From Worst to First: Behind the Scenes of Continental's Remarkable Comeback

From Worst to First: Behind the Scenes of Continental's Remarkable Comeback

by Gordon Bethune
Released August 1990
Publisher(s): Wiley
ISBN: 9780471356523

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Book description

The numerous anecdotes alone are worth the price of the book . . . most readers will find themselves asking why everyone doesn't run a business as preached by the chief executive of Continental Airlines.-The Washington Post Book World . . . in an age where managing seems increasingly complicated, some of Bethune's prescriptions are refreshingly straightforward.-Business Week

From Worst to First outlines Gordon Bethune's triumphs . . . about the turnaround he's led at Continental, a perennial basket case that's become an industry darling.-The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

From Worst to First is [Gordon Bethune's] story of Continental Airlines' turnaround under his command . . . The blueprint has worked . . . Fortune magazine named Continental the company that has 'raised its overall marks more than any other in the 1990s.'-The Seattle Post-Intelligencer

All of Gordon Bethune's proceeds from this book will be donated to the We Care Trust, a nonprofit organization that assists Continental Airlines' employees and their families in times of need.

Table of contents

  2. Copyright
  3. Praise For From Worst to First
  4. Letter from a customer and friend
  5. 1. How We Climbed from Worst to First
    1. 1. Is This Any way to Run an Airline?
      1. 1.1. Portrait of a Crisis
      2. 1.2. From Worst to First
      3. 1.3. You, Too, Can Save Your Company, with Employees You Probably Have Around the Shop Right Now!
    2. 2. The Last Suppers, or Whose Problem Is It?
      1. 2.1. A Terrible Place to Work
      2. 2.2. You Don't Change Unless You Want To
      3. 2.3. "Let's Try It a While with No Pilot": The Wrong Way to Take Over an Airline
      4. 2.4. The 10-Day Chief Executive, or Whose Problem Is It?
      5. 2.5. The Last Suppers
      6. 2.6. The Go Forward Plan
      7. 2.7. Fly to Win: The Market Plan
      8. 2.8. Fund the Future: The Financial Plan
      9. 2.9. Make Reliability a Reality: The Product Plan
      10. 2.10. Working Together: The People Plan
      11. 2.11. Taking It to the Board
      12. 2.12. The Key: Actual Change
      13. 2.13. Making an Airplane out of Tinkertoys
      14. 2.14. Getting Everybody's Attention
      15. 2.15. Come Up and See Me Sometime
      16. 2.16. Make Yourself Comfortable
      17. 2.17. And Stop Smoking
      18. 2.18. Actually Doing Something
      19. 2.19. Burning the Book
      20. 2.20. Shake a Tail Feather
      21. 2.21. Spreading the Word
      22. 2.22. Leading the Way
    3. 3. Fly to Win, or You Can Make a Pizza So Cheap Nobody Wants to Eat It
      1. 3.1. Stop Doing Things That Lose Money
      2. 3.2. Get the Money
      3. 3.3. Don't Be Telling People What They Want to Buy
      4. 3.4. Oops
      5. 3.5. How Running an Airline Is Like Making a Pizza
      6. 3.6. Figuring Out What People Do Want to Buy
      7. 3.7. Fly Where People Want to Go
      8. 3.8. Get People Working Together
      9. 3.9. Fly Full Planes, Not Empty Planes
      10. 3.10. Winning Means Saying You're Sorry
      11. 3.11. Come On to My House
      12. 3.12. The Key to the Universe: Value-Added Cost
      13. 3.13. The Definition of Better
      14. 3.14. The Row-Five Test
      15. 3.15. Finally, if Your Floor Is So Clean You Can Eat off It, You May Be Paying Too Much Attention to Your Floors
      16. 3.16. Keeping on the Winning Path
    4. 4. Fund the Future, or If There Ain't No Funds, There Ain't Gonna Be No Future
      1. 4.1. How to Stop a Spinning Plane
      2. 4.2. The Morals of the Spinning Plane Story
      3. 4.3. What to Actually Do
      4. 4.4. First, Stop the Bleeding
      5. 4.5. A Word about the Courts
      6. 4.6. Stop Borrowing from Pawnshops
      7. 4.7. A Pleasant Meeting among Friends
      8. 4.8. No Fat Jockeys
      9. 4.9. When All Else Fails, Beg
      10. 4.10. Financial Systems We Could Believe In
      11. 4.11. What's Going On?
      12. 4.12. Where's the Money Going?
      13. 4.13. The Thunderstorm
      14. 4.14. The Downside
      15. 4.15. The Ugly Reality
      16. 4.16. Wage Snapback
      17. 4.17. Creativity—and the Cost of Inaction
      18. 4.18. "These Guys Aren't Kidding"
      19. 4.19. Keep on Climbing
    5. 5. Make Reliability a Reality, or It's Time to Act like a Real Airline
      1. 5.1. Just Be on Time
      2. 5.2. What You Measure and Reward Is What You Get
      3. 5.3. Saving $5 Million by Spending $2.5 Million
      4. 5.4. Your Check Is in the Mail—and It Really Was!
      5. 5.5. Raising the Bar
      6. 5.6. Oh, You Want the Bags, Too?
      7. 5.7. A Word on Safety
      8. 5.8. Here's an Idea: How about If We Let You Do Your Job?
      9. 5.9. Working Together
      10. 5.10. The Checklist
      11. 5.11. More Help from Above
      12. 5.12. Call Me
      13. 5.13. "Sorry You Hated Your Flight—See You Next Time!"
      14. 5.14. Going Forward
      15. 5.15. Would You Please Pick Up the Phone?
      16. 5.16. Reliability Is Everywhere
      17. 5.17. Copycats
      18. 5.18. And the Details Never Stop
      19. 5.19. Phones Are Good—Phones with Dial Tones Are Better
      20. 5.20. Remember the Fundamentals: The Product Is the Point
    6. 6. Working Together, or Which Part of This Watch Don't You Think We Need?
      1. 6.1. What We Learned
      2. 6.2. The People Are the Company
      3. 6.3. The Revision of a Corporate Culture
      4. 6.4. Most Important Thing: Let Employees Do Their Jobs
      5. 6.5. Lady with Lapdog
      6. 6.6. No Monday-Morning Quarterbacking
      7. 6.7. But Pay Attention
      8. 6.8. How about We Try This on Each Other, Too?
      9. 6.9. Team Sports
      10. 6.10. Calling the Right Plays
      11. 6.11. Dignity and Respect
      12. 6.12. Many Watches in One Case
      13. 6.13. If You Need a Reason for Kindness: A Big Piece of Pie
      14. 6.14. Swell, Be Nice—But How?
      15. 6.15. The Day the Problems Started Walking Out
      16. 6.16. The Pilots Slow Down
      17. 6.17. The Pilot's Next Wife
      18. 6.18. Reminding People That Things Are Going Better
      19. 6.19. The Biggest Picture: Winning and Losing Together
    7. 7. Success Has No Autopilot
      1. 7.1. The Future Is Not the Past
      2. 7.2. You Still Have to Keep Winning
      3. 7.3. Keep Raising the Bar
      4. 7.4. Keep Measuring
      5. 7.5. It's All Relative
      6. 7.6. Staying on Time
      7. 7.7. Complacency Kills: Don't Take Anything for Granted
      8. 7.8. Keep Talking
      9. 7.9. Banana Management
      10. 7.10. Object Lesson
      11. 7.11. Staying Successful in Two Simple Words
  6. 2. A Flight Plan for Success
    1. 8. How the Sickest Patients Need the Best Doctors, and concerning Tapeworms
      1. 8.1. Keep Those Doctors
      2. 8.2. Can I Say This Again? Working Together
      3. 8.3. "That's a Lovely Tie You're Wearing Today, Boss"
      4. 8.4. Believe Your Instruments
      5. 8.5. The Tapeworm
      6. 8.6. The Booger
      7. 8.7. Measure, Measure, Measure
      8. 8.8. Simplicity Itself
      9. 8.9. Oh, Yeah—Don't Be a Jerk
    2. 9. Nobody loses When the Whole Team Wins
      1. 9.1. Bad Teams Don't Play Together
      2. 9.2. Good Teams Win Together
      3. 9.3. Running Plays the Team Believes in: Buy-in
      4. 9.4. Everything Is Relative—Even Winning
      5. 9.5. Winning Is the Ultimate Goal, but Not the Only Goal
      6. 9.6. Getting People to Win
      7. 9.7. If the Coach Wins, the Team Wins
      8. 9.8. You Gotta Be a Leader
      9. 9.9. Why Isn't the Horse Fast?
      10. 9.10. The Psychology of Horses and the Psychology of Humans
      11. 9.11. It's about People and Nothing but People
      12. 9.12. One Other Winner
    3. 10. Keeping die Lines of Communication Open
      1. 10.1. All the News, All the Time
      2. 10.2. Never Lie to Your Employees
      3. 10.3. Communication Works Both Ways
      4. 10.4. Get the Right People Communicating
      5. 10.5. The Point of All This Communication
      6. 10.6. If You Don't Know, It's Your Fault
      7. 10.7. Give Us Five Minutes and We'll Give You the Company
      8. 10.8. Okay Then, One Minute
      9. 10.9. Keep It Simple
      10. 10.10. It's Not All Qood News, Either
      11. 10.11. Make It Readable
      12. 10.12. And Read What We Tell the Customers
      13. 10.13. Communicating with Customers
      14. 10.14. The Customer Is Not Always Right
    4. 11. Predictability, or the Value of a Zippo
      1. 11.1. Predictability Is Valuable to Your Customers
      2. 11.2. Surprise! Predictability Is Valuable to Your Employees
      3. 11.3. We Made Continental a Predictable Place to Work
      4. 11.4. Like Everything Else, Predictability Starts at the Top
      5. 11.5. The Benefits of Predictability
      6. 11.6. Predictability Fosters Creativity
      7. 11.7. Predictably, a Concluding Example
    5. 12. What Gets Measured Gets Managed
      1. 12.1. Define Success Right
      2. 12.2. And Measure the Right Stuff
      3. 12.3. Clarify the Goals and Metrics
      4. 12.4. Define Success Reasonably
      5. 12.5. And about Those Rewards...
      6. 12.6. Managers Are No Different
      7. 12.7. Watch That Compensation—and Who Gets It
      8. 12.8. I'll Say It Once More: Goals, Measurements, Rewards
      9. 12.9. Never Stop Measuring
      10. 12.10. To Sum Up: Goals, Measurements, Rewards
    6. 13. Crop Duster's Son
      1. 13.1. The Education of a Crop Duster's Son
      2. 13.2. Negotiating with Mom
      3. 13.3. It Won't Hurt to Learn Something
      4. 13.4. How Much Better Do You Have to Be?
      5. 13.5. Telling Other People What to Do—and How
      6. 13.6. It's People
      7. 13.7. A Little Education Is a Dangerous Thing
      8. 13.8. Lessons from a Dying Airline
      9. 13.9. Optimizing Your Assets
      10. 13.10. Learning to Fly
      11. 13.11. Piedmont and Boeing
      12. 13.12. Know Your Business
    7. 14. Why You Just Read This Book
      1. 14.1. 1. Is This Any Way to Run an Airline?
      2. 14.2. 2. The Last Suppers, or Whose Problem Is It?
      3. 14.3. 3. Fly to Win, or You Can Make a Pizza So Cheap Nobody Wants to Eat It
      4. 14.4. 4. Fund the Future, or If There Ain't No Funds, There Ain't Gonna Be No Future
      5. 14.5. 5. Make Reliability a Reality, or It's Time to Act Like a Real Airline
      6. 14.6. 6. Working Together, or Which Part of This Watch Don't You Think We Need?
      7. 14.7. 7. Success Has No Autopilot
      8. 14.8. 8. How the Sickest Patients Need the Best Doctors, and concerning Tapeworms
      9. 14.9. 9. Nobody Loses When the Whole Team Wins
      10. 14.10. 10. Keeping the Lines of Communication Open
      11. 14.11. 11. Predictability, or the Value of a Zippo
      12. 14.12. 12. What Gets Measured Gets Managed
      13. 14.13. 13. Crop Duster's Son
      14. 14.14. The Last Time, I Promise: It's All about People
      15. 14.15. My Credenza
      16. 14.16. Everything Connects to Everything Else
      17. 14.17. Let Me Serve You
  7. 15. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Product information

  • Title: From Worst to First: Behind the Scenes of Continental's Remarkable Comeback
  • Author(s): Gordon Bethune
  • Release date: August 1990
  • Publisher(s): Wiley
  • ISBN: 9780471356523