Virgin Atlantic Airways was established after an American entrepreneur proposed the idea of an intercontinental airline that would only aim at the business class flights. Richard Branson vetoed this exact approach but loved the idea. To begin with, he reduced the risk by renting the whole thing, and he was capable of competing with the greater air companies by offering an allegedly better service at striking prices (Bolton & Thompson 2013).
Virgin Atlantic Strengths
The first and the foremost strength of Virgin Atlantic Airways is that it is headquartered in a country where air company rivalry is abided and boosted because of the elimination of administrative control in the aircraft travel business, which was ratified to generate more rivalry within the industry. Today, the two countries that dominate the airline market worldwide are the United Kingdom and the United States. This fact can be confirmed with the number of air company brands they have. Rates of the commercial airlines are quite adaptable to the clients’ budget. As a consequence of this strategy, Virgin Atlantic has been capable of presenting the best service suite to its clients worldwide at a low price.
Another strength of Virgin Atlantic is that even supposing they are not taking part in any major airline unions, the corporation has become associates with some well-known carriers (for instance, Singapore Airlines and Continental Airlines). Virgin Atlantic can benefit meticulously from these alliances. These benefits may include a larger market admittance, the attainment of different means of supply, the instant access to various new knowhows, and the overall upgrade of the company’s performance (Bolton & Thompson 2013).
The government of the United Kingdom sees the airline industry among the most important and is familiar with its influence on the economy. Due to this, the currently cushioned state of the UK airline business can be well thought-out as a strong point of Virgin Atlantic, too. It indicates that the market is being continuously supported, where all the enhancements and modifications for the business are seen as a provision basis. Virgin Atlantic is considered to be one of the frontrunners when it comes to the novelties in the airline amenities and customer service (Bolton & Thompson 2013).
Consequently, the utmost strength of Virgin Atlantic lies beneath its enthusiastic accent on client service and origination. As an example, it presented to their customers the first seatback entertaining system in planes. Another illustration of ingenuity displayed by the company was the evasion of being a solemn commercial corporation, but as an alternative is a business that provides a lot of entertainment, has a youthful attitude, and an overt sympathy for modern values.
Another aspect that can also be measured as one of the strengths of Virgin Atlantic Airways is technology (Carter 2013). Virgin Atlantic is industrially innovative as innumerable technology announcements of the corporation are made across the Internet. For example, as a replacement for the dial-up server for its IT organization, the corporation upgraded it and spent money on a remote server. These types of upgrades cut expenses significantly and make the business work faster, which is a direct advantage for both the management and the customers, who are expecting flawless service from Virgin Atlantic.
Virgin Atlantic Weaknesses
The weakness of Virgin Atlantic Airways is that it is not currently a part of a major international union. Even though it presently has numerous recognized allies, the range of the corporation in terms of major extension is still partial. The benefits that Virgin Atlantic Airways lack because of the limited flight-sharing are the lack of bigger net entrée, continuous travel, and improved benefits for those customers who are the members of the frequent-flier program.
One more weakness of the firm is that it lacks clarity. Virgin Atlantic does not expose yearly reports, which may be a shortcoming specifically to the clients who want to learn more about the company. The corporation favors casual methods, which may not be favored by the adult clientele who desire their air company to be as professional and as respected as possible.
The productivity of Virgin Atlantic Airways’ is at a low level. While the consequences demonstrate that the company is on the correct path, it has suffered losses throughout four out of the prior five years. Even in gainful periods, its operational boundaries have classically been only about 1% of incomes or less (Bolton & Thompson 2013).
Virgin Atlantic’s sub-brand, Little Red does not show a really good performance and brings profit. Instead, it shows the VA’s obsession with the London market and the fact that Virgin Atlantic is bound to only several major destinations unlike their rivals (Carter 2013).
Virgin Atlantic’s profit and loss account are under-exploited. It is proved by a hasty rate of money spending, granting this should alleviate if the corporation can accomplish its goal to come back to profit in 2017. VA’s private proprietorship assembly may also comfort its admittance to the reserves when required (its financial statement usually takes in about a hundred million pounds in mortgages billed to assembly businesses).
The Organisation’s Performance
Leadership
Some accept it as true that business is an unethical institution and that old-style concepts of integrity do not fit in the business setting. Others, like Virgin Atlantic originator Richard Branson, are certain of the fact that if you are not in commerce to do decent things, you ought not to be in business in the least (Branson 2014). An examination of leadership stylishness in the corporation, conversely, has exposed that renovating leadership is prevalent in Virgin Atlantic. It works similarly with other establishments belonging to the Virgin Group, too. Furthermore, the administrative principles of Virgin Atlantic have been named inventive, enjoyable, and non-conventional (Branson 2014).
A transformation in a leadership style in the interior of the Virgin Group will have a momentous influence on the general organisational values, along with the level of worker incentives. Consequently, the management has to observe numerous components of organisational activities such as employee enthusiasm, management style, and organisational values. These three might be considered the body parts of an organism and the management has to be aware of this detail when targeting to announce changes on any separate component (Carter 2013).
Corporate Culture
Culture can be explicated as common, informally learned data and forms of conduct. So, corporate culture relates to common principles and behavioral patterns that are linked to a definite company. Virgin Atlantic has a truly amazing ethnic dimension with originator Richard Branson reassuring the workers from all departments to provide honest feedback. In terms of escaping the ambiguity of the cultural dimension, alternatively, Virgin Atlantic structural philosophy can be labeled as proficient by the reason of the firm’s efforts of implementing a pioneering tactic in coping with countless propensities in the business.
It can be stated that in the example of Virgin Atlantic the corporate culture of the business is to nurture a gainful air company where customers love to fly and where employees love to do their job. Nevertheless, commonly, the corporate culture in Virgin Atlantic can be defined as pleasurable and unorthodox as it has been established and extensively endorsed by its founder Richard Branson. It has been acknowledged that Virgin Atlantic organisation exercises a broad specter of perceptible and imperceptible motivational gears to grow the levels of worker fulfillment and enthusiasm.
Corporate Governance
Virgin Atlantic is a mass customer brand. The strength of a brand with principles is in the way of how the customers distinguish the brand and the company’s skill to build trustworthiness and predictability (Singh 2014). More willingly than taking a top-down governance tactic on the way to establishing corporate accountability and maintainable growth, the management at Virgin Atlantic chooses to elucidate, lead, and inspire. In this manner, the company will guarantee the employees recognize that accepting sustainability as an essential value means working on pertinent issues which will eventually be advantageous for their result.
Virgin Atlantic changes the attitude that maintaining a business in an accountable and justifiable way means forfeiting progress and revenues. Virgin Atlantic helps all of its employees to concentrate on the good sides of commercial obligations and supportable growth of the business. A competitive benefit, guaranteeing supply, and rate effectiveness, along with risk management, may be considered a proper example. Virgin Atlantic keeps on paying attention to its employees to make certain new risks are recognized and resolutions found and distributed as fast as possible. Virgin Atlantic puts its faith in knowledge and the spreading of its methods of top practice. They are continuously learning, and they will let the customers of their progress as they move forward.
Conclusion
The paper dwells on the quick history of Virgin Atlantic and how it has been established. The key strengths and weaknesses of the company are reviewed and explained. The views of Virgin Atlantic (and Richard Branson’s in particular) on the leadership, corporate culture, and corporate governance are also thoroughly studied and explicated. The paper states the significance of the company for the UK economy and provides an analysis of the current status of Virgin Atlantic on the background of the current situation in the world.
References
Bolton, B & Thompson, J 2013, Entrepreneurs: Talent, Temperament and Opportunity, London: Routledge.
Branson, R 2014, The Virgin Way: Everything I Know About Leadership, Westminster: Penguin Publishing Group.
Carter, J 2013, Marketing Plan Example: Virgin Atlantic Little Red, Munich: Grin Verlag Ohg.
Singh, S 2014, Corporate Governance: Global Concepts and Practices, New Delhi: Excel Books.