Reinforcement = Motivation

Two weeks in the UK:
I got to experience day-to-day service as I commuted from the 'burbs near London into and out of the city. I tried a number of latte places, shopped, interacted with front desk folks at two different hotels (with vastly different service orientations) and of course needed to wing my way and back across the Atlantic, so had the opportunity to experience Air Canada service post 'award announcements'.

I was skeptical after my experiences last year. Friends in the UK gave me several earfuls of 'tales of the wicked airline experience' - this time it was all about British Airways.  (Do the brits, like Canadians, love to hate 'their own'?)

There have been no major staffing changes at Air Canada since last year. Yet.... everything was different, from the moment I checked in until I arrived at LHR and YYZ on my return. I call it 'more filled up' sentiment. It was demonstrated by all the front line staff save for one that I encountered. The incharge flight attendants seemed to make the crew's working together more seamless. Eye contact was in greater supply, as were changes. I happen to know it's not that they've had a pay raise, or a 'talking to'. The question of how to motivate a front line, unionized staff that goes largely unsupervised looms large and offers a challenge to most major airlines and many other organisations (like Toronto's TTC, for example). My off the top guess is that it's front-line staff at Air Canada might just be in touch in a very tangible sense that the perception of them has shifted - and this may be simply due to the communication of the news that AC won several awards for service excellence.

This bears thinking about - how making people feel they are part of something bigger, infusing a sense of pride and reinforcing their importance - this in itself can go a long way to changing the behaviour of the front-line people who are the face of any organisation.