Singapore Airlines

C AS E

14

Singapore Airlines: Managing Human Resources for Cost-effective Service Excellence

Jochen Wirtz and Loizos Heracleous

Singapore Airlines (SIA) has managed and organized its human resources (HR) to achieve sustainable competitive advantage and outperform other airlines in its peer group for decades. The case describes the role of HR in SIA’s pursuit of the apparent conflicting objectives of service excellence and cost-effectiveness, at the same time, through its approach to recruitment, selection, training, motivation, and retention of its employees. “At the end of the day, it’s the software, people like us, who make the real difference.”

Patrick Seow, Senior Rank Trainer, Singapore Airlines Training School, and Senior Flight Steward

© 2012 by Jochen Wirtz and Loizos Heracleous. This case is based on the following earlier publications: Loizos Heracleous and Jochen Wirtz (2010), “Singapore Airlines’ Balancing Act—Asia’s Premier Carrier Successfully Executes a Dual Strategy: It Offers World-Class Service and Is a Cost Leader”, Harvard Business Review, 88, no. 7/8, July–August, 145–149. Loizos Heracleous, Jochen Wirtz, and Nitin Pangarkar, Flying High in a Competitive Industry: Cost-Effective Service Excellence at Singapore Airlines. McGraw-Hill Education (Asia) 2009. Jochen Wirtz, Loizos Heracleous, and Nitin Pangarkar (2008), “Managing Human Resources for Service Excellence and Cost-Effectiveness at Singapore Airlines”, Managing Service Quality 18, no. 1 (2008) 4–19.

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Case Study

“In Singapore, we always want to be the best in a lot of things. SIA is no different. … a lot of things that we have been taught from young, from our Asian heritage … filial piety, the care and concern, hospitality, and, of course, the most important part is trying, if we can, to do whatever we can to please the customer. And how do we do it? Sometimes, people just wonder, ‘How do you guys manage to do it with limited time and resources on a flight?’ yet we...