations to increase investing in team members,
creating a communication plan with shareholders, and to increasing our public appearance. Each
recommendation is focused on a stakeholder group that would end up increasing their
satisfaction with American Airlines. If we do not begin implementing some of these changes, we
will not be able to make our stakeholders happy in the long run.

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References

American Airlines announces pay raises, and investors balk. (2017, April 27).
Retrieved October 11, 2017, from http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-american-
airlines-raises-20170427-story.html

Hethcock, B. (2017, October 4). Fleet modernization positions American Airlines for higher
returns. Retrieved October 11, 2017, from
https://www.bizjournals.com/dallas/news/2017/10/03/fleet-modernization-positions-
american-airlines.html

Glusac, E. (2017, May 03). On New Planes, American Airlines Will Add Seats and Reduce
Space. Retrieved October 10, 2017, from
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/03/travel/new-planes-american-airlines-will-add-seats
-reduce -space.html

Reed, T. (2017, September 01). American Airlines Flight Attendants Blast Pittsburgh Airport
Plan To Allow Non-Passengers Entry. Retrieved October 12, 2017, from
http://www.forbes.com/sites/tedreed/2017/09/01/american-airlines-flight-attendants-blast
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Koenig, D. (2017, September 28). American Airlines CEO: We'll Never Lose Money Again.
Retrieved October 10, 2017, from
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-09-28/american-airlines-ceo-we-ll-never
-lose-money-again

G. (2017, May 09). J.D. Power 2017 North America Airline Satisfaction Study. Retrieved
October 03, 2017, from
http://www.jdpower.com/press-releases/jd-power-2017-north-america-airline-satisfaction
-study

Press, A. (2017, April 27). American Airlines announces pay raises, and investors balk.
Retrieved October 02, 2017, from
http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-american-airlines-raises-20170427-story.html

American Airlines Jobs - Employee Benefits, About Working for American. (n.d.). Retrieved

October 12, 2017, from http://www.jobmonkey.com/airline/american-airlines-jobs/

17, 2. J. (n.d.). American Airlines is 2017 ATW Airline of the Year. Retrieved October 12, 2017,

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 from http://atwonline.com/daily-news/american-airlines-2017-atw-airline-year.com

American Airlines Employee Benefits and Perks. (n.d.). Retrieved October 12, 2017, from

https://www.glassdoor.com/Benefits/American-Airlines-US-Benefits-EI_IE8.0,17_IL.18,

20_IN1.htm

Press, A. (2017, April 27). American Airlines announces pay raises, and investors balk.

Retrieved October 12, 2017, from

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-american-airlines-raises-20170427-story.html

Investor Relations. (n.d.). Retrieved October 12, 2017, from

http://phx.corporate-ir.net/phoenix.zhtml?c=117098&p=irol-presentations

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