The Role of Digital Technologies in Aviation Operational Disruption

This essay examines the critical role of digital technologies in mitigating and managing operational disruptions within the aviation industry. It delves into various internal and external factors that cause disruptions, such as extreme weather, mechanical issues, and security alerts, which lead to flight delays and cancellations, impacting airline revenue and passenger experience. The essay highlights the increasing challenges posed by a growing passenger base and the rise of social media's influence. It explores how digital tools like chatbots, social media platforms, and software applications are employed to improve communication, offer proactive solutions, and provide passengers with greater control during disruptions. Real-world examples, such as British Airways' operational issues, illustrate the practical application of these technologies. The essay concludes that while the aviation industry remains vulnerable, the effective use of technology, particularly for communication and proactive disruption management, can significantly reduce the impact of disruptions and enhance customer satisfaction and loyalty. The essay references various academic sources to support its arguments.

Contemporary Issues of Management
and Change

Table of contents
INTODUCTION........................................................................................................................3
MAIN BODY.............................................................................................................................3
CONCLUSION..........................................................................................................................6
REFRENCES.............................................................................................................................8

INTODUCTION
The essay is about the role of the technology in the situation of disruption in the
aviation industry and how they are able to mitigate and manage the situation. Different
problems are discussed that happen to the aviation industry and some of them are not in
control of the aviation industry in this essay. Some technological advancement is explained
and how the companies can use them to reduce the disruption effects are discussed.
MAIN BODY
The role of digital technologies in the mitigation and management of operational
disruption in the aviation industry
The aviation industry in today’s time has to deal with lot of factors in the operation of
the company. There are many operational disruptions that influence the industry by the
external and internal factors. The problem can arise when the airplane is in the air or on the
ground. Unexpected costs and damage to the value of brand can occur due the extreme
weather conditions, mechanical problems, natural disasters, industrial action, labor issues,
security alerts and air traffic congestion. The airlines need to be delayed and cancelled due
these disruptions and can generate a loss for the airlines.
The flight cancellation due to the technical glitches or weather disruptions can put
pressure on the staff at the ground for accommodating the passengers into the next flight
along with the generation of new PNR. The revenue of the airlines is affected by these types
of irregular operations (Koh, Orzes and Jia, 2019). The airlines have to pay the cost for the
block of the aircraft for customer per minute, crew cost, fuel cost per minute along with the
maintenance and ownership of the aircraft that is quite a lot for the airlines. The British
Airways have cancelled about 100 flights and delayed more than 200 flights.
There is a problem of the growing number of the passengers using the flight. The
international civil organization recorded that about 3.7 billion passengers used the airline in
the year 2016, it is estimated that the in the year 2035 the passengers will be doubled and the
total of 7.6 billion passengers will be travelling through air. With the increase in the number
of passengers, the risk of disruption will be increased along with the increase in the
consequences related to it.

The increased use of the social media has also caused problems to the aviation
industry as the social media is shifting the focus of the people and the potential passengers
are getting distracted from the messages of the airline and the airport to the voice of the
unhappy passengers of the airlines. The inefficiency and the unorganized services to the
passengers result in the unhappy comments from the passengers (Su and et.al, 2021). Due to
some issues in the British Airways the airline was affected at the short-haul flight check-in as
well as the departures at the Gatwick, London and Heathrow. This issue was expressed by the
customers on the social media, to that the flights responded that they are turning back to the
normal pace slowly and the operational disruption is getting solved. The airlines cannot
always be responsive to the customers on social media, this can be improved by the digital
transformation and by making the business customer focused.
For managing this type of disruption the airlines have disruption management that set
measures to recover their schedules and remove the factors that are generating problems to
the airlines. The airlines are been vulnerable to the disruptions for a long time but now the
situations are changing with the introduction of the new technologies. The optimization of the
flight along with the disruption management is capable of enhancing the operational
performance as well as the customer experience.
The times when the passengers cannot get onboard is considered as the disruption for
the aviation industry. The passenger gets frustrated due to the delays and the cancellation of
the flights but they get more frustrated due to the problem in the communication with the
staff. The management of lack of communication is the main principle of the disruptive
management. The communication aspect is ignored by most of the airlines and that need to be
considered as the priority by the airlines for managing the disruption related problems.
The aviation industry uses the social media as a tool for sharing the marketing
messages for the sales and making the customers aware of the new destinations. Social media
can be used by the aviation industry for the better communication with the passengers at the
time of disruption by addressing the consequences of the disruption in a timely manner to the
passengers. Social media can be used to inform the customers about the IROP on time, along
with dealing with the positive and the negative reviews in spaces that are personalized
(Javlekar and Agarwal, 2019). The communication should be based on the facts rather that
the assumptions, clear speaking should be involved and using empathy while having the
communication. The social media provide the aviation industry with various platforms that

can be used to share the issues. The airlines are using Twitter and Facebook for the
interacting with the customers and apologizing for the problems the passengers had to face
during the travelling, this makes the customer believe that the airlines care for them and
trying everything to fix the issues.
The aviation industry is communicating through the chatbots to their customers. They
are using the chatbots from the mobile apps and the traditional interfaces to the chat driven
environments like the Facebook messenger. Common questions and requests of the customers
are responded through the chatbots along with making the reservations. This help the aviation
industry to free the customer care staff and make them work only when the situations are not
handled on the chat. The airlines look over to this opportunity and make the people to install
the brand specified apps due to the app fatigue and that might turn into a bad strategy. The
chatbots are better than the apps as they are able to work in all the kind of interfaces and
mobile phones. Chatbots help the passengers by managing the disruptions for example, it
provide information and update about the irregular handling of the operations along with
providing the passengers with the alternate flight available for recovering from the disruption
effects (Sigurdsson and et.al, 2020). Instead of the direct communication with the airlines the
customer having the chatbots in the mobile can use it for booking the flight, rebooking the
flight, find hotels near the airport, get the updates of the flight arrivals and also refund the
ticket.
The availability of the structured data on the chatbots makes it easy for parsing
different attributes of flights, cars, hotels and tours. This makes it easy for the chatbots to
work with; it is cheap and effective solution for managing the flight disruptions.
The use of software for a service application can have technical complexity. The
software can work as the meta-search engines and proposes the passengers for the closest
flight just after the disruption happens. There are software’s available that help the air
dispatchers to make quick and right decisions by using the available options at the time of
disruption for mitigating the consequences, as the software unify the weather, landing slots,
traffic control and system recommendations (Bouarfa, Müller and Blom, 2018). The
software is also able to predict the risks, take proactive measures and reroute the flight by
analyzing the weather and traffic data.

This type of software is used by the management of the airlines and the software can
track the overall performance of the flights in the airline and give the notification if
something is not going according to the norms.
The customer feels more control over the disruption when they are able to help
themselves without the use of the intermediates. The interaction with the airlines will be less
frustrating from the passenger’s side having more control over the situation. An app can be
used by the business traveller called Freebird for the quick booking of the next flight at the
time of the disruption and the app also notify the user for rebooking options.
The aviation industry needs to understand the fact that the passengers sometimes have
no options to wait anywhere until the next rebooked flight that are stuck in the middle of the
trip or tours (Ravishankar and Christopher, 2020). The airline can use a startup named
Roomstorm for such passengers, Roomstorm provide the options of places for the passengers
to sleep those who are hit by the disruption. Accommodation of the passengers will not help
the airlines in the disruption but the dissatisfaction level of the customers can be controlled
and the loyalty of the passengers can be maintained.
CONCLUSION
It can be concluded from the discussion that the aviation industry is vulnerable to
disruption but with the use of the technology the effect can be reduced. The cancellation and
the delayed flights cause disruption and that can be reduced by using the chatbots for booking
the closest flight. The aviation industry can use the social media platforms as the tool for
interacting with the passengers at the time of disruption and inform them with the facts and
scheduling of the flights, this will reduce the level of frustration of the customers as the lack
of communication is avoided.

REFRENCES
Bouarfa, Müller and Blom, 2018. Evaluation of a Multi-Agent System approach to airline
disruption management. Journal of Air Transport Management. 71. pp.108-118.
Javlekar and Agarwal, 2019. Research Paper on How Chatbots is used to Generate Leads in
the Real Estate Industry. NOLEGEIN-Journal of Information Technology &
Management, pp.14-16.
Koh, Orzes and Jia, 2019. The fourth industrial revolution (Industry 4.0): technologies
disruption on operations and supply chain management. International Journal of
Operations & Production Management.
Ravishankar and Christopher, 2020. IMPACT OF INNOVATIVE SERVICES ON
CUSTOMER SATISFACTION AND ENHANCING TOURISM: AIRLINE AND
HOTEL SERVICES FROM TOURIST PERSPECTIVE. Journal of Critical
Reviews. 7(11). pp.705-711.
Sigurdsson and et.al, 2020. The relationship between the firm's social media strategy and the
consumers' engagement behavior in aviation. Managerial and Decision
Economics. 41(2). pp.234-249.
Su and et.al, 2021. Airline Disruption Management: A Review of Models and Solution
Methods. Engineering.