Word: neeleman
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...Neeleman has raided rivals for employee-focused top executives, including COO Dave Barger, a key part of the team that turned around Continental Airlines. Neeleman lured chief financial officer John Owen from Southwest, "because there is no one else in the world who is better at buying airplanes and running a successful financial operation." For his people person, Neeleman chose the only executive who ever fired him. That was Ann Rhoades, who helped develop the airline industry's happiest employee group at Southwest. But in 1994 she pink-slipped Neeleman after Southwest bought Morris Air, another low-price airline...
...Neeleman obsesses over keeping employees happy, and with good reason. Airline watchers say JetBlue's ability to stay union-free is critical to its survival as a low-cost carrier. The industry's labor-relations record is famously toxic. "But if there is anyone who realizes the importance of treating their employees right, it's the management team at JetBlue," says airline analyst Holly Hegeman, the editor of planebusiness.com...
...Neeleman, who wants to take JetBlue public within two years, is just as obsessed with keeping costs down. Like Southwest, JetBlue flies only one type of aircraft, which keeps a lid on training and maintenance expenses. With flight attendants and even executives like Barger chipping in to help clean the jets even before they have landed, turnaround times average just 35 minutes, as fast as industry leader Southwest...
...best thing JetBlue may have going for it is Neeleman. One of seven siblings, who has nine children of his own, Neeleman has been dreaming about airplanes since he saw a red one on his second birthday cake. A serial travel entrepreneur, he started his first business as an accounting undergraduate at the University of Utah. He has launched four airlines, including Morris Air and Canada's WestJet Airlines, each one more successful than the last. Neeleman, who retains such geeky attributes as wearing a calculator-watch combination, even developed the computer system that became the basis for e-ticketing...
According to his father Gary, a journalist turned publishing executive, David got his entrepreneurial drive from his grandfather, who opened what Neeleman pere claims was the country's first convenience store, on South Street in Salt Lake City. David certainly learned frugality: of the $3,000 his parents sent him during his year on a Mormon mission in Brazil, he saved $1,300. He has retained that trait. He gets around New York City by subway...