Sabena Belgian World Airlines (A) and Weytjens' First Assignment Case Solution

1. What personal, business and environmental factors influence Erik Weytjens’ decisions and actions? In what way?

At personal level the aspect of Weytjens’ past experience and knowledge as an engineer and a consultant will influence his decisions a lot. For instance, since he is used to consulting other businesses in solving their problems and coming up with new solutions, he will welcome a challenging business environment where he gets to do all that himself. This should motivate him to put his best foot forward and take decisions that are easy to implement, yet have potential to make a turnaround for the business. The fact that he knows Cloetens from his past experience will also help in getting through to management quickly and taking approvals for decisions which others might feel hesitant to even suggest.  

Labor union issues will be the most important business factor which will influence his decisions and actions. This is because, there could be several instances where he wants to take tough decisions but the company policy regarding recruitment hinders him. On the external front, the most important factor would be continued economic crisis situation. Such a scenario will put the company at even higher risk and Weytjens will have to ensure that the actions he takes are such that help the company in combating these problems. The threat of competition from other airlines will also be a significant influencer.  

2. What is your assessment of the situation at Sabena catering and how ready is the organization for change?

In my personal opinion, there are several issues prevalent at Sabena catering. However, the most serious problem is that of poor labor and management relations. The reason is that there are three different unions covering the workers at catering. It is quite clear that they wield significant influence over the management. This relationship cannot prove to be a beneficial one for the company in long run as labor union will continue to hamper employee productivity. Considering that the catering aspect is a key area in flight operations and has the power to stop day-to-day operations, there needs to be strict action taken against the unions prevalent at Sabena. If the management promises its labors and employees that they will handle all their grievances in a just and fair manner then no employee will consider joining any union and things will fizzle out in the long run. However, if the laborers continue to feel their rights are not being covered then they will continue to take cover behind powerful unions and safeguard them.