Strategic Management Strategic Management Strategic Management

Strategic Management Strategic Management 1 Introduction 1 Strategic Management Strategic Management Author Note: Summary of the case study 2 Applicability of the original vision 3 Impact of external environment 4 Forces that affects the Emirates strategy 4 Threat of new airlines in the industry 5 Focus strategy of Emirates 6 Value chain of Emirates 7 Various resources of Emirates 8 Competitive advantage 8 Effective leadership in Emirates 9 References 10 Summary of the case study This case study reflects the whole scenario of Emirates Airline, which is one of the top Middle East carriers

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Table of Contents
Summary of the case study........................................................................................................2
Applicability of the original vision............................................................................................3
Impact of external environment.................................................................................................4
Forces that affects the Emirates strategy....................................................................................4
Threat of new airlines in the industry........................................................................................5
Focus strategy of Emirates.........................................................................................................6
Value chain of Emirates.............................................................................................................7
Various resources of Emirates...................................................................................................8
Competitive advantage...............................................................................................................8
Effective leadership in Emirates................................................................................................9
References................................................................................................................................10

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Summary of the case study
This case study reflects the whole scenario of Emirates Airline, which is one of the
top Middle East carriers along with Etihad and Qatar Airways. On March 5, 2015, US
Airlines released a report that states Dubai flagship airline including Etihad and Qatar
Airways received $42 billion relating to government subsidiaries and tax breaks since 2004
due to which these state owned airlines are experiencing benefits of unfair advantage. The
open skies treaties that have been used by these top three airlines to access to the US needs to
be renegotiated to retrench their further growth in United States. Emirates assumed to be the
sultan of the skies as since its birth it has been growing as no other airlines had grown.
Emirates airline is one of the leading transporters acquiring the most number of passengers in
terms of international routes as it has Airbus A380 and Boeing 777 jets. These Middle East
carriers are giving tough competition to the US airlines as they are in a verge of meeting the
fate of the European carriers. Dubai, which is known as the hub of Emirates, managed around
75 million passengers and is one of the busiest airport in the world. Recently a new terminal
was built costing to $4.5 billion to accommodate 224 Emirates aircrafts that cover almost 145
destinations all over the world. Emirates offers high quality services to its passengers and
even the flight attendants know almost 50 languages (SADIK 2018). The flight attendants
belongs to different nationalities representing their culture and uniting people around
different places of the world. Emirates provides various top class amenities such as stand up
bar, offer premium wines, marble design showers and many more that are enjoyed by the
passengers. The charge that was reported by US airlines relating to government subsidiaries
and acquiring cheap fuel, Sir Tim Clark, Emirates president states that the airline never
acquired such benefits from the government rather everything related to the airline is properly
disclosed in its financial statements that too with proper disclosures. Even to for the audit
procedures international auditor is appointed and quarterly profits are also posted in the

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financial statements for better understanding of all the transaction of the airline. Clark
declared that all allegations on Emirates are false as no certain proofs are there relating to the
allegations. This case study reflects the financial statements of the Emirates and all
information related to it such as its formation, certain experience provided by the airlines,
types of employees it recruits, and many more that help the airline to increase its level of
standard for further expansion.
Applicability of the original vision
The vision is to make Emirates a global company and to bring people close across all
over the world. Since its birth Emirates is expanding to various countries and even getting
appreciation for its high quality amenities. In spite of the various facilities that Emirates is
providing to its passengers, it is not popular in most of the countries in which it is expanding.
The management of the Emirates realised the fact that in spite of becoming one of the top
airlines in Middle East, it could not develop it brand amongst its customers. The airline
recognised that it should evolve a message that could be used to motivate its existing
employees and even the management to raise the bar of the airline to achieve recognition
across the world. Emirates takes help of 10 advertising companies that are world’s best to
organise an international massive advertising campaign that will bring great recognition.
StrawberryFrog is one of the leading advertising agency in New York founded by Scott
Goodson and is recently working on the advertisements activities towards the expansion of
Emirates in various countries. Scott Goodson gained the idea of starting an advertising
agency after reading an article on interview given by the president of Emirates, which states
the vision of the airline. Goodson develop the idea of “Hello Tomorrow” which proves to be
beneficial to attract the contract with Emirates. This idea not only proves to be one of the best
ad campaign however it also act as a catalyst by connecting global culture across the world in
terms of shared values, aspirations and many more. Various innovative words, images and

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storytelling are used to deliver the message relating to Emirates. Hello Tomorrow brand
proved a great success for the Emirates as the StrawberryFrog agency gave 18 months to
educate the employees of the Emirates and making them aware of this campaign. In 2012, the
brand was launched and it gives a universal message in almost 150 countries.
Impact of external environment
Many other carriers are gaining popularity and even giving tough competition to
Emirates. To become the popular and rule the market customer satisfaction is one of the most
important factor (Redpath, O'Connell and Warnock-Smith 2017). Currently many airlines
were competing with each other to attract customers and to maximize their profits. One of the
great challenge that was faced by Emirates when the Etihad airlines one of the UAE based
airline improved its first-class suite. Etihad introduces high quality amenities such as $21000
one-way residence and $16000 one-way and many more (Bose 2018). Even it offers the first
flights between Dubai and London, and in future, it is planning to expand its flights to New
York and Sydney. According to a business travel writer, Joe Brancatelli Emirates was a
popular airline few years back however, at present many other airline are providing more
amenities and exciting facilities than this airline (Mantur 2016). As per the Emirates
chairperson and CEO, the airline is able to cope up with all the innovative ideas that are
required for further expansion and growth of the company.
Forces that affects the Emirates strategy
Various factors that affects the strategy of Emirates can be well explained with the
help of porter’s five forces model.
Threats of new entrants: First, to enter in to an aviation industry requires a lot of
government approval as well as fulfilling all the legal compliance and requirements. The
quality of the aircraft carriers should be of high quality and proper safety measures needs to

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be ensured. Although Emirates had already established its position in the market and it is
facing less threat of new entrants as it can handle pressure in an adequate manner.
Bargaining power of buyers: Emirates customers mainly interested in the quality rather than
price. Due to seasonal experience, Emirates can influence its prices to some certain extent.
Bargaining power of suppliers: Airbus and Boeing are the main requirements of the
company. In aviation industry, there are lower number of supplier due to which suppliers gets
ample benefits and even maintain a high bargaining power in the market.
Threat of substitute products: emirates is the leading airline in the industry, it faces
moderate level of threat from its substitute products. Many other carriers that are providing
transportation facilities to the passengers, however, Emirates provides the best customer
service quality thus making it superior.
Competitive rivalry: There is a pressure on the management of Emirates to develop its
existing strategy, to cope up with the intense rivalry that is going on in the aviation industry.
The management is focusing on the improving the service quality as the passengers of
Emirates are mainly interested in the quality service.
Threat of new airlines in the industry
Emirates is one of the leading airlines in the Middle East and Dubai is it main hub. In
Middle East, two other airlines are extremely popular and even giving tough competition to
the Emirates in its functioning. Presently, the airways industry is emerging day by day and to
cope up with the competitive situation every airline company needs to adopt innovative ideas.
Even various ways of advertising should be developed by the companies to gain customer
satisfaction and to retain the existing customer (Almarzouqi 2017). Due to the introduction of
new airways in the airline, industry the Emirates is decreasing its leading position and even
the new airline companies are using innovative facilities that are proving profitable for them

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to carter customer experience. Mainly an airline industry can face two types of barriers from
the new entry that are barriers in operating and marketing fields, as these two fields are the
base of an organization and by adequately performing the operational activities and even
adopting innovative ideas for marketing, the potential of the company can increase. Emirates
has the largest fleet of Airbus A380 and long range jets such as Boeing 777, which makes it
one of the leading airline company. However, due to entry of new airline company such as
Etihad, which is assumed one of the top UAE, based rival of Emirates, is giving strong
competition to the airline companies as it has made many new improvements in its first-class
suite and even it has made many changes in its amenities, which are highly appreciated by the
customers. To maintain its position in the airline industry and to remain constant in the
market the Emirates should try to develop innovative ideas by which it can provide customer
satisfaction and can paves the way for further development and growth of the business.
Focus strategy of Emirates
Emirates emerged from the roots of Gulf Air, which was owned and managed by the
government of Bahrain, Qatar, Abu Dhabi and Oman. The Gulf Air decides to cut flights into
and out of Dubai, which was not acceptable by Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al Maktoum,
therefore, he decides to start his own airline that would convert Dubai into a business centre
and an amazing tourist place. The main credit for the tremendous growth and expansion of
the Emirates goes to Sir Tim Clark who managed the route planning for the airline company
and make it a successful project. He identified that major population of the world comes
within eight hours of Dubai and he should take advantage of this location and make Dubai an
international hub for the aircrafts. To accomplish this dream he introduced many new
advance aircrafts and that too with exciting technology. The long-range aircrafts has been
introduced, which could link two points in the world having one stop in Dubai. Even during
the recession time the carrier continues to expand and grow further, it carried more

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passengers than any of its competitors. This airline is known for its amazing and high quality
cuisine and even it provides top class service to its passengers in all sections of the aircrafts.
It hire flight attendants those who are fluent in multiple number of languages and can provide
excellent service to the passengers. To welcome the first-class and business class passenger’s
one multilingual member group is there who take care of the passengers during their arrival
and departure.
Value chain of Emirates
A state-of-the-art facility is designed by Emirates to train its recruited employees.
Adequate and proper training is given to the employees those who are involved in activities
such as welcoming the passengers to serving the passengers inside the plane. External
training is given to employees who are engaged in the fuselage of a jetliner. The management
make sure that proper service is given to all the passengers and in every single flight equal
service is provided to the passengers. Catherine Baird is responsible for giving training to the
new recruited employees and these employees constituted only 5 percent of the total
applications received by the airline. Eligible candidates gets a chance to become part of the
Emirates cabin crew and can enjoy the experience of travelling around the world (Wafik,
Abou-Shouk and Hewedi 2017). The crewmember consists of 75 percent of the women and
mainly had an average of 26 years. The women crewmember has to take proper care of their
health and even proper makeup is mandatory. Emirates provides a seven weeks no-expenses-
spared training program where new recruit employees are trained as per their specialization.
Proper training regarding what should be the posture, safety measures, etiquette and
evacuation is given to them so that they can provide excellent service to the passengers and
attract brand reputation. Emirates introduce one of the motivational training program that is a
team-building exercise and high quality customer service is provided.

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Various resources of Emirates
There are different types of resources used the airline in its business activities such as
tangible resources, intangible resources and many more. All these resources contributed
towards the growth and expansion of the Emirates and helps in adequate functioning of its
activities (Kotsi and Michael 2015). It uses various intangible assets, which reflects the brand
reputation of the company. As it is a renowned airline company, it has extremely strong
goodwill that helps in attracting more number of customers and building strong brand image.
The company uses various tangible assets such as property, plant and equipment, equity
investment, short-term and long-term borrowings, financial instruments, receivables and
many more assets that helps in its operational activities (Bing and Al-Mutawakel 2018).
Using all these resources in an efficient manner shows the capabilities of the company and
even by utilizing all resources in an adequate manner will prove to be profitable for the
airline company.
Competitive advantage
Internal resources refers to financial resources such as investments opportunities,
various sources of incomes and many more (Huang et.al 2015). Certain physical resources
are there such as company’s plant and property, location of the company, which plays vital
role in its efficient functioning. Internal capabilities of an organization includes different
levels of the business and ensure that proper functioning is carried out in all the levels of the
organization. Internal resource reflects the inner strengths and weakness of the firm and
provides certain measures by which this can be overcome (Alameeri 2017). Emirates should
conduct SWOT analysis before setting its objectives thus it can analyse all its weakness and
can take adequate measure to deal with them within specified time (Mahdi and Almsafir
2014.). To build a competitive advantage, strengths can serve as a foundation and weaknesses
can act as hindrances (Alshubaily 2017). Even though Emirates has highly equipped aircrafts

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and uses high advanced technology, it should try to improve its aircrafts to make it more
better thus it can be more superior to its competitors. Achieving sustainable competitive
advantage means all assets and attributes of the company helps in acquiring a long-term
position of the company in a particular industry.
Effective leadership in Emirates
The travel and tourism industry is one of the leading and fast growing industry in the
current competitive world. In economic industries it has becomes the largest developing
sector (Abdouli and Saifan 2017). Emirates is one of such company that cones under the
purview of travel industry and expanding tremendously in this modern era. Dubai is earning
ample amount of foreign currency by dealing in travel and tourism industry. Social and
economic development of the country is ensured due to the expansion and growth of the
airline company. Emirates provides services to people and connect people from various part
of the world (RAGHAVENDRA 2019). Leadership and management both are extremely
essential for completion of any project. In an airline company it is vital to have a strong
leadership structure thus, all the objectives of the company can be achieved and can give
profitable results. For continuous success of the Emirates airlines leadership plays an
important role (Almansoori 2018). All senior managers and leaders of the airline company
are responsible for providing equal treatment to all the passengers, being honest with their
work, executing proper planning and encouraging the employees to achieve the ultimate
goals of the company. Emirates leadership and management should be efficient and adequate
to achieve the organizational goals of the firm.

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References
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on leadership effectiveness: a case study of the Ministry of Interior in the United Arab
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