Taking Off: A Proposal for People-Powered Sustainability at Delta Airlines

Taking Off: A Proposal for PeoplePowered Sustainability at Delta Airlines MBA/MS Student Project Work (Sample)

This report is a representative sample of project work that MBA/MS students do at the Erb Institute. It was prepared as a critical analysis of a sustainability topic, based on publicly available information, and is not meant to illustrate either effective or ineffective handling of a management situation.

Contents

Taking Off: Sustainability at Delta Airlines

Stakeholder Engagement + Mapping............................................. 4 Materiality Assessment........................ 8 Human Rights Risk Assessment................................. 12 Human Rights Business Integration........................... 16 Metrics & Reporting........................... 20 Conclusion........................................... 24

This publication was developed using available desktop research.

Delta was not consulted for commentary during the student project.

These are solely the insights and opinions of our students.

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Appendix............................................. 26

Introduction In 2017 and 2018, Delta provided the highest-quality airline transportation to more than 360 million passengers traveling around the world.1 As facilitators of national and international trips for business and pleasure travelers, Delta offers a range of fares to fit all client needs and continues to innovate new ways to put customers first. Delta is always looking to the future and working to improve operations and service delivery to customers and to be an industry leader among U.S.-based airline carriers. Considering the dynamic future of mobility and the expectation that airline travel will double in the next 20 years, Delta must continue to challenge itself internally and be a model for the industry in tackling toplevel sustainability challenges.2 Delta’s success in its sustainability efforts relies on the 80,000 employees who ensure the company’s daily operations and make up the Delta family. People come first at Delta—dedicated employees and customers are the reason Delta has the highest-quality rating for a domestic carrier and continues to be recognized by Forbes as one of the Fortune 100 Best Places to Work year after year.3 The base of Delta’s sustainability strategy has been recognizing that employees will be the implementers and advocates for all levels of the sustainability strategy.

This report details four core components of a holistic Delta sustainability strategy, with a focus on the people power needed to lead change forward within the company, effective waste management, reducing greenhouse gas emissions and safety. This report walks through the process undertaken to select these four target pillars of the sustainability strategy, and it offers an in-depth analysis of how Delta will tackle these top-level issues.

1 https://www.delta.com/us/en/about-delta/overview 2 https://www.iata.org/pressroom/pr/Pages/2016-10-18-02.aspx 3 https://news.delta.com/delta-again-named-one-fortune-s-best-companies-work

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Stakeholder Engagement + Mapping

Taking Off: A Proposal for People-Powered Sustainability at Delta Airlines

Stakeholder Engagement + Mapping SCOPE This sustainability strategy assessment and report encompass all of Delta’s primary business functions necessary to flight operations, sales and management. The report looks at the Delta transportation fleet, administrative offices and the people who make all of this work.

In the next step of this report, this scope helps generate a list of stakeholders in Delta’s core business with a vested interest in Delta’s long-term success.

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ISSUES + IMPACTS As a major U.S. airline with a workforce of 80,000 employees serving 160 million passengers

Stakeholder Engagement + Mapping

each year, Delta has a wide range of issues and impacts that fall within the triple-bottom-line sustainability framework.

Below is a chart with a high-level overview of the largest issues and impacts of Delta’s business operations. In this chart, the sustainability issues that Delta and its stakeholders face are vast, and it is difficult to understand the precise steps needed to mitigate these issues. For example, Delta relies on jet fuel for its core business operation of moving people from one place to another and generates a large carbon footprint through fuel usage. The question that follows is: Whom can Delta partner with to reduce the carbon footprint of jet fuel, and how can Delta encourage Boeing and other manufacturers to

SOCIAL

Following this chart is a stakeholder list of those entities that are directly affected by or engage with the issues in this chart. From this iterative process of building impacts and issues and mapping out which stakeholders will be most greatly affected or have the greatest need for engagement, the key pillars of the sustainability strategy emerge.

ECONOMIC

ENVIRONMENTAL

Gender equity

Labor force

GHG emissions

Diversity, equity & inclusion

Regulatory compliance

Waste generation

Human rights (external)

Affordability

Water usage

Community engagement

Brand image (inclusion)

Health

Equal pay

Transparency

Energy use

Safety

Access (destinations)

Resource efficiency

Water Usage

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make more efficient aircraft? This chart ultimately helps drive the conversation forward by generating a series of questions about how to begin to tackle these issues with key stakeholders.

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DELTA’S KEY STAKEHOLDERS These stakeholders directly engage with Delta on a daily basis and are fundamentally important

Stakeholder Engagement + Mapping

to consider as the business continues to grow around sustainability topics. From this list of stakeholders, the next step is identifying how to focus in to build an effective strategy. The stakeholder prioritization grid allows for a graphical representation of which stakeholders most urgently need to be engaged in Delta’s ongoing sustainability efforts.

Policymakers Investors

Government

Media

Investors

Regulators Media

Media

Satisfy

Aircraft Aircraft Suppliers

Engage

Suppliers

Delta

Regulators

POWER

Customers

Other Suppliers NGOs

Communities

Monitor Customers

Employees

Inform

Communities Employees

INTEREST

In this stakeholder prioritization grid, the top right quadrant represents the greatest opportunities and needs for collaboration. In the scope of this sustainability strategy exercise, the most important stakeholders to engage are Delta’s aircraft suppliers, employees, government and investors, as well as government regulators and customers. This stakeholder grid helps narrow the focus of the strategies and illuminates the path forward to integrate key sustainability issues into Delta’s business plan. While the other quadrants may not be engaged immediately, this process will need to be revisited as the sustainability strategy is evaluated

and monitored. Media will need to be satisfied, because they report on Delta’s business operations and could help communicate the sustainability strategy to external stakeholders, customers and Delta’s competition. It is also important for Delta to be able to inform local communities around its hub airports of Delta’s investments in the communities, its plans to expand and its environmental impacts.

While these communities often do not have the same influence or power over the business as regulators do, their vibrancy and acceptance—and the workforce they produce—are important to Delta’s long-term success.

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Materiality Assessment 8

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Taking Off: A Proposal for People-Powered Sustainability at Delta Airlines

Materiality Assessment After analyzing the key stakeholders and issues, it is important to establish a materiality framework for Delta to focus its resources on the most important issues. In first identifying the purpose of this assessment, Delta would want to ensure it can mitigate economic and social risks to benefit the business.

In deciding the scope of the assessment, we decided to focus primarily on Delta’s internal and directly controlled business units, rather than looking upstream and downstream to what Delta can influence. Although Delta has a wide potential influence, the company has plenty of material issues that it can tackle before moving into other areas of its business activities. In regard to timeline, we focused on issues that are material immediately and into the next 5 to 10 years.

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Materiality Assessment

Next, we had to identify Delta’s key business drivers and objectives: service reliability, target customer demand and cost management. Then, to determine materiality, we took each of the issues identified in the stakeholder assessment and mapped them by their importance to the business drivers and objectives and their importance to our identified stakeholders, putting more weight on the issues’ importance to our most influential stakeholders that we are looking to engage. Below is a rendering of the final map.

Materiality Map

After creating the materiality map, the issues that ended up in the upper right quadrant and thus emerged as most material were safety, labor relations, regulatory compliance, emissions/fuel usage, external inclusion and waste. It is important for Delta to have real engagement on these issues and report out to stakeholders. Innovation, though material, landed in the upper left quadrant and will require more engagement as well, but it is not as pressing as the other material issues. The other issues identified are less of a priority, but they still will need to be actively monitored, because external and internal factors can shift the materiality map.

PILLAR

People first

GOALS •

Hire an executive-level DEI role.

•

Increase the percentage of employees who are women and underrepresented minorities.

Implement employee development programs for unskilled workers to provide greater economic opportunity.

•

Climate

Waste Safety

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•

Purchase more carbon offsets.

•

Transition to renewable energy sources for operations.

•

Partner with Boeing, Inc., to further research more fuel-efficient aircraft design and biofuel opportunities.

•

Forecast in-flight food and drinks more diligently.

•

Reach 100 percent recyclable and compostable packaging on flights by 2025.

•

Continue investing in workforce safety programs.

•

Increase the number of employees who receive training via the Blue Lightning Initiative for human trafficking.

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In assessing where Delta should prioritize and organize its efforts, we have identified four pillars to serve as buckets within which all material issues sit. We have also outlined goals for Delta to aim for and measure itself against within those pillars.

WASTE

Integral to everything it does, Delta’s people are its most important asset. Starting with its workforce, Delta is highly regarded for employee satisfaction relative to its peers. However, enormous opportunities exist to promote gender equality and provide economic opportunity to historically marginalized groups within its workforce. Also, Delta’s customers are essential to its business, and it must continue to anticipate its customers’ needs and desires.

Delta produces an extremely large amount of waste that results from its in-flight food and entertainment. Reducing its waste will both provide cost savings and limit its environmental footprint.

This is an area Delta does not appear to have paid much attention to yet, but it should become increasingly important as momentum builds against things like single-use plastic. By setting clearly defined targets to achieve 100 percent recyclable and compostable packaging for in-flight service by 2025, Delta will demonstrate its commitment to sustainability and serve as an example among toptier airlines globally.

CLIMATE As one of the largest airlines in the United States, Delta is responsible for an enormous amount of emissions from its fuel consumption. Outside of flying its aircraft, Delta also uses a lot of energy to power its operations. The company should continue to invest in offsets for its flight emissions, look into using renewable energy sources for its operations, and leverage its relationship with its aircraft suppliers to collaborate on aircraft innovations and biofuel opportunities.

Materiality Assessment

PEOPLE FIRST

SAFETY Keeping its passengers and employees safe is paramount to Delta’s success as an organization.

Delta already invests heavily in this area of its operations, but it should take additional measures to continue progressing. Some of these additional areas include increased training and accountability regarding human trafficking and taking more proactive measures for workforce safety.

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Human Rights Risk Assessment 12

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Taking Off: A Proposal for People-Powered Sustainability at Delta Airlines

Human Rights Risk Assessment Human rights are vital and need to be monitored and acted on in any sustainable organization. Delta is no exception. Despite being a serviceoriented business that is not typically associated with human labor issues that more manufacturing-oriented companies might be, Delta interacts with people all over the globe on a daily basis. The airline serves 160 million customers and employs more than 80,000 people worldwide, leaving it with a significant responsibility in making sure the company is not involved in any human rights infringements, direct or indirect. Delta is aware of this responsibility and activity reports, and it acts on many of its most relevant human rights risks.

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Human Rights Risk Assessment

Moving forward, four sources of risk need to be expanded on and further developed; three of these risks are internally focused and centered around employees, while the fourth is more externally facing. Below, we identify the top risks, in the order of their precedence to the company, and offer recommendations. For a more detailed human rights impact assessment, please refer to the attached human rights impact assessment.

The largest human rights risk to Delta would be the failure to fully commit to and focus on historically marginalized populations in the company. The organization has published DEI initiatives, but further opportunities remain in this endeavor. One of these opportunities is gender in the airline workforce, and the other is ethnic minorities.

Right now, Delta’s workforce consists of 41 percent women and 41 percent ethnic minorities, but the company does not report on individual distributions across ethnic groups. The airline has a DEI initiative that is focused on seeking diversity, promoting inclusion and driving accountability, but there is still room for improvement, such as establishing a stand-alone DEI officer who reports directly to the CEO. This role would be responsible for such oversight and would have more flexibility to focus on DEI issues than the current role tasked with that responsibility, the head of HR.

diversity, equity and inclusion in the workforce human trafficking workplace safety and worker rights terrorism and racial profiling

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The other important risk to consider is its role in human trafficking. Global conflict has led to an increasing number of displaced people, and following this displacement is an increase in trafficking activities. In particular, flights are used more frequently to transport enslaved people. As a primary carrier in the United States and one that has global operations and partnerships, Delta has a responsibility to be aware of its possible role in trafficking activities. The airline is conscientious about this risk and has acted on it, but there is room for growth. Delta currently participates in the federal government’s Blue Lightning Initiative, training more than 68,000 employees to date.

Despite this impressive number, Delta still has an opportunity to continue training until all

employees who interact with customers have been trained. In addition, the training could be made repetitive so that skills are constantly refreshed and all employees are aware of the human trafficking industry. Delta also could install the necessary infrastructure to make sure victims have adequate opportunities to alert authorities during transport.

Security screening stations and bathrooms, both on planes and in airports, could have discreet alert opportunities to allow victims to notify police and airport authorities.

Human Rights Risk Assessment

Another opportunity to mitigate human rights risk would be expanding the Women Inspiring our Next Generation (WING) program. The lack of opportunity for minorities in the workplace goes beyond hiring standards and entails educational opportunities and general exposure to the industry.

These opportunities are vital in preserving the right to work and the support for safe, supportive careers. In an effort to establish concrete channels and learning opportunities for all minorities, an expanded WING program would allow for more minorities to be exposed to how the airline industry works, what skills are needed to succeed, and potential job opportunities in Delta and other airlines. This program is currently up and running for young women, but it is easily expandable to other demographics. In addition to helping with the human rights risk of available employment, a program expansion would help to foster continued growth in the minority percentages previously mentioned.

Other relevant risks for Delta include workplace hazards, working conditions and employees’ right to unionize. Delta is aware of these issues and is currently acting on all of them, and we recommend the company continue building on its existing programs.

The last significant human rights risk that Delta faces relates to terrorism and racial profiling. In the last 10 years, terrorist acts have become a focus of the media, and the effects have percolated into the airline industry. Airlines have a responsibility to help identify possible threats and ground planes when needed. Similar to the Blue Lightning Initiative for human trafficking, Delta should increase training for potential terrorist threats.

Conversely, some populations—Middle Eastern travelers in particular, and people coming from less developed countries—are often subject to terrorist stereotypes. This results in questionable actions against them by other travelers and the airlines themselves. It is Delta’s responsibility to increase awareness of this racial profiling and to separate it from actual terrorist awareness.

On the surface, Delta is rather removed from human rights violations. However, there are several important risks the company should act on. Such actions will mitigate the company’s risk and help to prevent those human rights violations from proliferating. In acting, Delta will need to be careful in how it implements these measures and where it will use its resources.

TAKING OFF: A PROPOSAL FOR PEOPLE-POWERED SUSTAINABILITY AT DELTA AIRLINES

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Human Rights Business Integration 16

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Taking Off: A Proposal for People-Powered Sustainability at Delta Airlines

Human Rights Business Integration When implementing human rights risk mitigation measures, Delta should outline a careful plan as to why the risk requires action, who will conduct the actions, what geographies they will cover, and when those actions will be performed and for what duration. Most of the implementation strategies will be designed and implemented from the corporate level, but these strategies will have far-reaching effects. Employees at every level will have increased responsibilities and changes to their daily operations. Such changes will have to be carefully designed and implemented.

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Human Rights Business Integration

As previously mentioned, ensuring and promoting gender equality and equal rights and opportunities for minority populations are the most important human rights issue that Delta faces. The airline is an enormous organization that employs tens of thousands of people, and failure to make sure employees adequately represent certain demographics—and all employees have the same opportunities—could result in limited motivation, and even labor strikes in some cases. It is in Delta’s interest to mitigate this risk, because it is a human right that every employee deserves, but also because failure to control it would result in catastrophic losses to Delta’s business.

In implementation, the corporate headquarters team will be primarily responsible for action items and ensuring goals are being met. Human resources will also have a role in researching and understanding current trends. Their responsibilities will span all Delta operational geographies and cover all aspects of the value chain. In action, the following initiatives are expected to take a few months to design and implement, with continued monitoring for the foreseeable future.

Here are three objectives for Delta to consider with its DEI strategy: hiring quotas that are representative of regional demographics minority employee development programs continued regular diversity training for all employees (see human rights implementation impact appendix)

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Human trafficking will require a more unique implementation strategy, as it is more external facing and will be harder to complete. Despite these challenges, this is important to Delta because of the increased number of trafficking occurrences. By failing to assist in monitoring and recognizing such activities, Delta will be subject to intense media criticism and customer pushback. Airlines are very public-facing businesses, and human trafficking sparks an emotional connection with most people.

Anything less than significant effort in fighting trafficking activities could instill distrust and anger in the company’s customer base. Flights and airline

security will be the focus of this initiative, but all airline operations should be aware of the human trafficking problem. It is important that these actions are completed as soon as possible and that employees are vigilant and aware of such happenings.

Human Rights Business Integration

In working toward these objectives, the company should research and define what regional hiring quotas should be, a role that will be led by human resources. In addition, specific managers should be assigned to design and lead the minority development programs, who have themselves been extensively trained. Finally, semi-annual dates need to be defined and set aside for company-wide training. Progress in these actions can be measured through the overall company demographics and the number of DEI-related incidents reported through the Delta HelpLine.

This strategy includes two main objectives. The first is to increase overall employee awareness of human trafficking patterns and how to recognize them. The other is to have accessible infrastructure available in all planes and airports to discreetly alert authorities to any possible victim of human trafficking. Within these objectives, Delta will have to first research and understand trafficking patterns across the globe.

This awareness will help to define which flights to focus on. This will be a general responsibility, as all employees should have this knowledge. In addition, Delta will need to increase its involvement in trafficking prevention training, such as the federal government’s Blue Lightning Initiative. The more employees trained, the better opportunity Delta has to fight trafficking. The final action would be to install the necessary infrastructure to allow for the discreet notification of trafficking situations. This will likely be at airport security and bathrooms in both planes and airports.

By identifying these risks and implementing strategies, Delta will position itself as a leader in the airline industry. The airline will also present itself as an ally of all employees and customers and protect itself from negative pushback that would result from overlooking human rights violations.

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Metrics & Reporting

Taking Off: A Proposal for People-Powered Sustainability at Delta Airlines

Metrics & Reporting

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KEY SOCIAL AND ENVIRONMENTAL STRATEGIC GOALS Having discussed Delta’s stakeholder and materiality strategies above, we now turn to metrics and key performance indicator (KPI) reporting. Defining, accurately measuring and reporting such metrics and KPIs is critical to the overall sustainability strategy process. Without such

Metrics & Reporting

indicators, the organization in question will have no way to determine whether it is progressing or moving backward. To the greatest extent possible, metrics and KPIs should be quantitative, so they can be clearly understood and measured on a year-to-year basis; highly relevant to key stakeholders and materiality issues; credible to external organizations that review reported metrics; and actionable, in terms of having a clear path for future improvement.

One of the most commonly used reporting tools is the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) framework, an international standard for reporting on key sustainability metrics that is run by an independent organization and used around the globe by both public and private companies. Delta currently prepares its annual corporate sustainability report in accordance with the GRI framework, and it also relies on GRI standards to conduct stakeholder engagement and materiality exercises. Therefore, the GRI is highly relevant to how Delta currently measures sustainability progress, and our analysis toward an optimal sustainability strategy is laid out in this report.

Current KPIs for Delta include employee and customer satisfaction; safety; improving operational efficiency and offsetting CO2 emissions; and environmental compliance.

Regarding employee and customer satisfaction, Delta measures overall employee satisfaction (87 percent in 2017), and uses the Net Promoter Score and JD Power Award frameworks as proxies for customer satisfaction. For safety reporting, Delta tracks its Global Injury Rate, which was 3.91 in 2017; however, it is unclear what this number actually entails and how the company performs

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relative to its peers. For operational efficiency and CO2 emissions, Delta tracks its fuel efficiency internally and outsources CO2 emissions analysis to a third-party agency, Ruby Canyon Engineering.

Overall CO2 emissions are down from 46.2 million metric tons in 2005, but they have been climbing slowly since 2014, indicating a necessary area of improvement for the company. Finally, regarding environmental compliance, Delta has set goals for avoiding major fuel spills, environmental notices of violation, and reducing hazardous waste generated.

Similar to CO2 emissions, in recent years, the company appears to be underperforming in its stated goals and will need to focus more on these metrics in the future.

Turning to our proposed strategy for Delta and concurrent metrics, Delta appears to lack metrics or KPIs for the following substantive materiality issues: labor relations; regulatory compliance, particularly in relation to the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA); water usage; human rights; overall energy usage; and increased access to flight-based mobility. Therefore, there appears to be a significant gap in metrics and reporting that can be addressed by the strategy proposed in this report.

We recommend the following metrics for these identified issues.

LABOR RELATIONS: Delta currently

REGULATORY COMPLIANCE: Similar to

environmental notices of violation reporting, Delta should note any compliance issues raised by the FAA on a year-to-year basis.

WATER USAGE: Water consumption and

scarcity issues are increasingly relevant worldwide, and Delta currently has no metrics whatsoever on organizational water consumption; Delta should address this problem by tracking overall consumption resulting from passengers and its overall operations.

HUMAN RIGHTS AND TRAFFICKING: These issues are more ambiguous to measure from a quantitative metric standpoint, but Delta still should analyze the potential for trafficking on current flight operations and child labor in the supply chain of major suppliers such as Boeing and Airbus.

Metrics & Reporting

reports on the percent of unionized employees (19 percent) but should also report on labor-related work outages and any upcoming union contractual negotiations.

Delta has made a promising start to sustainability metrics and KPI reporting, adhering to the GRI framework and demonstrating the overall willingness to transparently measure and report performance. The metrics that are reported, with the exception of safety in relation to peer organization performance, are relevant to stakeholders, clearly reported through easily understood quantitative measures, and subject to actionable improvement plans. Our materiality issue analysis, however, demonstrates that there is still significant room for improvement.

Most notably, Delta should invest in developing the metrics proposed above to better track and report labor relations, regulatory compliance, water usage, human rights and trafficking, energy usage, and access to flight mobility. It is likely that Delta already has information about some of these issues (for example, labor relations), but without transparent reporting data, stakeholders are unable to understand how the organization is currently performing. By pursuing the metrics and reporting strategy proposed above, we 5believe Delta will be well positioned to meet and exceed critical sustainability requirements for its key stakeholders.

ENERGY USAGE: As discussed above, Delta

tracks fuel-based CO2 emissions, but in the future, it should begin measuring electrical consumption as well, including estimating the fuel mix for consumed electricity from a carbon intensity standpoint.

ACCESS: Delta should invest more in programs that could increase access to flight mobility for lower-income populations.

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Conclusion With the number of air travelers expected to double in the next 20 years, Delta has the opportunity to be the sustainability leader of U.S.-based airlines.4 By centering the sustainability strategy on Delta’s employees, the three additional pillars of the strategy have a higher likelihood of adoption and success. Airlines will need to continue innovating on how to reduce jet fuel consumption as well as improving aircraft design to make for more efficient flights. Finally, improving waste management and water usage will be fundamental given population growth, urban population density, and water scarcity issues facing the planet into the future. As a leader in social, environmental and economic sustainability, Delta is well positioned to continue innovating around sustainable causes while making the business case to integrate sustainability values at all levels of the business.

4 https://www.iata.org/pressroom/pr/Pages/2016-10-18-02.aspx

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Taking Off: A Proposal for People-Powered Sustainability at Delta Airlines

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Appendix

1.

2.

26

HUMAN RIGHTS IMPACT ASSESSMENT Define Salient Risks

Source of Risks Impacted International Bill of Human Scope and Impacts Stakeholders Human Right Rights Article Right not to be subjected UDHR 4; ICCPR 8; ILO No.29; Human Victims & their Global. Human trafficking efforts families to slavery, servitude or ILO No.105 trafficking is increasing forced labor around the world, and airlines are increasingly becoming a method of transportation.

Scale

Remediability

24.9 million people are currently trapped in modern-day slavery.

This drives human trafficking and is a $150 billion industry.

Difficult, but important.

Delta has a responsibility as a leader in the industry, especially one with such a global influence.

Right to freedom from war propaganda, and freedom from incitement to racial, religious or national hatred

UDHR 7; ICCPR 20

Terrorism and the perceived biases people have toward populations associated with such acts

Customers

Global. Perception often varies in degree by area.

Varies with location and Plausible, but requires recent events. Recent awareness on the part of attacks often heighten Delta. profiling and stereotyping.

Right to enjoy just and favorable conditions of work (including rest and leisure)

UDHR 23 and 24; ICESCR 7

Employee work environment

Employees

Delta global workforce

Relatively minor and controlled.

Currently controlled and to be continually monitored.

Right to form trade UDHR 23; ICESCR 8; ILO unions and join the trade No.98 unions, and the right to strike

Employee rights Employees and representation

Delta global workforce

19% of employees currently, but could grow quickly if benefits and representation begin to fall.

Currently controlled through payback initiatives like profit sharing.

Rights of minorities

Equal Employees representation in the Delta workforce for women and ethnic minorities

Delta global workforce.

There is more awareness in the USA, but not much equality elsewhere. There is work to be done everywhere.

Differing degrees of severity by location, but split 41-59 both for women/men and ethnic minority/majority.

Feasible. Requires a restructure of hiring procedures, as well as educational aspects.

ICCPR 27

HUMAN RIGHTS IMPACT IMPLEMENTATION

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Prioritize Risks Attribution

Control

Management

Recommendations Continue to engage in the Blue Lighting Initiative and devote more employees to such training, allowing for the increased awareness of trafficking situations by Delta employees. Install more opportunities for victims to discreetly alert authorities in the bathrooms of aircraft.

Increase research to understand global trafficking patterns.

Employees and federal Increased training for recognition programs employees and infrastructure such as the Blue support for victims.

Lightning Initiative.

Airport security, other customers, and customer-interfacing roles.

Increased training and recognition of profiling.

Ensure training for Delta employees on the recognition of racial profiling, both from other employees and other customers.

All customer-interfacing roles should be required to take regular training on racial profiling and how to end it.

Employees should also be trained to intervene in the event profiling is recognized between customers. Creating a norm to think critically about possible terror threats will help to separate acts of terrorism from the people of associated countries.

Management and corporate.

Working condition mandates and better recognition of less obvious stressors in the workplace. Internal audits and close monitoring.

Constant monitoring of working conditions and the mandates to make sure they are appropriate and applicable. Strict audits that encompass a diverse array of factors and are reflective of current environmental conditions.

Research and understand employee perceptions of conditions. Make sure these insights are brought back to the decision-makers for condition mandates. Place employee satisfaction as a responsibility for managers and corporate.

Management and corporate.

Continued profit sharing Increase the $1.1 bn in profit and payback for sharing and provide dedicated employees. In the event resources to union activities. of further unionization, provide support for the organization.

To continue and expand the profit-sharing program and to look for other ways to thank employees. In the event of further unionization, Delta should support the organization by providing resources and infrastructure necessary for operation. Delta unions should also interface with management regularly and have adequate opportunity for representation in the company.

Hiring managers and corporate presence.

Hiring procedures, Strict quotas for female and retention and minority representation in the educational campaigns. workforce. Increased effort (internal & external) to educate potential minority employees about opportunities.

Research and define what healthy, fair quotas should be for hiring practices. Once hired, ensure that promotion opportunities and work culture are equal between groups.

Develop more programs similar to the WING program both internally and externally and for a wider range of professional opportunities.

TAKING OFF: A PROPOSAL FOR PEOPLE-POWERED SUSTAINABILITY AT DELTA AIRLINES

Appendix

Risk to Delta brand/reputation and legal implications for negligence.

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ERB INSTITUTE MBA/MA STUDENT AUTHORS: Kevin Bosma Joe Garcia Carly Kadlec

Connor Larkin Kimberly Ludas

SUPERVISED BY COURSE INSTRUCTORS: Terry Nelidov December 2018

Emily Keeler