United’s New President Shows Why Airlines Hire Insiders as Senior Executives
Skift Take
Airlines prefer not to take risks with most of their senior hires, which makes sense, because the industry is more complicated than most.
When United Airlines brought in Oscar Munoz as its CEO a year ago, his hiring was unusual because he came from outside the airline industry.
Munoz had served on United's board, but he had no direct airline experience, having first worked for AT&T, then Coca-Cola and PepsiCo, and later serving as president of CSX, a rail company.
Given United's struggles with responding to customers during former CEO Jeff Smisek's reign, passengers may have wanted United to fill its senior ranks with outsiders charged with making the company more like a typical consumer-oriented business. But because of how the airline industry operates — carriers face more regulation and operational and financial challenges than is typical elsewhere — airlines rarely fill top jobs with newcomers.
So it surprised few industry watchers when Munoz hired two consummate insiders for his management team — president Scott Kirby, who came from American, and CFO Andrew Levy, former president of Allegiant A
