Critical Analysis of United Airlines' Public Relation Failures and CSR

This essay critically analyzes several public relations failures of United Airlines, focusing on incidents that have significantly damaged its brand image and customer trust. The essay explores the failures in leadership, communication, and corporate social responsibility (CSR), highlighting specific events such as the violent removal of a passenger, the death of a passenger's dog, the breaking of a musician's guitar, and the shortage of wine in business class. The analysis connects these incidents to broader issues of ethical behavior, customer treatment, and the importance of maintaining a positive brand reputation within the aviation industry. The essay argues that these failures stem from poor leadership and a lack of commitment to CSR, emphasizing the need for transparent communication and customer-oriented practices to rebuild trust and improve the organization's performance. The essay concludes by underscoring the importance of ethical standards and a customer-centric approach in the aviation sector.

Running head: PUBLIC RELATION
Public Relation
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author note

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Introduction:
Public relations and corporate social responsibility are two distinct reference points
for the brand image and the communicational functions for the organizations within their
operational area. Both these notions refer to the way of communication with the stakeholders
of the company in its own way. Rangan, Chase. and Karim (2012) states that while the
corporate social responsible policy refers to the intention of the company for meeting several
societal issues that the community is facing and the way the company intends to help out the
community, on the other hand, the public relations is associated with the idea of maintaining
a brand image, popularity and reputation of the company in front of the stakeholders.
Therefore, it can be understood that both the concepts refer to a kind of activity which can
improve the reputation and image of the company which eventually improves the
organization and its financial performance. However, there are many such organizations
which do not bother about their social responsibility. According to the findings of Benn,
Todd and Pendleton (2010), the public relation professionals should ensure that the company
is adhering to its social responsibility and the corporate policies of any organization should be
aligned to that. The public relation professionals should also understand the approach of the
management and they have to behave according that. Otherwise, it usually considered to be a
failure of the higher management. This can also be considered as the failure of leadership and
organizational approach. This essay will trigger four recent scandals of the United Airlines
which has hampered its image to a great extent. The scandal with the shortage of wine was a
major failure of communication, whereas breaking the guitar and the dog death incident can
be considered as a failure of leadership. Along with that, the recent scandal of throwing out
the passenger is a major failure of leadership of United Airlines. As the recent incident in the
United Airlines does not go with its social responsibility, this essay will critically analyze the
entire situation.

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Discussion
Corporate social responsibility is now a significant part of any business activity which
remains a resource for considerable skepticism. There are several international organizations
which keep the environmental and human rights issues in accordance with the bigger
environmental or societal objectives. Benn, Todd and Pendleton (2010) argue that the public
relation professionals of any organization require to reflect on the practice and theory of
public relations so that it operates along with the corporate policies of the organization. As
stated by Ruiz-Mora, Lugo-Ocando and Castillo-Esparci (2016) the corporate social
responsibility is a sustainable, integrated and systematic approach to the business activities
which also acts as the significant component to the organizational structures and strategies. In
addition to that, the public relations is the way which tend to enlighten the general population
about the corporate policies of the company, along with ensuring that it improves the brand
image by advertising the CSR achievements.
Incidents
Leadership issues
However, the recent scandal that happened on April 9, 2017 at the O’Hire
international Airport is devastating and it should not have been happening to any human
being under any kind of circumstances. The airport police has violently threw out a passenger
David Dao while he had refused to leave the airplane as the management of the airport asked
him to. It been said that it was done for accommodating some other passengers, however
regardless of any kind of emergency, it was not justified, especially the way it was executed.
The passenger was a 69 years old man, who was forcefully pulled out of his seat and threw
out of the flight by the airport police. It was also said that he was actually unconscious while
the security officers had pulled him out of the flight. The family members of Dao had

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claimed that he had suffered from a severe concussion, his sinuses were damaged, his nose
was broken and he had also lost his two teeth from the front after he was taken out of the
flight. After the video of the incident went viral online, a sheer outrage resulted from all over
the world. Even the U.S president, Donald Trump condemned this act and called this
treatment horrible. However, later on the next morning, the CEO of the company has issued a
statement for justifying the act of removing the reluctant passenger from the flight and
referred to the entire incident as ‘re-accommodating of the customers’.
Another scandal took place with United Airlines when a dog of a passengers’ family
passed away during the flight. The airline already had bad records of pet deaths during their
flights and this incident with the death of Houston family dog is now added to the list. The
family had claimed their dog died when the flight was being hold in cargo. The company had
released a statement post the incident saying that a thorough review would take place of the
entire incident.
In 2009, United Airlines has been accused of breaking guitar of the musician Dave
Carroll and his band while travelling. When the band reached their destination they found out
that their Taylor guitar worth $3500 was damaged severely. Later the brand created a song
named ‘United breaks guitars’ which had around 16 million views on social media.
Communication issue
United Airlines has recently faced another scandal when they ran out of wine for
international business class passengers. The management had released a memo to the flight
attendants saying that the customers are consuming more wine on the flight which resulted
into using 300 percent more than the estimated budget. Previously, the airline has introduced
a first class luxurious class with features like multicourse meal and unlimited booze; however

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the management now wants to cut short the booze. This memo has been shared o n Twitter by
one of the business partners of the airline, Brian Sumers.
Analysis of the incidents
Social responsibility is the recent dimension of the corporate social responsibility of
the corporate social responsibility of the companies which refers to the active participation of
the company to the contemporary social issues and the other affairs within the community.
Therefore, the primary target of such social responsibility is the stakeholders of the company.
This responsibility also includes the consumers who are availing the service and buying the
products of the company (Drongelen et al. 2014). Along with that, the concept of offering
satisfaction and necessary respect to the customers was included, even though it was not very
new to the organizations. However, the concept of being responsible towards the consumers
was added to the social responsibility which may create a profound influence on the
profitability of the organization. However, in the considered situation, the company did not
act responsible towards the customers and acted inhumanly for their own profitability. They
broke their instruments when those were under their surveillance. In fact they were also
unable to ensure the safety of the passengers’ dog.
Considering the responsibility of the organization towards the customers, it can be
said that the company is obliged more to the customers comparing to the other stakeholders.
This can also be considered as giving the good value of their money as well. Primarily the
customers have an expectation towards the company that they are going to offer a good
service and steady supply of the promised services and products (Amankwah-Amoah,
Ottosson and Sjögre 2017). Therefore, it is the primary duty of the companies to deliver the
right services with the enviable quality as well. The companies are also expected to deliver
the services at the right place, at right time and within a fair price. Within the contemporary

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business scenario, the business companies are mostly considered as the social institutions as
they are different from the other financial entities for two distinct reasons. Firstly, the
business organizations have to consider the fact that they operate and exist within a social
structure; therefore they have to be socially accepted for surviving in the industry. Secondly,
they should also become socially responsible as they may have a huge influence for the life
style of the society. The companies not only exist within the community for earning profits,
but they also need to satisfy the requirements of the customers and the other social
requirements. These social needs have a huge responsibility towards their clients as they are
the primary stakeholders of any company. However, in this case, the organization did not
treat its primary stakeholders in a right way for meeting their own requirements (Lee and Gin
2017). The employees of the organization had treated the customer in a violent way and
harmed him physically for an unethical cause for accommodating all their own employees
who were required later on. They had cut short the wine budget even if it was promised
before. The published memo has indicated as the customers are consuming more alcohol,
they cannot be offered unlimited quantity. This can definitely be considered as an unfair
decision. These incidents indicate to an unethical and unfair treatment of the customers while
travelling.
The aviation sector is an industry which is associated with several tremors as it is
entirely dependent on the employee welfare dynamics. There are several airline services
which were considered to be unethical towards the employees. The United Airlines has been
no exception to that. Providing adequate respect to the customers is considered to be their
primary responsibility whereas they did not adhere to their responsibility; rather they treated
the customer ruthlessly and harmed him physically (Kline and Hutchins 2017). The entire
business service within the aviation sector is dependent on the value and trust of the
customers. The fundamental basis of the customers is based on the idea of the customers as

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well. Any company should adhere to ethical behavior and maintain their services regardless
of any kind of business. However, the relationship between the customer and the company is
mostly subjective (Sagers 2017). The customers always perceive the organizations on the
basis of their own bias and beliefs. Therefore it is necessary for the companies to comprehend
the requirements of the customers and treat them in a right way. Considering the incidents, it
can be seen that the airline did not offer any respect to the customers and their pets and
luggage. They have been irresponsible and did not take care of those. Ethical behavior and
social responsibility of the company also includes treating the customers and their luggage in
a right way. However, United Airlines had failed miserably at this part. It should always be
noted that the relationship between the customer and company is always a two way path,
therefore the company not only requires providing productive, appropriate and honest
information to the customers, they also require to treat them with respect (Wahba 2017)..
However, they had taken the money and in return the customer received a violent and
unethical behavior.
Conclusion:
While the customers deal with any organization, they pre-perceive a set of
expectations consisting of maintaining ethical standard for behaving properly with the
customers and offering them everything that have been promised before the service. If the
ethical expectations of the customers are met and reinforced during the service, they are most
likely to have a negative experience of the brand. Therefore the organization should have a
transparent business communication and follow the model of customer oriented
communication. The researchers have indicates that the model is mostly based on the
communication procedure between the customer and company should be widely discussed
and should not have any false information. Here United Airlines should have maintained the
communication clear regarding offering wine in the flights therefore it could have not led to

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the present scenario. The continuous scandalous incidents with the airline also indicate a poor
leadership as well. The leaders of any organization should maintain the organizational
structure and keep the communication process within the organization transparent. However,
it can be indicated that the higher management and the employees of the organization were
not working with the same aligned ethics and moral. This can also be considered as a failure
of poor human resource management that they have recruited people who are not well aware
of the ethical concerns and the mission, vision of the organization. Therefore the organization
should ensure that functions of HR management are focused on getting suitable people
onboard at the same time.

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Reference list and Bibliography
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