Highlands and Islands Airports Limited (HIAL) manages 11 airports across the Scottish Highlands and Islands. These airports provide a platform for travel connectivity that is essential to the social and economic development of the communities that they serve. Like other airport operators worldwide, HIAL has to cope with a range of significant operational and business challenges, some of these quite unique to the region that it serves. The challenges include, for example: maintaining the safety of its infrastructure and systems to the highest possible standards, improving customer service, managing efficient and cost-effective airport operations, and meeting the needs and expectations of airlines, passengers, employees and local stakeholders.
In late 2015, HIAL contacted the Cranfield Centre for Air Transport Management in recognition of our previous experience of working with airport clients in remoter regions. We were invited to manage a one-day strategy workshop in 2016, hosted in Edinburgh, that involved both the board of directors and senior management team.
We managed a group learning exercise based on the 'world café' method, where participants engaged in conversations around an agreed set of important and emerging themes. We worked with HIAL to ensure that by the end of the workshop participants agreed a set of important and necessary actions that could be taken to the next stage in the development of their long-term strategy.
The business
Kenya Airports Authority (KAA) manages 18 airports and employs around 2000 people. While having to face the many challenges of managing a very disparate airport system, KAA is confident that there are significant opportunities for growth and performance improvement, given the pace of the country’s development in recent years. According to the World Bank, Kenya is one of the fastest growing economies in Sub-Saharan Africa. Informed leadership is essential in times of change and opportunity. Many of the senior managers and its board of directors were relatively new to the aviation industry, with limited appreciation of some of the important business and operational drivers.
In early 2017, KAA contacted the Cranfield Centre for Air Transport Management in recognition of our experience in delivering both masters-level education and customised executive education programmes for the airport industry. We were invited to manage a three-day Global Airport Business seminar that involved both the board of directors and senior management team.
Our approach
In May 2017, we delivered a programme of sessions around relevant themes in airport business process and operations management. This included, for example: managing airport-airline relationships, achieving excellence in passenger customer experience and understanding the impact of security on business operations. In particular, we had some really engaging conversations around airport retail and commercial activities in general and the scope that exists at the international airports for further growth and development.
We also organised a group activity where participants were invited to play the roles of different airport service providers and how they would respond to a series of incidents that are typically experienced in many of today’s large airport passenger terminals. The intention behind the exercise was to foster an increased level of appreciation and understanding of airport terminal operations from the perspective of the wider business partner and stakeholder community.
Feedback from participants was very positive and we have been asked by KAA to deliver more Global Airport Business seminars.
