Delta Troop Fail - Consider the Bigger, Less Popular, Business Picture

UPDATE: The YouTube video has been pulled down. But I'm leaving it in the code below. Delta has increased its allowance for checked baggage for military personnel. And I stand by my post. What do YOU think?

First let's note that I'm not here to defend Delta. But I'm also NOT here to join the Delta pile on. That's too easy and I don't need to add to a PR echo chamber that's sure to set off an avalanche creating enough pressure to turn one of Delta's PR people into a friggin' diamond.

"What was Delta thinking?" Wow, that's bold insight. Thanks. So while hate steeps its powerful brew, let's look at the bigger picture.

The White Zone is for Loading, Unloading & Assuming
Anonymous sources I know that have dealt with similar situations at other airlines note the following:

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First of all, spokespeople don't set policy. But they're sure to suffer personal attacks from this. Media, bloggers and customers are sure to repeat the false, heated and personal accusations thrown at me back in the day:

"Admit it, you hate soldiers! You wish they would all just go back to their bases and leave the country to you civilians."

Nothing could be further from the truth. But here's the deal: the Army sets the number of bags that a soldier is allowed to carry. Back when I dealt with it, each soldier was allowed two bags by the Army. We waived all weight and size restrictions. If the soldier needed a third bag, the Army had to approve their request. Upon approval the soldier would cover the cost of the third bag. It would then eventually be reimbursed by the Army.

This policy has been in place since before 2001, and there hadn't been any issues in all that time. My experience involved one soldier, in 2009 I think. He neglected to follow the policy and get approval and he had to cover the cost. When he was charged for a third bag, he decided to alert a local newspaper. The public reacted as they are now.

We eventually had to waive charges for all military personnel with a third bag. Ultimately, it didn't save any soldier any money -they would not have paid for the third bags. It did cost my then employer what the government was previously paying for.

I highly, highly doubt that these soldiers were given Army permission to travel with a third or fourth bag. The military will also ship excess items on its own transportation. Personnel should just be traveling with their personal effects.

Essentially, Delta is getting heat for something that is not their fault. But no one would ever blame soldiers for not following the rules.

This makes the airlines choice pretty straight forward. Take the heat for playing by the rules and not empowering employees to lose $2,800 in revenue on behalf of the company or make a poor business decision to avoid the ill-informed public outcry.

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Can Fact Beat Emotionally-Charged Fiction?

It's easy to dislike the airlines. You have plenty of others doing it. And travel's a pain in the butt.

But travel is also a business.

Prior to learning the above, I already assumed it was not the spokesperson's fault. But I wondered if Delta could have avoided this problem by aligning marketing more with customer service.

Pete Blackshaw (now with Nestle) has been talking about the need for customer service to be aligned with social media efforts by companies for years. Jet Blue is a stand out in using social media to spot customer service issues, including being stranded on the tarmac. Zappos chose to focus almost solely on customer service as its social media platform. Best Buy’s TwelpForce, the list goes on. But not much longer.

Blackshaw recommends appending customer profiles with social information. Thereby they will know that while Joe Smith is not a big customer for Delta, Joe posts to three blogs and has a strong Twitter presence. So, while it’s not in their financial best interest to do anything for Joe, if he’s pissed it would make more sense to escalate the issue than if financial was the only weight used to asses the priority.

Breaking down company silos and aligning more closely to the customer through customer service is still valid. Many support Blackshaw's POV.

But in hindsight my take would not have helped in this situation. And if you argue that Delta is at fault, are you confident enough that you'd spend $2,800 on behalf of your employer in a similar situation? Perhaps. But our jobs require us to consider the bigger picture -- a picture that is based in the realities of business. A picture that's not always a pretty picture to paint for the media.

Initially inspired (in a very good way) by this post from Steve Woodruff.
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