Westjet Airlines Strategic Management Case Analysis

Document Type:Research Paper

Subject Area:Business

Document 1

Although Westjet airline has done all in its power to remain competitive and become a leader in the industry, there are various issue that this airline should address so that its operations can run smoothly and for it to remain competitive in the market. Most of these things deal with the issue of technology and the effect that the actions of CIO Smith had on Westjet. Issue Although Westjet airline has used information technology effectively, some of it was insufficient in that it led to discrepancies between the business and the IT organization in terms of work. As a result of this, Westjet had to struggle with looking for a technology leader to lead and guide the company’s technical aspects in a direction that is positive.

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Even before the coming of Smith into the company as the CIO, the management team had quickly noted that the company was heavily depended on technology and its ability to apply IT because transiting into Sabre brought a great challenge for the organization. It has ceased to become the international airline it used to be, servicing only Western Canada, into making international flights with Vacation Packages of its own. This was made possible by creation of a strategic alliance between Westjet and Air Transit. Furthermore, Westjet established alliances with the other airlines so that their ability to codeshare could be increased. This caused the airline to successfully expand its business a great deal. The business strategy adopted by this airline is a “world-class guest experience” influences to a great extent both the company and the information strategy.

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However, Smith’s hyper-competitiveness in this organization was too fast and therefore did not in well to the culture of the organization. Although she though that she was revolutionizing information technology for the company, she ended up causing disruptions in the company for both her practices and staff. For the greater number of employees, the new change into a matrix structure meant they would be divided to work at specified units in the business to which the application of IT was necessary and important. This became a major issue because those employees who had worked in this company for a long time resisted change. According to the Technology Acceptance Model, employees resist change and especially in the use of technology until they are actually ready for it.

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It can, therefore, be seen that there is equal distribution of IT supply and business demand. Recommendation Generally, the choosing of Smith to change the aspects of the company in terms of technology and steer the company to success was a good choice. Someone experienced was needed to be able to reform Westjet into a conventional information technology company. In reiteration, the issue that faced Westjet was the fact that Smith was too fast in implementing the changes of transforming the company into a number of business units. Smith should have conducted a poll in the company to establish the proportion of the employees that was in favor of the implementation and that which was not for it. D. D.  Organizational behavior.

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