Southwest Airlines, one of the largest low-cost carriers in the United States, has announced that it will be scaling back its hiring plans for 2023 due to delays in receiving its orders of Boeing aircraft. The airline initially planned to hire over 5,000 new employees in 2023, but now expects to hire a small percent of that. This is because the company is awaiting the delivery of new Boeing 737 MAX jets. Boeing has faced many production and delivery delays leading to reduced supply of the planes.
In response to the delays, Southwest has adjusted its hiring plans for 2023, as the airline will now only be able to hire a smaller number due to the reduced fleet growth. Southwest's Chief Financial Officer, Tammy Romo, explained that the airline is disappointed to have to adjust plans.
Southwest remains optimistic, with plans to expand its operations and invest in new technologies that will improve the travel experience for its customers. However, the delays in receiving its Boeing orders continue to remind us of the challenges that continue in the wake of the pandemic, as supply chain were disrupted, we had labor shortages, and other unforeseen obstacles had to be overcome.
From what I remember Southwest was hit pretty hard during the covid years which might also contribute to why they are scaling back hirings this year. While I know you wrote that the orders had delays due to covid I feel like covid also shortened their money supply so Southwest's ability to wait for the orders decreased as they didn't have the funds to do so as long due to covid.
ReplyDeleteThis is interesting because as Winter mentioned above, Southwest was an airline company that came up on the news quite often due to lack of staff that resulted in constant flight delays and/or cancellations. I wonder what this is going to do for Southwest's overall service and customer satisfaction if there is now only going to be a smaller pool of employees being hired.
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