British Airways is a global airline that is owned by the International Airlines Group. British Airways has about 41,000 employees working in more than 70 countries and serving about 37 million passengers annually who fly to their destination through British Airways. The company has wide range of networks for communicating information within as well as outside the organization. Managing the relevant information within the company is of strategic importance.
Types of Business Information
The different types of business information in British Airways are as following:-
- News
- In British Airways, news is originated from the HR department mainly; however spokes person of other departments also present their relevant news as per requirements. The purpose of news is to inform external as well as internal stakeholders about significant changes/event/occurrences within the organization.
- Financial and credit information
- In British Airways, credit and financial information is originated from the finance department mainly with the purpose of presenting the company’s financial status to the stakeholders.
- Company and executive profiles
- The profiles of the company and its executives are presented to the general public by the HR department in order to bring good brand image to the company’s services.
- Industry economic analysis
- The economic analysis of the Airlines industry is generated by the company’s finance department with the purpose of presenting the economic prospects of the industry to the company’s executives.
- IT research
- The IT research information is presented by the IT department in order to suggest improvements in the Information Systems of the company to the company’s top management.
The basic business related information formats are divided into the following main categories:-
- Various forms of basic reference sources like dictionaries, guides, bibliographies, handbooks, almanacs, encyclopedias and yearbooks
- These basic reference sources are originated by the HR department mainly and the purpose of these are to present the most basic information about British Airways to the general public as well as to its employees.
- Directories
- The directories published by British Airways include the important contact information about the significant figures of the company. This information is also originated by the HR department.
- Newspapers and periodicals
- Newspapers and periodicals are a regular feature of the British Airways in which the newspapers are provided to the customers travelling in their flights while the periodicals are issues within the company for its employees.
Since a greater part of the employees of British Airways work outside the office, the company is implementing the Microsoft Office 365 along with the implementation of the Yammer Enterprise’s social networking service which is aimed at assisting the company’s employees to not only stay in touch with each other but also help them serve customers in better manner. Both of these applications are cell phone based platforms so the employees can share the information including their expertise in order to improve the overall services of the company. These applications also contribute to an increased engagement of employees with the company, and help drive the business strategies. Yammer social networking application is of significant importance in British Airways since it enables the employees anywhere, anytime to engage themselves in useful exchange of information through interesting way of connecting with each other socially.
Information Related to Strategic Decisions
The business information that is useful for the executives of British Airways is mostly based on the presentations presented to them by their middle management and the company’s financial and economic analysis and/or reports. The strategic decisions seem to be of generic in nature and the overall planning of the company but they need detailed analysis and information in order to be taken in correct manner. The British Airways has a uniform structure of centralized flow of information from lower to higher level while a decentralized command and control based on the strategic decisions taken by the company’s executives .
Vision
The vision of British Airways is to become a Global Premium Airline.
Mission:
The services of British Airways have an appealing influence on the customers worldwide. People prefer to fly with British Airways and this has become possible only because of unique set of standards and extraordinary quality of services that they offer. Their motive is to remain distinguished in the minds of customer and they regard paying little high as worth investment. British Airways is committed to provide safe, comfortable and enjoyable journey and we will keep bringing new ideas to enhance their services in coming future .
Goals
- Advance level training of the ground and crew staff has been conducted in order to ensure world class services. Customers are provided with new and technology based facilities and new innovative in-flight amusement programs have also been lined up to be integrated soon.
- Committed to increase the company’s visibility in the key global location. Focusing on more number of flights to Dubai, Saudi Arabia and Johannesburg. New York, London etc.
- The company’s main focus is on obtaining important place in London which is remarkably known as the largest aviation center of the world. New and critical slots, improved tunnel and baggage facility and other related activities to bring ease to our customers.
- The top goal of the company is to achieve the ultimate customer satisfaction level by meeting all their needs and demands in an effective and profitable manner. Supplementary services have been included to increase the brand visibility and equity. British airways is trying its best to make best use of its side services like website, in-flight facility of sale and top notch engineering capacity, care hiring and booking of hotel through online services have been recently made available to the customers.
Objectives
The dynamic environment poses great challenges on business workflow. The British Airways is committed to unbeaten standards of quality and flawless communication process through its operations. Management is striving hard to become the best one in the industry by design long term goals and vision.
Air Travel
The British Airways offer travelling service to their customer which is their primary service as well. The corporate communication for air travel is carried out in two ways in British Airways. The first and foremost is the internal corporate communication in which the airline staff communicate with each other while facilitating the clients in order to bring good brand image to the company. The second one is external corporate communication in which the company’s spokes persons communicate with the public through press, ads, and other related media while bringing good brand image to the company’s air travel services.
Effectiveness of information in British Airways
Business information in British Airways keeps the organization well coordinated which promoted healthy activities within the company and smooth operation of the routine activates like booking, cancellation, flight scheduling etc. The business information system of British Airways is very effective which enables the company to deal with the contingencies with a quick response like emergency landings etc. The same information system enables the company’s employees at all levels to take well informed decisions. The overall effectiveness of information systems in British Airways can be seen through the company’s harmonious and favorable environment.
Legal and Ethical Issues in British Airways related to the Information
First of all the ethical concerns regarding the use of the company’s information is regarding disclosure of non-confidential information to other companies without any prior authority. This include any part of information which may or may not harm the organization but is not restricted specifically by the company’s policies. Another major ethical concern relating to the information of the company is to keep balance of flow of correct information within the company in which every employee is responsible to forward the requisite information in timely manner while reporting any contingency situation as quickly as possible. The example is cancellation of seats from customer which must be notified to the as quickly as possible so that any other customer can be entertained for the same seat in order to optimize the profits.
The legal issues relating to the company’s information is restricted to the information that is classified as secret only which is strongly forbidden to be shared with any third party or other airline and even to any irrelevant person. In case of violation of such policies, the British Airways take serious notice and take disciplinary action against the culprits accordingly. Technical information relating to the company’s aircraft comes under this category.
Electronic and Non-electronic Ways of Communication in British Airways
The electronic methods of communicating business information are based on the electronic media which include following:-
- Presentations
- The audience for this method of communication is mainly the top management and the company’s executives who are responsible for making strategic level decisions
- Reports
- The reports in the form of financial and technical reports are required by middle level management mostly who need such reports from lower level managers in order to make operational level decisions.
- Emails
- Emails flow in both directions i.e. top to bottom for conveying decisions and bottom to top for conveying information that is helpful in making decisions.
- TV Ads
- The TV and other electronic forms of Ads are aimed at bringing good brand image to the company in order to increase the sales.
The non-electronic ways of communication in British Airways include the following:-
- Magazines
- The magazines of British Airways are issues for the company employees as well as for the general public which communicates the company’s stable conditions and presence around the globe.
- Brochures
- The brochure of the company are printed and then distributed to the general public to inform them about the schedule of flights along with presenting the facilities offered in the services.
- Newspaper Ads
- Newspaper ads are published in the newspapers to make people aware of the British Airways and its good services in order to maximize sales.
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Works Cited
Evans, Nigel, George Stonehouse and David Campbell. Strategic Management for Travel and Tourism. Boca Raton: CRC Press, 2012.
Harris, David. Integrated Management. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 2005.
