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Change Management

Heartfelt Leadership at United Airlines and a Journey Through Adversity: Summary of Oscar Munoz’s Memoir, ‘Turnaround Time’

December 16, 2024 By Nagesh Belludi Leave a Comment

Leadership is a delicate balancing act where success and failure can hinge on perception. When a company thrives, traits like optimism and active listening are celebrated as visionary, and leaders who engage with their teams are hailed as collaborative, inclusive, and forward-thinking. But when things go wrong, those same qualities come under attack—optimism’s dismissed as naivety, and “listening” gets criticized as indecisiveness or an overreliance on consensus. Ultimately, results shape the narrative, transforming managerial traits into strengths or weaknesses based on the outcome.

'Turnaround Time' by Oscar Munoz (ISBN 0063284286) Oscar Munoz, former CEO of United Airlines, waited more than four years after handing the reins to Scott Kirby before publishing his business memoir, Turnaround Time: Uniting an Airline and Its Employees in the Friendly Skies (2023.) With United now performing well despite the harsh challenges it faced over the past five years—such as the COVID-19 pandemic, operational disruptions, Boeing’s issues, and various supply chain problems—Munoz’s retrospective lens casts his “people-first leadership” in a favorable light.

At United, Munoz was more of a caretaker CEO than an industry visionary. He was elevated from the board to CEO following his predecessor’s scandal-driven resignation, with his main charge being to find a competent successor with deep industry experience. He succeeded spectacularly by recruiting Scott Kirby after Kirby was abruptly dismissed from American Airlines in 2016. When Munoz handed over the CEO role to Kirby just before Christmas 2019, on the eve of the COVID pandemic, analysts believed Munoz’s legacy would largely rest on hiring Kirby and his rocky initial response to the David Dao incident, followed by a dramatic course correction. To his credit, Munoz used the Dao debacle as a turning point, overseeing an acceleration in significant changes to United’s operations and employee culture.

However, Turnaround Time, which emphasizes the “human aspect of leadership,” lacks the tactical depth expected from a CEO memoir. It’s filled with anecdotes about “listening to employees” rather than providing detailed business strategies or a comprehensive portrayal of the complexities of running a major airline during a challenging time for the industry, with countless variables and uncontrollable factors shaping outcomes.

A key moment in the book recounts Munoz’s seemingly insightful interaction with a flight attendant named Amy Sue, who tearfully told him, “I’m just tired of always having to say, ‘I’m sorry.'” Her words underscored the burden frontline employees face—apologizing for service flaws and management decisions beyond their control. This encounter, claims Munoz, crystallized his leadership mission: to empower employees by aligning resources and support with their professional pride. United’s morale had been battered by financial struggles following 9/11, bankruptcy, and a slow-moving “merger” with Continental Airlines. Change was overdue, and Munoz’s employee-first approach aimed to revive a dispirited workforce.

Leadership Lessons from United Airlines' CEO, Oscar Munoz Yet, one can’t help but ask: Why hadn’t Munoz engaged with employees during his decade on the board of United’s parent company (and another five years at the acquiring company, Continental Airlines)? Wise board members often gain an unfiltered understanding of company culture by connecting with employees directly rather than relying on polished C-suite reports, which can skew the board’s perceptions of the organization’s internal climate.

The real strength of Munoz’s memoir lies in his personal story, which brings a human depth to the book. Just 38 days into his CEO role, Munoz was hospitalized with coronary artery disease and underwent emergency heart surgery, followed by a heart transplant two months later. In Munoz’s telling, this harrowing experience reshaped his approach to leadership, infusing it with compassion and an awareness of the personal struggles many employees likely faced. With Kirby and the rest of the leadership team handling the daily operations and improvements of the airline, Munoz focused on creating a supportive company culture. Frontline employees I’ve interacted with often describe Munoz as personable and genuinely interested in their well-being and professional satisfaction.

Munoz’s heart transplant and recovery add emotional resonance to what might’ve been a typical corporate memoir. Turnaround Time highlights the emotional and psychological resilience that underpinned his leadership at United, showing how his personal journey mirrored his professional one. It’s a fast, engaging read worth picking up for the human story behind the corporate challenges.

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Filed Under: Business Stories, Leadership, Leadership Reading, Leading Teams, Managing People Tagged With: Aviation, Books, Change Management, Conversations, Great Manager, Leadership, Leadership Lessons, Performance Management, Problem Solving, Teams

Big Wins are Rare

April 19, 2024 By Nagesh Belludi Leave a Comment

Big Wins are Rare: Small, Consistent Steps Are Your Secret Weapon Most people look for big wins. Most people want rapid progress. Most people aim to knock it out of the park. This is a common trap that folks fall into.

Sure, these big wins happen, but rarely. Big wins are elusive. And big wins aren’t the only path to achievement.

Big wins often stem from the accumulation of numerous smaller wins. In sports, only a few athletes stand as champions after relentless training and countless setbacks. Entertainers strive for acclaim, yet only a select few experience the euphoria of widespread recognition. Entrepreneurs face fierce competition, economic challenges, and unforeseen obstacles in their quest for success. Academic breakthroughs are scarce, demanding years of research and experimentation.

Idea for Impact: Work on the small things, which most people don’t want to do. Embrace the grind, cheer for small wins, and keep at it. Every step counts toward hitting it big.

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If Stuck, Propel Forward with a ‘Friction Audit’

April 1, 2024 By Nagesh Belludi Leave a Comment

'Friction Audit' mindset fosters proactive problem-solving and continuous improvement culture Friction audits assist organizations in identifying inefficiencies by pinpointing bottlenecks, obstacles, or pain points in their processes. By systematically identifying difficulties and frustrations, teams can focus their efforts on streamlining those specific areas through simplifying procedures, improving communication, or investing in better technology.

As an individual, you can apply the same principles to confront the barriers that’re holding you back, clearing the way for growth, simplicity, and peace of mind.

  • Eliminate “reasons” that you come up with to rationalize things you do but shouldn’t be doing. Breaking a bad habit often requires introducing obstacles, making it less convenient to indulge. Take mindless snacking while watching TV, for example. Lock up those tempting treats in the garage, adding a little inconvenience to your indulgence. Having to fetch the key and trek over will give you pause, helping to curb those cravings. By removing temptations or creating friction in the process, it becomes easier to resist the urge and opt for other alternatives.
  • Eliminate “excuses” that you come up with to justify not doing things you should be doing. Focus on identifying their root causes and develop strategies to address them effectively. Foster good habits by making them more convenient and accessible. Streamlining the processes, removing obstacles, and weaving new habits into your daily grind can make it effortless and enjoyable to maintain, increasing the likelihood of long-term adherence.

Idea for Impact: Identify the friction points that are getting in the way of a better you. Leverage the power of convenience and inconvenience. Smooth out the wrinkles. Reshape your behavior. Commit to self-awareness and accountability.

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Don’t Try to ‘Make Up’ for a Missed Workout, Here’s Why

January 11, 2024 By Nagesh Belludi Leave a Comment

Why You Shouldn't 'Make Up' for a Missed Workout Fitness enthusiasts adhering to a training plan often grapple with the guilt of missing a workout. The temptation to compensate by intensifying the next session or sneaking in extra exercise on a designated rest day can be counterproductive.

Sustainable progress, not desperate measures, is the key to achieving fitness goals. Trying to make up for missed workouts risks injuries, overexertion, and excessive fatigue, ultimately undermining your training efforts.

Overtraining without adequate recovery hinders progress. Sometimes, it’s wiser to let go of a missed workout, as a single session won’t determine your overall success. By releasing the burden of guilt, you can shift your focus towards establishing a sustainable fitness routine.

Life’s unpredictability means it’s okay to recalibrate your expectations and prioritize consistency over perfection.

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The Best Way To Change Is To Change Your Behavior First

December 14, 2023 By Nagesh Belludi Leave a Comment

How 'Faking It Till You Make It' Could Help You Change Visualize change as a triangular framework, with thoughts, emotions, and behaviors as its vertices. Manipulate one element, and the other two inevitably respond. When your thoughts evolve, your emotions and actions undergo transformation; altering your emotions can reshape your thoughts and behaviors, and changes in behavior can impact your thoughts and emotions.

This symbolic triangle acts as a guide for fostering meaningful change. It provides the flexibility to choose the route that best aligns with your individuality and circumstances. Start somewhere.

Idea for Impact: If you find yourself at a crossroads, acknowledging the necessity for change but waiting for the mental and emotional shifts to emerge, take a gentle step in the right direction. Embrace the timeless wisdom of “acting as if” or “faking it until you make it.” By altering your actions, you’ll soon notice your thoughts and emotions falling in line, per the Self-Perception Theory. Commitment becomes a potent catalyst for transformation—remember that your self-concept isn’t solely shaped by existing beliefs and emotions but can also be molded by your behavior.

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The “Adjacent Possible” Mental Model

September 18, 2023 By Nagesh Belludi Leave a Comment

The “Adjacent Possible” consists of all those ideas that are one step away from what actually exists. One thing leads to another, and when you achieve an adjacent possibile, you may hit upon more adjacent possibles.

So exploring the edges can take you somewhere new that you can’t predefine. The adjacent possible is something that gets continuously shaped and reshaped by your actions and your choices.

Steven Johnson’s Where Good Ideas Come From: The Natural History of Innovation (2010) urges, “The adjacent possible is a kind of shadow future, hovering on the edges of the present state of things, a map of all the ways in which the present can reinvent itself.”

Johnson borrowed the conception from biologist Stuart A. Kauffman’s The Origins of Order: Self-Organization and Selection in Evolution (1993.) This book examines a fundamental law of evolution: how everything has to evolve one step at a time within its realm of possibility, which sits directly adjacent to its current position. Novelty isn’t an abrupt, isolated happening, but rather stem from the voyaging of what is adjacent or related to what already exists.

Idea for Impact: Start at the edge of what works. Then, explore the adjacent possibile space. You may just get to those streams of opportunities that lead to the next big thing.

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When Implementing Change, You’ll Encounter These Three Types Of People

April 6, 2023 By Nagesh Belludi Leave a Comment

'Change is like a Slinky' by Hans Finzel (ISBN 1881273687) To successfully make changes in your workplace, you’ll need to have everyone on board. But don’t try to get them all to accept change at once. Not everyone responds to change similarly; some employees will not react well to it initially.

According to Hans Finzel’s Change is Like a Slinky Paperback (2004,) you must anticipate your allies and adversaries. Determine which of these three groups each of your employees belongs to and adapt.

  1. The Innovators and Early Adopters. Some people love the challenge of change for its excitement and the opportunity to spearhead change. These employees can research the topic, develop prototypes, and act as “change ambassadors” to motivate people further down the hierarchy.
  2. The Careful Majority. Most employees will support change once they’re reasonably confident it’ll succeed. Demonstrate to skeptics what the change will represent and how it will benefit them and the company. Acknowledge concerns—both the spoken and unspoken—and the discomfort of being in unfamiliar territory while focusing on what’s within their control. Eventually, the majority will follow the early adopters’ lead.
  3. The Holdouts. A few employees may resist—and even sabotage—change because they feel uncomfortable about it, don’t believe in it, or can’t see any benefits in it for themselves. If their contentions are worth the time and energy to debate and discuss, make a fair effort to gain alignment on perspective and resolution on position, but be firm with your strategic direction. Get key organizational leaders to give these dissenters reasons and opportunities to get on board, but let them know the price if they don’t accept change.

Idea for Impact: The best managers understand that each employee has different skills, sentiments, wants and needs—and work to put each employee in a position to feel valued and contribute.

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Do You Really Need More Willpower?

January 5, 2023 By Nagesh Belludi Leave a Comment

Sure, self-discipline is an asset. Plenty of successful people evidently benefit from having truckloads of it. However, strengthening willpower may not always be easy for the rest of us.

You can increase productivity and contentment simply by altering your environment. Make it easier for you (and others in your life) to confront temptation and adopt the habits you want.

Use stimulus control to shift your behavior:

  • Want to stop taking on more debt? Freeze your credit cards.
  • Can’t stop checking your phone for likes, comments, texts, tweets, and game requests? Disable the apps.
  • Want your household to be more organized? Establish routines and make things easy to put away with clearly labeled receptacles.
  • Want to switch to healthier snacking choices? Splurge on pre-washed, pre-cut, grab-and-go vegetables.

You’re more likely to start change when you put the stimulus for action into your environment.

Idea for Impact: Don’t get bogged down by thinking that lifestyle changes are entirely about willpower. In a world so heavily baited with pervasive cues and craving-inducing stimuli, the more you can tweak your environment to better condition yourself into your desired habits, the more likely you are to meet your goals.

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Use This Trick to Make Daily Habits Stick This Year

January 2, 2023 By Nagesh Belludi Leave a Comment

The best way to catalyze significant change is by relying on highly specific habits and routines and making time for them amid the busyness of life.

Habit formation relies on consistency. Here’s a simple trick to prevent good intentions from slipping.

Suppose that you want to start a daily walking habit. You set a target to go for a walk for at least an hour a day. But some days, this habit might not be doable.

Consistency & Small Habits = Big Results

To prevent slipping on your daily goal and beating yourself up about it, establish two targets: one for the “good” days and one for the “tough” days.

Set the bar very low for when it’s not possible to dedicate an hour to walking. On the tough days, when you’re exhausted, hungry, feeling lazy and unmotivated, or you’re simply not in the mood to walk, you can go for a quick walk. And on good days, when you have more time and energy, go for longer walks. Average out the tough days with the good days.

Make it so easy that you can’t say no to maintaining your habit on the tough days. You’ll decrease your skipped days and sustain the habit’s consistency by lowering your expectations.

Another benefit of having easy-win targets for the tough days is that you nudge yourself into action. Let’s say you target reading an hour a day. On tough days, when you set out to read for just ten minutes, you’ll perhaps get engrossed in more of the task once you get started and find your way into the text. Action begets momentum, and you’ll find it easier to keep going at it.

Idea for Impact: Consistency is the Foundation of Building New Habits

Habits take a long time to create, but they develop faster when you do them more routinely and repeatedly. The more days you skip, the harder it is to get back into the habit. Set the bar low for the tough days and build deep-seated habits.

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Don’t Be A Founder Who Won’t Let Go

January 17, 2022 By Nagesh Belludi Leave a Comment

You’ll never get a potential successor to take your job if you’re going to be peering over her shoulder constantly and talking to employees directly about what they’re doing.

When you have a case of the founder’s syndrome, you’re addicted to running the show, and you’ll have a hard time separating yourself from the company you’ve built. When there are conflicts, you’re often at the center of it and hold your vision and experience over the leadership’s heads.

In the long run, your compulsion to have a say in all the nitty-gritty of your company will undermine the future of the very company that you’ve devoted your life to. The best thing you can do for its future is to back off and give your successor real control.

Establish a timetable to disengage yourself from the operating decisions and set some firm rules about this transition. Spend increasingly more time away from the business and pursue other interests. Start to envision a world in which your next ventures or leisure activities will become the principal focus of your life.

Idea for Impact: Know when your work is over and when it’s time for you to move on to other things. Grooming exceptional talent to take over the business you’ve built and gradually letting go of control is one of the most challenging things a founder will ever do. If done well, it’s the most transformative you can do for your business.

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About: Nagesh Belludi [hire] is a St. Petersburg, Florida-based freethinker, investor, and leadership coach. He specializes in helping executives and companies ensure that the overall quality of their decision-making benefits isn’t compromised by a lack of a big-picture understanding.

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