Research Proposal: CRM & Performance in the UK Airline Industry

This research proposal investigates the effectiveness of Customer Relationship Management (CRM) in improving the performance and productivity of the UK Airline Industry, with a specific focus on British Airways. It outlines the rationale for the study, highlighting the importance of understanding customer needs and enhancing business performance. The proposal sets out to identify the concept and importance of CRM in the airline industry, examine the challenges faced by British Airways in managing CRM, and discern strategies for overcoming these challenges. The literature review explores these areas, referencing various studies and perspectives. The proposed research methodology employs a positivism philosophy and a survey strategy, utilizing both primary and secondary data collection methods, including questionnaires distributed to 30 managers at British Airways. The data collected will be analyzed quantitatively to provide insights into the effectiveness of CRM. Desklib provides access to this and other solved assignments for students.

Research proposal
(Effectiveness of customer relationship
management in improving the performance and
productivity of UK Airline Industry)

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................3
RATIONALE...................................................................................................................................3
PROJECT AIM AND OBJECTIVES..............................................................................................4
LITERATURE REVIEW................................................................................................................5
What is the concept of customer relationship management and its importance within airline
industry?......................................................................................................................................5
What are the challenges which are faced by British Airways while managing the customer
relationship management within workplace?..............................................................................5
What are the strategies which can be used by British Airways for overcoming the problem
faced while managing CRM within business?............................................................................6
RESEARCH METHODOLOGY.....................................................................................................8
RESOURCES REQUIRED AND ACTION PLAN......................................................................10
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................12
APPENDIX....................................................................................................................................13
Questionnaire ...........................................................................................................................13

INTRODUCTION
Customer relationship management(CRM) is a systematic framework which helps an
organization to successfully manage the relationship and communication with their new and
potential customers. Big and successful companies always conduct this practice in order to
examine and manage the customers perception and data throughout the lifecycle of their
customer within their company. The main role and goal of CRM is to enhance the customer’s
services relationship and help them to reacquire the customer which can help them to increase
their sale. CRM system compiles data related to the customers with the help of various channels
present between the customers and a business organization. Companies official website, live
chat, telephone, direct mail and various social media platforms are some kind of techniques
which be used by the management of the company to interact with their customer base. If an
organization has the complete information of their customers regarding the experienced they face
faced after make a purchase in past then it will be very helpful for them to make such kind of
products and services that can completely satisfy the customers. The collection of information
regarding the customers can assist a commercial enterprises to identify the current trend occurs
in the market field. Furthermore, the chosen organization in this report is British airways which
is a multinational airline company headquartered in United kingdom. It is the second largest
airline company of UK which operates their business in more than 183 destinations. The
company was founded in the year 1916. Later on, in January 2011 the company British airways
made collaboration with Iberia, which is a world’s third largest airline airline company in the
term of revenue. All operations and functions of this company is managed by the British
government (Humagain, 2021).
RATIONALE
The main reason of selecting the topic CRM is to create the knowledge and
understanding in the management of an organization regarding customer needs and wants. It will
help the British airways to enhance their business performance and overall productivity. Through
this the researcher will be able to examine the challenges faced by them in order to completely
satisfy their customers (No, 2019). Moreover, this study is very helpful for the company to offer
the most appropriate and valuable services to their target audience. In personal context, the

researcher will be able to develop both personal and professional skill such as better
communication, presentation and many other valuable skills.
PROJECT AIM AND OBJECTIVES
Research Aim:
“To determine the effectiveness of customer relationship management in improving the
performance and productivity of UK Airline Industry”. A Study on British Airways
Research Objectives:
 To identify the concept of customer relationship management and its importance within
airline industry
 To examine the challenges which are faced by British Airways while managing the
customer relationship management within workplace
 To discern the strategies which can be used by British Airways for overcoming the
problem faced while managing CRM within business
Research Questions:
 What is the concept of customer relationship management and its importance within
airline industry?
 What are the challenges which are faced by British Airways while managing the
customer relationship management within workplace?
 What are the strategies which can be used by British Airways for overcoming the
problem faced while managing CRM within business?

LITERATURE REVIEW
What is the concept of customer relationship management and its importance within airline
industry?
According to the perspective of Migdadi (2020), the concept of customer relationship
management is wider as it includes various strategies and technologies which helps in improving
the relationship between the business and customer. The motive of customer relationship
management is to acquire and nurture leads, improve customer satisfaction and also increase
sales conversion. There are different component of customer relationship management such as
strategy, process, technology and people. Customer relationship management is important for an
organisation as it helps in improving the performance and productivity of business (Sharma,
2020). There are mainly five steps of customer relationship management they are generating
brand awareness, acquiring leads, converting leads into customers, providing superior customer
service and drive upsells. The main objective of customer relationship management is to support
and manage the relationship with current customer and boost the productivity of business.
Through customer relationship management, company can attract more and more people towards
the brand and also enhance their customer base due to which they can gain competitive edge.
Customer relationship management is important within workplace as it focuses on identifying the
need and expectation of people and also offers them solution in order to gain loyalty and build
trust among them (Hossain and Rahman, 2021). The customer relationship management helps in
improving the profitability and growth of business. Thus, it is important to have effective
customer relationship management team that ensures that the satisfaction level of consumers
which leads to increase in profitability and growth of business (Jermsittiparsert, 2020). Customer
relationship management also allow company to create more targeted marketing aimed at the
needs and preference of customer. In order to gain competitive advantage, it is important to
satisfy the need and demand of people so that they can attract and retain loyal people towards the
brand.
What are the challenges which are faced by British Airways while managing the customer
relationship management within workplace?
Customer relationship management is very difficult for an organisation because they have to
influence their employees to adopt a change made in their company. The management of the

company should always implement most effective CRM system which can enhance their
business productivity and revenue level. In context to British Airways, various challenges are
mentioned below which can be faced by them while managing CRM system:-
Handling data security:-
This is one of the main problem which can be faced by the company as if they adopt
CRM system in their company they will get huge amount of valuable information of their
potential customers. Due to this they have to maintain or keep the information in a very safe
place. Because if the data has been leaked then anyone can misuse that data in a bad way. In
context to British Airways, they have to stay concentrated on this factor as they have the
precious details of their customers such as bank details, address and many other personal details
(GS, 2020).
Dealing with the time and cost of CRM implementation:-
The business enterprises have to invest huge amount of monetary funds and time in order
to adopt a new Customer relationship management. It may take week, month or even a year to
get success from the CRM system. In case of British Airways, the Customer relationship
management will help them to reduce the time of transferring the valuable data in a short period
of time. It is very difficult for them as they have to make a change in their ongoing business
operation (Ashi and Elhag, 2021).
Trusting the technology:-
An organisation should always make a complete research before implementing a CRM
system. The management of the company should always select the most effective techniques
which can help them to increase their overall growth. The company has to change the
infrastructure of their business in order to keep their data safe from the hackers.
What are the strategies which can be used by British Airways for overcoming the problem faced
while managing CRM within business?
There are various kind of strategies which can be used by the company to get success in
their CRM system:-
Skilled manager:-

Whenever the company has adopted new and upgraded modern CRM technique it is very
important for them to hire skilled and educated manager who can successfully run or manage the
operation included in this field. In case of British Airways, the skilled manager will make take a
necessary steps on the exact time which can help them to accomplish their set goals and aims in a
very short period of time.
Training programs:-
The management of the company should conduct the training workshops and seminars
for their employees in order to give them knowledge regarding the new CRM system. If the
employees of the company will have the complete knowledge of their CRM system then it will
be very easy for them to work in an organisation. In relation to British airways, the company
should collaborate with professors or trainers to give the guidance to their employees regarding
the CRM system.
Data quality:-
The company should use high data quality which can help the to keep their data
organized. In case of British Airways, the company should adopt high quality data system in
their organisation due to this they will be able to put the information of their customers into one
place (Baral and Shrestha, 2019).

RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
Research methodology is a tool which is used by researcher for gathering, analysing and
evaluating the data of chosen topic. Within a research paper, it is being analysed that research
methodology is one of the important section which provides detailed information related to the
proposed study (Mukherjee, 2019). There are different types of research methods which are used
by investigator in order to accumulate the information related to subject matter.
Research Philosophy:
Research philosophy is a method of research which defines the way through which
researcher can collect and analyse the information. It is mainly classified into two different types
such as positivism and interpretivism philosophy. Within this research, the investigator will
focuses on choosing positivism philosophy as it provides quantitative information which helps in
fulfilling the aims and objective of research in effective manner. Researcher selects positivism
philosophy as it is less time consuming and also requires less cost in gathering information.
Research strategy:
Research strategy includes the set of actions through which data can be collected in
significant way. It is classified into different types such as case study, focused group, survey,
experimental research and many others. In the existing research, the researcher will show their
dependence on survey strategy as it is one of the easiest form of research strategy that helps in
gathering and analysing the data related to the proposed study (Bloomfield and Fisher, 2019).
Through survey strategy, investigator can gain information from wider respondents and ask for
their opinion and viewpoint. Investigator has chosen survey strategy as it focuses on collecting
primary information which is according to the need of investigation.
Research choice:
Research choice is also a method of research which gathers reliable and accurate
information related to the research study. The two different types of research choice are
qualitative and quantitative research choice. Investigator will lay emphasis on choosing
quantitative research choice as it provides numerical information in appropriate manner. The
reason behind selecting quantitative research choice is that it collects numerical data within less
time (Huang and et. al., 2020).
Data collection:

Data collection is a research method that collects and interpret data related to the chosen
subject matter. Primary and secondary data collection method are the two types of method which
helps researcher to avail the information in effective and efficient manner (Bang and Moon,
2019). Researcher will choose both the data collection method in order to accumulate data
related to the chosen topic. In order to collect primary information, questionnaire will be framed
by researcher while for gathering secondary information different sources are used including
articles, newspaper, journals and many other sources. 30 managers of British airways is selected
for answering the question related to the chosen topic.
Data analysis:
Data analysis is a process of summarising the information which are collected by
researcher related to the topic. The methods of data analysis are thematic analysis and frequency
distribution analysis. Within this investigation, the investigator will lay emphasis on choosing
frequency distribution analysis as it provide numerical data related to the proposed study.
Ethical Consideration:
Ethical consideration includes the norms and ethical practices which must be followed by
the investigator in order to gather the information. There are various ethical practices which must
be used by researcher while collecting the data such as obtaining informed consent, protecting
anonymity and confidentiality, avoiding using deceptive practices, minimising the risk of harm
and many others (Sadık, 2019).

RESOURCES REQUIRED AND ACTION PLAN
Resources required:
There are various resources that will be required by researcher while conducting a
research project. These resources are cost, time, travel cost, data processing requirement and
other cost which is helpful in completing this investigation in effective and significant manner.
Action plan:

Budget:
Total forecasted budget
Particular 2017-18($)
Promotional expense 7000
Implementing technology cost 17000
Advertisement expense 5500
Catalogues 1800
Training charges 7500
Total cost 38800

REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Ashi, A.M. and Elhag, S., 2021, December. Enhancing Customer Relationship Management
Using Association Rule Mining and the Evolutionary Algorithm. In The 5th
International Conference on Future Networks & Distributed Systems (pp. 162-170).
Bang, H. and Moon, H., 2019. A study on the methodology to express the main topics of text in
time series using text mining. The Korean Data & Information Science Society, 30(6),
pp.1259-1276.
Baral, P. and Shrestha, B.K., 2019. Influence of customer relationship management on customer
behaviour, a moderating role of social media in bank and financial
institutions. International Journal of Electronic Customer Relationship
Management, 12(2), pp.75-96.
Bloomfield, J. and Fisher, M. J., 2019. Quantitative research design. Journal of the Australasian
Rehabilitation Nurses Association, 22(2), pp.27-30.
GS, G., 2020. Customer relationship management and innovative strategies in tourism
industry. Journal of Contemporary Issues in Business & Government, 26(2).
Hossain, M. S. and Rahman, M .F., 2021. Website quality, perceived flow, trust, and
commitment: developing a customer relationship management model. In Impact of
Globalization and Advanced Technologies on Online Business Models (pp. 202-226).
IGI Global.
Huang, K and et. al., 2020. An innovative quantitative analysis methodology for Natech events
triggered by earthquakes in chemical tank farms. Safety science, 128, p.104744.
Humagain, S., 2021. Exploring the perceptions of service users towards service provider's dark
behaviours based on the customer relationship management practices (Doctoral
dissertation, University of the West of Scotland).
Jermsittiparsert, K., 2020, January. The Moderation Effect of Supply Chain Information
Technology Capabilities on the Relationship between Customer Relationship
Management with Organizational Performance of Thai Restaurants and Hotels.
In Proceedings of the 2020 11th International Conference on E-Education, E-Business,
E-Management, and E-Learning (pp. 338-346).
Migdadi, M. M., 2020. Knowledge management, customer relationship management and
innovation capabilities. Journal of Business & Industrial Marketing.
Mukherjee, S .P., 2019. A guide to research methodology: An overview of research problems,
tasks and methods. CRC Press.
No, N.I., 2019. Customer Relationship Management: Customer Retention.
Sadık, O., 2019. A discussion of the concepts of validity and reliability in qualitative and
quantitative research.
Sharma, S., 2020, April. Big Data Analytics for Customer Relationship Management: A
Systematic Review and Research Agenda. In International Conference on Advances in
Computing and Data Sciences (pp. 430-438). Springer, Singapore.