Cross-cultural influences on Jet Airways' strategy following Etihad's acquisition

Master-Thesis
in (winter)-semester 2014
at Faculty 3: Business and Law
of Frankfurt University of Applied Sciences
degree programme
MBA Aviation Management
Master Thesis
presented by
JOSÉ JOAQUIM FERNANDES
Born 15th
August 1966 in Copenhagen
Matrikl-Nr.: 1034431
Topic: Cross Cultural influences on Strategic Analysis Processes of Jet
Airways, following Etihad’s acquisition of a stake in Jet Airways
Examiner:
Prof. Dr. Regine Graml
Co-Examiner:
Prof. drs. Adrian Borggreve
Topic received on: 26th
June 2014
Thesis delivered on: 26th
December 2014

Page i
Table of Contents
1 Introduction ................................................................................... 1
2 Problem statement........................................................................ 4
2.1 Overview .................................................................................. 4
2.2 Selection of literature................................................................ 5
3 Methodology ................................................................................. 6
3.1 Method behind the empirical data ............................................ 6
3.2 Research design and progress............................................... 10
3.3 Representativity of data.......................................................... 13
3.4 Reliability of data.................................................................... 14
3.5 Validity of data........................................................................ 15
3.6 Presentation of theory ............................................................ 16
3.7 Criticism of references............................................................ 18
4 Company description – Jet Airways ............................................ 19
4.1 Brief historical overview.......................................................... 19
4.2 Recent strategic events.......................................................... 20
4.2.1 Financial decisions......................................................... 20
4.2.2 Operational decisions..................................................... 22
4.2.3 Structural decisions........................................................ 23
5 Theory......................................................................................... 25
5.1 Strategy process theory.......................................................... 25
5.2 Lewin’s model for change....................................................... 27
5.3 Cultural theory........................................................................ 29
5.3.1 Artifacts.......................................................................... 32

Page ii
5.3.2 Espoused values............................................................ 33
5.3.3 Basic underlying assumptions........................................ 33
5.4 What is leadership?................................................................ 34
5.5 Leadership and change.......................................................... 36
5.6 The GLOBE Project................................................................ 37
5.7 Culturally contingent leadership factors.................................. 42
6 Country specific analysis............................................................. 47
6.1 The Southern Asia cluster ...................................................... 47
6.2 The Anglo cluster ................................................................... 48
6.3 Middle East cluster ................................................................. 49
6.4 The Germanic Europe cluster................................................. 50
6.5 Differences among the clusters.............................................. 50
7 Strategy process and decisions in Jet Airways ........................... 55
7.1 Strategy process before Etihad .............................................. 55
7.2 Strategy decisions after Etihad............................................... 55
7.2.1 Route network................................................................ 56
7.2.2 Product........................................................................... 56
7.2.3 Services ......................................................................... 57
7.2.4 Financial......................................................................... 58
7.2.5 Organisational................................................................ 59
8 Cultural analysis in Jet Airways................................................... 61
8.1 Artifacts .................................................................................. 61
8.2 Espoused values.................................................................... 63
8.3 Basic underlying assumptions................................................ 66
9 Discussion................................................................................... 70

Page iii
9.1 Shift from entrepreneurial school to positioning school .......... 70
9.2 Leadership as change ............................................................ 73
9.3 Cross cultural leadership style................................................ 75
9.4 Organisational change ........................................................... 78
9.5 Influencing the corporate culture ............................................ 81
10 Criticism ...................................................................................... 83
11 Conclusions ................................................................................ 86
12 Recommendations and predictions............................................. 88
12.1 Modernist perspective......................................................... 88
12.2 Corporate culture ................................................................ 89
12.3 Leadership and change....................................................... 89
12.4 Lewin’s 3 step model........................................................... 91
13 Perspectivation ........................................................................... 93
14 Declaration of independent preparation of the Master Thesis..... 95
15 References.................................................................................. 96

Page iv
List of Appendices
Appendix A Selection of literature.................................................... 109
Appendix B GLOBE Project - 9 cultural dimensions ........................ 112
Appendix B1 Uncertainty avoidance ............................................ 112
Appendix B2 Power distance ....................................................... 112
Appendix B3 Institutional collectivism .......................................... 112
Appendix B4 In-group collectivism............................................... 112
Appendix B5 Gender egalitarianism............................................. 113
Appendix B6 Assertiveness ......................................................... 113
Appendix B7 Future orientation.................................................... 113
Appendix B8 Performance orientation ......................................... 113
Appendix B9 Humane orientation ................................................ 113
Appendix C Cultural clusters classified on cultural dimensions ....... 115
Appendix D An overview of the findings of Javidan ......................... 116
Appendix D1 Status conscious leadership................................... 116
Appendix D2 Bureaucratic leadership.......................................... 116
Appendix D3 Autonomous leadership.......................................... 116
Appendix D4 Face-saving leadership .......................................... 116
Appendix D5 Humane leadership ................................................ 117
Appendix D6 Self-sacrificial leadership........................................ 117
Appendix D7 Internally competitive leadership ............................ 117
Appendix E Alitalia names new senior management team.............. 118
Appendix F Interview guide – corporate culture at Jet Airways ....... 119
Appendix G Interview guide - strategy process at Jet Airways......... 122

Page v
Appendix H Interview guide – onboard airline crew Jet Airways...... 125
Appendix I Jet Airways - single brand launch................................. 127
Appendix J 7-S Model..................................................................... 129
Appendix J1 Strategy................................................................... 132
Appendix J2 Structure.................................................................. 132
Appendix J3 Systems .................................................................. 132
Appendix J4 Style ........................................................................ 133
Appendix J5 Staff......................................................................... 134
Appendix J6 Skills........................................................................ 134
Appendix J7 Shared values ......................................................... 135
Appendix K Value chain analysis..................................................... 136
Appendix L The aviation industry value chain ................................. 138
Appendix L1 The airline value chain ............................................ 140
Appendix M Jet Airways SWOT analysis - 2003 .............................. 142
Appendix N Notes on Word automation and referencing................. 144
Appendix O About the author........................................................... 146

Page vi
List of Figures
Figure 5.1 Lewin's 3 step model for change ........................................ 29
Figure 5.2 Levels of culture ................................................................. 32
Figure 6.1 Cultural Clusters comparison, India, Austraia, UAE and
Germany.............................................................................................. 54
Figure 15.1 Jet Airways single branding strategy .............................. 128
Figure 15.2 7-S Model....................................................................... 130
Figure 15.3 Porters value chain......................................................... 137
Figure 15.4 Aviation industry value chain.......................................... 139
Figure 15.5 Airline value chain .......................................................... 141

Page vii
List of Tables
Table 5.1 Kotter’s eight steps for successful large-scale change ........ 37
Table 5.2 GLOBE six leadership behaviours....................................... 40
Table 5.3 Globally culturally endorsed implicit leadership dimensions
and twenty primary factors .................................................................. 41
Table 5.4 Universally desirable leadership attributes .......................... 42
Table 5.5 Universally un-desirable leadership attributes ..................... 42
Table 5.6 GLOBE culturally contingent leadership factors .................. 45
Table 5.7 Relationship between culturally contingent leadership factors
and cultural dimension......................................................................... 46
Table 6.1 Cultural dimensions and high score clusters ....................... 51
Table 8.1 Corporate culture of Jet Airways.......................................... 69
Table 9.1 Comparison between changes in Jet Airways and British
Airways................................................................................................ 80
Table 12.1 Steps still to be implemented in Jet Airways change efforts
............................................................................................................ 90
Table 12.2 Predicted changes in Jet Airways...................................... 92
Table 15.1 Cultural clusters classified on cultural dimensions........... 115
Table 15.2 Jet Airways SWOT analysis - 2003 ................................. 142

Page viii
Abbreviations
AUH: Abu Dhabi
ATR72: Avions de Transport Régional, build by Aerospatiale
B737: Boeing 737
CEO: Chief Executive Office
CxO: Chief x Officer
EU: European Union
GCC: Gulf Community Council
IATA: International Air Transport Association
ICAO: International Civil Aviation Organization
IT: Information Technology
MoCA: Ministry of Civil Aviation
MRO: Maintenance Repair and Overhaul
SFO: San Francisco
SWOT: Strengths Weaknesses Opportunities Threats
UAE: United Arab Emirates
U.K.: United Kingdom
U.S.: United States of America

Page ix
Abstract
This thesis performs an analysis of the cross cultural influence on Jet
Airways Strategic analysis processes following Etihad’s acquisition of a
24% stake in Jet Airways.
Using strategy process theories, organisational and change theories,
leadership and change theories, cultural theories as well as findings
from the GLOBE project and the findings of Javidan on empirical data
from strategy process interviews and cultural interviews performed at
Jet Airways in Mumbai in the fall of 2014; this thesis provides
circumstantial evidence to support the hypothesis that there is a
deliberate and intentional effort to change the corporate culture of Jet
Airways, influenced by Jet Airways’ new investor Etihad Airways, and
that these cross cultural influences are also reflected in the strategic
analysis processes of Jet Airways following Etihad’s acquisition of a
24% stake in Jet Airways.

1 Introduction
Jet Airways is an international airline based in Mumbai, India.
Jet Airways operates a fleet of 101 aircraft to 68 destinations worldwide,
21 International destinations and 47 domestic destinations. Its primary
hub and maintenance base is Mumbai, with secondary bases
Bengaluru, Brussels, Chennai, Delhi, Kolkata, Pune (Jet Airways
2014i).
In general, business related travel accounts for around 40% of all air
trips (Doganis 2005).
At the start of the thesis work, the Jet Airways corporation covered the
full service carrier, Jet Airways, as well as the medium range carrier, Jet
Konnect, and their low cost arm, Jet Lite.
Etihad Airways has recently acquired a 24% percentage equity stake in
Jet Airways (Jet Airways 2014d). Several management positions at the
Jet Airways headquarters in Mumbai, including the CEO, are now being
filled by managers that have previously worked for Etihad Airways in
Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates.
Jet Airways has on 18 September 2014 announced (Jet Airways 2014e)
that they will now cease as a player in the low cost market, making all
their routes, on both Jet Airways and Jet Konnect, full service carriers.
The existing low cost arm, Jet Lite, will be complete absorbed into the
existing full service carrier, Jet Airways.
On 01 October 2014, Jet Airways announced (Jet Airways 2014f) that
they had received approval from the Ministry of Civil Aviation (MoCA)
for its appointment of Mr. Cramer Ball as the company’s Chief
Executive Officer. Mr. Ball has previously had roles at Etihad Airways,
Gulf Air and Qantas. Most recently, he served as the Chief Executive
Officer of Air Seychelles, leading a major restructuring program that
returned the national carrier to profitability.

Mr Ball was appointed as Chief Executive Officer (Designate) of Jet
Airways (India) Limited in June 2014 and will lead an extensive three-
year business plan to reshape the airline and secure its long-term future
(Jet Airways 2014f), (Cruising Heights 2014), (TravelBiz Monitor 2014).
According to Times of India (Times of India 2014) Jet Airways is shifting
focus away from the domestic market by pulling out capacity from local
routes and deploying more flights to international destinations in what
looks like a strategy to feed the network of Etihad, the UAE carrier that
owns 24% of the Indian airline.
Government and industry data on daily available seat kilometres (ASKs)
show that Jet Airways and JetLite have cut down on capacity over the
past few months in the domestic sector. While Jet Airways and Jet Lite
have been reducing capacity on local routes since June and April,
respectively, Jet Airways has added capacity in the international sector
by 16% between April and August this year (Jet Airways 2014a), (Jet
Airways 2014b), (Jet Airways 2014c).
Times of India (Times of India 2014) is also referring to an email
responding to questions from ET Bureau that Jet Airways it is
restructuring the network to "optimise our operations in this over-
capacitated industry environment" and deploying capacity on markets
that have highest value for the network as a cohesive system. "The
ongoing network optimisation is focussed on improving revenue returns
to meet our objective to return the company to sustainable profitability"
it said. According to Times of India (Times of India 2014) analysts
expect Jet Airways' focus to remain more on the international sector.
Times of India (Times of India 2014) is also quoting Kapil Kaul, chief
executive of Centre for Asia Pacific Aviation in India "I see Jet's focus
on domestic operations to be moderate and be more oriented to
international operations".
Cruising Heights goes as far as calling the transformed Jet Airways
“Jetihad” (Cruising Heights 2014).

As such a lot of events are surrounding Jet Airways and speculations in
the media are even more plentiful.

2 Problem statement
This thesis hypothesis that there is a deliberate and intentional effort to
change the corporate culture of Jet Airways, influenced by Jet Airways’
new investor, Etihad Airways; and that these cross cultural influences
are also reflected on the strategic analysis processes of Jet Airways,
following Etihad’s acquisition of a 24% stake in Jet Airways.
The scope of this analysis is Jet Airways in Mumbai.
2.1 Overview
This section provides a brief overview of the remainder of this thesis.
Chapter 3 Methodology, details the methodology and considerations
behind the chosen method for our research.
Chapter 4 Company description – Jet Airways, provides a brief
historical overview of Jet Airways and furthermore details recent
strategic events surrounding Etihad’s acquisition of a 24% stake in Jet
Airways.
Chapter 5 Theory, details the different theories that we are using to
support our hypothesis.
Chapter 6 Country specific analysis, gives a theoretical analysis of the
different relevant cultural clusters in the GLOBE project.
Chapter 7 Strategy process and decisions in Jet Airways, details the
past strategy process in Jet Airways and details recent strategic
decision having been made in the airline, based on empirical data
collected in the fall of 2014.
Chapter 8 Cultural analysis in Jet Airways, performs a cultural analysis
of Jet Airways in Mumbai.
In Chapter 9 Discussion, we discuss the different aspects of cultural
and strategic changes taking place in Jet Airways in relation to the
presented theories.

The thesis ends with Criticism, Conclusions, Recommendations and
predictions, and Perspectivation in chapters 10, 11, 12 and 13.
2.2 Selection of literature
The research articles were selected by undertaking a search through
the search engine Google Scholar and through the electronic databases
ScienceDirect and ResearchGate in addition to a general search on
Google.
For a detailed description of the selection of literature, please refer to
Appendix A, Selection of literature.

3 Methodology
In this chapter we will detail the methodology and considerations behind
the chosen method.
Overall the problem is an empirical survey based in a practical problem,
supported by theoretical considerations.
From a methodological point of view the purpose of the theoretical
chapter is to form the theoretical basis. Thereby the theory will form a
fundamental foundation for the empirical research while at the same
time creating the conceptual framework for the subsequent analysis of
the collected data.
We will in the following part of this chapter argue the empirical method
that we have chosen for our thesis, the data collection method and the
choice of respondents.
Conclusively we will discuss the reliability and validity of our data and
present the theory we have chosen to use.
3.1 Method behind the empirical data
Our research takes starting point in Jet Airways where we have to
achieve knowledge of the corporate culture and the strategic analysis
processes. This forms the basis for the choice of methodology for
collection of empirical data.
Within our problem we have the choice between two methods, the
qualitative method and the quantitative method.
We have chosen the qualitative method, based on the subject and
purpose. The subject is strategic analysis processes influenced by the
corporate culture of Etihad Airways, since Etihad’s acquisition of a stake
in Jet airways. This subject is difficult to operationalise and quantify
without being explorative. We have as a starting point not included

operationalisation and quantification and have therefore deselected the
quantitative method.
Also where it is necessary to understand the reasons for the decisions
the respondents have taken, or to understand the reason for their
attitudes and opinions, Saunders (Saunders et al. 2011) recommend
conducting qualitative interviews.
The explorative method is necessary for this analysis because the
knowledge we need to achieve will have many unpredictable aspects.
On the basis of a qualitative and explorative analysis it could be an
added advantage to also supplement with a quantitative analysis, which
is also what Ib Andersen (Andersen 1997), P.43, recommends.
Ideally following this recommendation we would include supplementary
qualitative analysis in the form of questionnaires to secondary groups of
non-core respondents for both the strategic- as well as the cultural
analysis, as it might have provided greater width in the analysis.
In view of the lack of formal response from our primary groups of
respondents, this form of data collection method from secondary groups
of non-core respondents was deliberately not performed.
The purpose of our project is to be explorative (Andersen 1997), P.24,
as we wish to examine what are cross cultural influence on the strategic
analysis processes of Jet Airways.
Exactly what cross cultural influence is taking place, and in what
manner it manifests itself are not known in advance, and consequently
an explorative investigative approach will be necessary.
We therefore find that the qualitative method with an explorative line-of-
sight be the most appropriate approach for our thesis.
Although questionnaires are less time-intensive than interviewing,
enable comparisons to be made and can be analysed more easily than
interviews, Rassam (Rassam 2010), P.130, also gives significant
disadvantages of using questionnaires as people may misinterpret

some questions, they may be constrained not to tell all they know and
feel of fear of being discovered and so give the answers that they think
are required. Also the questionnaires leave very little room for
supplementaries.
In addition to this, Schein (Schein 1992), (Schein 2006) states that
there is no way a questionnaire can collect cultural data, and gives
reasons of criticism against the questionnaire methods when attempting
to collect cultural-based data (Schein 1992).
According to Schein (Schein 1992), P. 184-197, the questionnaire
method as a method to explain corporate culture results in four basic
problems.
1. A questionnaire method measures certain aspects of the norms
or climate of an organisation. Schein sees this as artifacts and
does not believe that this alone can account for the corporate
culture.
2. The corporate culture underlying the root cause analysis covers
all aspects of a group’s internal and external life. It is therefore
practically impossible to complete a questionnaire which will be
sufficiently covering.
3. Not all cultural dimensions are equally relevant for the works of a
group. It is therefore not possible to design a questionnaire which
captures the cultural dimensions which are relevant for the group
the researcher choose to investigate.
4. It is impossible to know what the respondents will answer based
on what they feel you look for, in the culture; or they answer the
questionnaire based on their view of the factual circumstances.
As the basic cultural assumptions are hidden and therefore not
necessarily present in the awareness of the respondents it can be
difficult for an individual to extract the relevant data.
Ideally, in order to perform a thorough cultural analysis a focus-group
interview should be applied. In a focus-group interview it is possible to

observe how the individuals working their way through artefacts and
values and begin to stimulate each others’ perception of the situation
and thereby start to provide the basic assumptions that signify the
culture (Schein 1992). Unfortunately for technical reasons, we were not
able to assemble all respondents for the cultural analysis at the same
time in a single focus-group interview, but had to perform several
smaller focus group interviews, including some one-to-one interviews as
well.
We do not believe that this will have a severe adverse effect on our
analysis of the corporate culture, as the focus groups interviews support
and complement each other.
As Rasien and Friga (Rasiel and Friga 2007), p. 61, also recommends,
we use an interview guide, in order to organise our thoughts on paper
and secondly identify the topics we intend to cover in the interview and
prepare accordingly.
The above supports our choice of the qualitative method and
furthermore points towards completing the qualitative interviews using
an interview guide.
A semi-structured interview provides the researcher with the opportunity
to probe answers where one wants the respondents to explain or build
on their responses (Saunders et al. 2011). Moreover it has also been
our intention to avoid limiting the respondents in their answers as
Rassam confirms (Rassam 2010) is one of the disadvantages by using
questionnaires. Where have therefore placed significant emphasis on
the core group of respondents presenting their own views of the
situation.
The tools and research methods suggested by Andersen (Andersen
1997), Rassam (Rassam 2010), Rasien and Friga (Rasiel and Friga
2007), Schein (Schein 1987),(Schein 1990), (Schein 1992), (Schein
2006) and Saunders (Saunders et al. 2011) are also supported by
Andler (Andler 2011).

3.2 Research design and progress
We start our research by analysing publicly available material from Jet
Airways, including Jet Airways Newsletters (Jet Airways 2014h), (Jet
Airways 2014e), (Jet Airways 2014f), Annual reports (Jet Airways
2013), (Jet Airways 2014d), fact sheets (Jet Airways 2014i), Jet Airways
Monthly Operating Data (Jet Airways 2014a), (Jet Airways 2014b), (Jet
Airways 2014c), telephone conference transcripts (Jet Airways 2014g) ,
and media articles (Business Standard 2014), (Buyek 2012), (CAPA -
Centre for Aviation 2014), (Forbes India 2014), (Times of India 2014),
(Outlook 2014), (Singhal 2013), (The Hindu 2014), (Times of India
2012), (Cruising Heights 2014), (TravelBiz Monitor 2014).
The result of these successive consolidations is an overview of the
places in the organisation involved in cross organisational work
between Jet Airways and Etihad Airlines, the executive management
team.
Addressing the top level organisation where this interaction occurs
gives us the basis for our empirical investigation of the strategy
process.
In the following we describe the way we have chosen to complete the
qualitative interviews. We describe our choice of respondents and our
choice of data collection method including justifying our choice of
respondents. We also argue for our choice of data collection method
and research design
We base our subsequently explorative investigation of the strategy
processes in the executive management team unit at the head office of
Jet Airways in Mumbai.
The data sources for our empirical research can all be characterised as
primary data.
We found it important to separate our interviews in groups according to
purpose. The reason behind this is that it would give us a potential to

select the group of respondents which we felt would best contribute to
the primary purpose of our interviews. It would at the same time help us
in maintaining interview focus.
We interviewed vice presidents about their understanding of the
strategy processes.
The remaining respondents, captains, airport ground staff and in-flight
cabin crew were interviewed about cultural aspects.
We felt it important to interview all these different groups about culture,
as none of these single groups alone would be able to create a picture
of an objective reality. The reality is a social construction created by
people interacting and communicating with each other through
language (Haslebo 1997).
We interviewed captains, primarily about their about their understanding
of cultural aspects and subsidiary about the changes they had
personally experienced, since Etihad acquired a stake in Jet Airways.
We interviewed airport ground staff and in-flight cabin crew primarily
about the changes they had personally experienced since Etihad
acquired a stake in Jet Airways and subsidiary about their
understanding of cultural aspects.
The main reason for this was the more limited time available with the in-
flight cabin crew, and the fact that the captains, with a typical higher
educational background, were able to provide more elaborate answers
to the questions in the semi-structured interviews.
The vice presidents are all at a senior level in the organisation,
accountable for major areas in the airline, and hence they will be
forthcoming if anyone provides them any hope of further benefiting from
the cross cultural influences. However, Jet Airways being in a fierce
competition with other market players, they had agreed to do so only on
remaining anonymous.

Moreover due to the work involvement into the cross organisational
dealings between Jet Airways and Etihad, and proximity to the board of
directors and CEO, and in attempt the preserve the confidentiality of our
respondents, we will deliberately not here divulge the number of
respondents, only that there has been several interviews with vice
presidents, aircraft captains, airport ground staff and cabin crew, aiming
at providing a varied picture from within the airline.
As the vice presidents are directly involved in the strategic issued facing
the airline and also the cross organisational dealings between Jet
Airways and Etihad Airways we consider this group of respondents our
primary core group of respondents for strategic processes.
All interviews with senior executives were deliberately performed as
one-to-one interviews due to the nature of confidentiality of the subject.
As the aircraft captains, the airport ground staff and the aircraft cabin
crew are all in daily contact with passengers, they are the real culture-
bearers of the organisation. We consider this group of respondents our
primary core group of respondents for corporate culture analysis.
They were selected because they are also directly affected by the cross
organisational results and change programs which has been recently
been introduced in Jet Airways, since Etihad came into the picture.
They also wanted to remain anonymous in providing their feedbacks.
It was also important to include this group of respondents and obtain
their view of the corporate culture, in order to have an understanding,
how these groups of employees observes the influence of Etihad on
their daily work, sometimes following only orders of their superiors, thus
feeling helpless in coping with the changes.
Ideally, a corporate culture analysis should be completed as a focus-
group interview, taking into consideration an equal distribution between
young employees having a low seniority and old employees having a
high seniority, in order to discover the different views on corporate
culture. A focus-group interview is also preferred to a one-on-one

interview, in particular in relation to culture, as respondents will
generally stimulate each other during a focus-group interview, the
aspect of which is not achieved by a one-to-one interview (Schein
1992).
The majority of the culture interviews were conducted as small focus-
group interviews, although two of the cultural interviews had to be
performed as one-to-one interviews for practical reasons.
In this thesis we are using the Pareto principle, as this we believe that a
relatively small number of factors, inputs, occurrences and so on will
usually have a disproportionate effect on an eventual outcome (Rassam
2010). Moreover, striving for a 100% solution in this case, will not be
sensible in terms of effort required on Jet Airways (Obolensky 2010). In
processing the data made available to us from Jet Airways, we apply
the principle described by Cowey (Cowey 1994) as circle of concern
and circle of influence, and choose the disregard the causes we find are
in our circle of concern, but not in our circle of influence. The reason for
this is that although some of them occur frequent, they are beyond our
relevance to the topic of this thesis and our addressing these issues will
have little or no effect on the results.
3.3 Representativity of data
A major disadvantage by limiting our strategic interviews to the vice
president level in this unit in Mumbai is that we obtain only the views of
key strategic personnel in this unit.
A similar disadvantage may be even more relevant for the corporate
culture, as we have captured only the corporate culture from a Mumbai
perspective.
Although the vice presidents are employees closest to the strategic
analysis- and decision making processes, and the cabin crew, the
captains and the airport staff are the closest employees to the
passengers and culture bearers of the organisation, we will have

significant views from other units in Jet Airways, such as the middle
management layers, which are not even represented.
Moreover, even if we were able to capture views from other parts of the
Mumbai organisation, there is no guarantee that the same units in other
Jet Airways stations in India or abroad would have the same view.
For an investigation to be genuinely valid corporate wide, it would
require significant effort and time, which we for time reasons have
chosen not to address.
Never the less, we believe that the interview results will be relevant for
Jet Airways and also still believe that the main effects of the cultural
influence on strategic analysis processes will be applied from the top
level management and from the units where the former Etihad
employees are located.
3.4 Reliability of data
It will probably be difficult to recreate the exact same process as we
have been through. Ideally, it should be such, that others with the same
assignment, the same organisation and employing the same tools
should reach the same conclusions.
Broadly speaking we have two theoretical perspectives, a rational view
and an open ethnographic view (Andersen 1997). Employing the
rational view, the researcher does not allow himself to deviate from the
original idea and no learning will take place (Andersen 1997).
Using the open ethnographic view, where the entire project is a
process, it allows the researcher to identify oneself with the field of
research (Andersen 1997). In this perspective learning and reflexion will
occur.
Furthermore we have to be aware that a respondent during the course
of an interview, or later on, can change his descriptions and statements
of a particular subject. The respondents will frequently not be able to
repeat statements from previous interviews because they during the

interview or in the intermittent period often will have obtained new
knowledge or increased consciousness of the particular subject which
the interview or the questionnaire has focused on (Andersen 1997). The
same this applies to the researcher during the course of the project
(Andersen 1997).
The central focus has for us been the explorative and investigative
approach for the project. We see this as a search-and-learning process.
3.5 Validity of data
We feel that the validity of our data is in accordance with Schein’s view
that only a joint effort between members of an organisation and an
outside consultant can clarify the basic assumptions and the relation
which exist between these basic assumptions (Schein 1992), P. 169.
We also feel that we have achieved the level of co-operation and
motivation from all our respondents which is necessary to achieve an
understanding of their view of the root causes. We base this in the fact
that all our respondents in advance have become an accepted part of
the Jet Airways organisation.
Firstly, all the respondents have in advance, willingly accepted to make
themselves available for our research project. This means that none of
the respondents have been forced to participate in our work. The
motivation of the respondents in their contribution to our work has
therefore been high.
Secondly, all the respondents have been assured that have we in no
way had a hidden agenda towards the management in that any of their
statements or views will be used against them in their work.
We therefore do not feel that the respondents have limited their
statements fearing future retaliation from their employer. Consequently
we also feel that we have avoided the pitfall that Schein say exist in
making a cultural investigation where the necessary level of co-
operation and motivation will not be present (Schein 1992), p. 170-171.

In relation to this, we wish to inform that for personal protection of our
informants we have to the greatest possible extent chosen not to refer a
citation to a particular person. Instead we have in the cases where we
felt it necessary and relevant, chosen to group the statements in the
following two categories: vice presidents and operational staff.
Moreover we have for personal protection of our respondents, and also
for restrictions of space in this report, omitted minutes of the interviews.
If necessary, these are available separately in writing.
3.6 Presentation of theory
The theory is used as a tool to understand and analyse our collected
empirical data. The theory has given us inspiration to the project, but
has primarily given us the basis to understand and process the
collected data. We have used the theory to identify the problems and
topics which we have become aware of during our initial study. We
have used the concepts and definitions that the theory contributes to
structure and analyse the empirical material.
From an overall perspective, we will through circumstantial evidence
and theoretical linkages explain that a new Australian born CEO; having
different leadership assumptions, in a traditional top heavy
entrepreneurial organisation, going from an entrepreneurial strategy
process approach, to a position driven strategy approach, changing
significant parts of the corporate leadership team, backed by a powerful
foreign investor, which by the way also happens to be the CEO’s
previous employer, making changes to all aspects of the operation of
the airline, using corporate-wide training programmes is deliberately
and intentionally influencing the corporate culture of Jet Airways in
order to turn the company into a profit making enterprise; in the end
supporting our hypothesis that there is a deliberate and intentional effort
to change the corporate culture of Jet Airways, influenced by Jet
Airways’ new investor, Etihad Airways; and that these cross cultural

influences are also reflected on the strategic analysis processes of Jet
Airways, following Etihad’s acquisition of a stake in Jet Airways.
In order to explain these different linkages we firstly need to clarify the
theories we will be drawing on to substantiate this fact.
From strategy theory, we use what Mintzberg (Mintzberg et al. 1998a)
calls the entrepreneurial school of strategy to explain the strategy
process under the founder and Chairman, Mr. Goel.
We then use Mintzberg’s (Mintzberg et al. 1998a) perspective of the
prescriptive school of strategic theories, such as the positioning school,
to explain the more data driven approach employed by the new CEO,
such as Porters value chain (Porter 1998a), (Porter 1985), (Johnson
and Scholes 1997), (David 2012) SWOT (Johnson and Scholes 1997),
(David 2012) and Porters five forces (Porter 1998b), (Porter 1980),
(Johnson and Scholes 1997), (David 2012).
From the organisational and change theories we use Lewin’s 3-step
model of change (Burnes 2006), (Goodstein and Burke 1991), (Hatch
1997), (Johnson and Scholes 1997), (Stacey 1996) to argue that there
is a deliberate and intentional change to the corporate culture values in
Jet Airways, just as there was in British Airways in 1982 (Goodstein and
Burke 1991).
From leadership and change theories we use Kotter’s (Kotter 1995),
(Kotter 1996), (Kotter and Cohen 2002), (Cohen 2005), (Kotter 2008),
(Kotter 2014) eight steps for successful large-scale change to explain
that there is a deliberate change process going on inside Jet Airways.
From cultural theories we use Schein’s, three layer model (Schein
1990), (Schein 1992), (Schein 2006), to uncover the present corporate
culture found in Jet Airways.
From the GLOBE project we use the House’s results (House et al.
2004) as well as Javidan’s findings of the culturally contingent
leadership factors, of the GLOBE Project (Javidan et al. 2010), to argue

that there has been a deliberate change of leadership style in Jet
Airways to a cross cultural leadership style.
3.7 Criticism of references
Especially within the cultural theories, but also in the strategic theories it
is possible to discuss which picture of the world the author holds. It is
also possible to discuss the background with which the author writes.
Especially within the strategy process we see segregation between
different schools (Mintzberg et al. 1998a).
Each of these strategic schools have their own perspective on
determining factors, such as the environment, perception of the social
context and the general perception of viewing things.
We have attempted to minimise this aspect by using different theories
and to understand them in a context.
There is no doubt that our own perception of things is influencing the
way we interpret and analyse our empirical data.
We have only to a limited extent employed secondary data. We base
this preference with the fact that articles from magazines and
newspapers as well as internal corporate newsletters often only
provides a fragmented picture of the reality.

4 Company description – Jet Airways
This chapter provides a brief historical overview of Jet Airways and
furthermore details recent strategic events surrounding Etihad’s
acquisition of a 24% stake in Jet Airways, as published in the media.
4.1 Brief historical overview
Jet Airways is a major Indian airline based in Mumbai. It was founded in
1992 (Jet Airways 2014i) and is the second largest airline in India, both,
in terms of market share (Times of India 2012) and passengers carried
(Singhal 2013). Jet Airways commenced its operations with four B-737-
300s on May 5, 1993. At the time, and until October 1997, the airline
had 20% participation from Gulf Air and Kuwait Airways each, with the
remaining balance held by Tailwinds Ltd., a company registered in the
Isla of Man and owned entirely by Mr. Naresh Goyal (Flouris and
Oswald 2006). Implementing a new regulatory framework, effective
October 1997, the Indian government withdrew permission for foreign
airlines to invest in Indian domestic airlines, which in effect let to
Tailwinds Ltd. acquiring the equity stake previously held by the two
Middle Eastern carriers. Jet Airways went public in March 2005 and
posted a profit up 103% from the previous year, of 89.4 Million USD.
Revenue for the year 2004 was $1 billion USD, an increase of 24%
from the previous year (Flouris and Oswald 2006).
In July 2014, Jet Airways employed 13.945 employees, and operated a
fleet of 101 aircraft to 68 destinations worldwide, 21 international
destinations and 47 domestic destinations. Its primary hub and
maintenance base is Mumbai, with secondary bases Bengaluru,
Brussels, Chennai, Delhi, Kolkata, Pune (Jet Airways 2014i).
For the Indian financial year ending on 31 March 2014, Jet Airways
posted a loss of 366.785 Lakh Indian Rupees, as opposed to a loss of
48.550 Lakh Indian Rupees the previous financial year ending on 31
March 2013 (Jet Airways 2014d), and a loss of 123.610 Lakh Indian

rupees in the financial year ending on 31 March 2012 (Jet Airways
2013).
4.2 Recent strategic events
This sections details the recent strategic events having taken place in
Jet Airways.
It is divided into financial decisions, operational decisions and structural
decisions.
4.2.1 Financial decisions
In April 2013, Jet Airways announced plans to sell 24% equity to Etihad
Airways for about Rs 2,058 crore, as part of a strategic alliance that
would lead to a major expansion in their global network (Outlook 2014).
Etihad Airways, the national carrier of the United Arab Emirates and Jet
Airways announced on November 20, 2013 that both airlines closed the
transaction for the subscription of a 24% equity stake by Etihad Airways
in Jet Airways. All requisite Indian regulatory approvals had been
obtained by November 12th, 2013. Jet Airways had, on November 20th
,
2013, issued and allotted 27,263,372 equity shares of a face value of
Rs. 10 each at a price of Rs. 754.7361607 per equity share on a
preferential basis to Etihad Airways (Jet Airways 2014h).
Jet Airways has 150 million USD external commercial borrowing, raised
in the last quarter of last Indian fiscal year (first quarter of 2014) from a
middle eastern bank which has been guaranteed for by Etihad (Jet
Airways 2014g). A further 150 Million USD was in the process of being
completed during September 2014 (Jet Airways 2014g).
Summarising the Investment by Etihad into Jet Airways are:
Acquisition of 24% equity: 380 million USD
Acquisition of Jet Airways three pairs of arrival/departure slots at
London Heathrow airport: 70 million USD

Acquisition of majority stake in Jet Privilege loyalty programme:
150 Million USD
Additional assistance in supporting US 150 million USD loan;
Totalling 750 million USD.
According to the management (Jet Airways 2014g), fixed cost does not
seem to be going down.
Jet Airways has sold a majority share of their frequent flier programme,
Jet Privilege, to Etihad (Jet Airways 2014g). Etihad now owns 50.1%
and Jet Airways 49.9% (Jet Airways 2014g). Although Jet Airways no
longer owns the majority of their own frequent flier programme, they see
it as a win-win situation, as it gives them the opportunity to serve their
customers, improve their unique quality and their traffic mix, just the
same way as larger alliance frequent flier programmes (Jet Airways
2014g). Over the recent months, numerous additions to a wide range of
partners have been introduced into the airlines frequent flier
programme, such as Starwood hotel group.
The airline expects to continue to have a share in their own frequent
flier programme, however it is not certain if Jet Airways will continue to
hold onto their minority share of 49.9% or it in future will be less than
that (Jet Airways 2014g).
Jet Airways are re-allocating capacity and extending the utilisation of
aircraft (Jet Airways 2014g).
The objective for Jet Airways (Jet Airways 2014g), as compared to last
year, is to get underutilised assets, either in the air, or out of their
system. According to Jet Airways, they have achieved this goal and it
has already had a positive impact on utilisation (Jet Airways 2014g).
The airline is going through a process of fleet standardisations, which
mean that they are able to configure their aircraft into similar
specifications across the board (Jet Airways 2014g). This fleet
standardisation allows Jet Airways greater operational flexibility and

also gives Jet Airways the ability to squeeze more flying time out of their
assets (Jet Airways 2014g). The target utilisation for Jet Airways is
about 12 hours, and at present their utilisation is a little short of 12
hours (Jet Airways 2014g). Compared to global industry standards, an
aircraft utilisation of about 12 hours on a narrow-body fleet is, according
to Jet Airways (Jet Airways 2014g), in the higher bracket.
4.2.2 Operational decisions
A critical step in Jet Airways turn-around programme is to re-establish
Jet Airways as a master brand, in order for Jet Airways to harness their
proud heritage and original values into one consistent predictable and
clearly recognisable brand (Jet Airways 2014g), (Cruising Heights
2014).
The Jet Airways master brand will provide operational flexibility across
the airline’s domestic fleet (Jet Airways 2014g). The domestic economy
class will provide a differentiated offering to address the needs of their
travellers, setting value and competitive fares, while ensuring service
continuity with inbound international flights (Jet Airways 2014g),
(Cruising Heights 2014).
Enhanced domestic offering will provide a quality product with unique
value adds, including premium seating. Lounge passes and higher
baggage allowance than Jet Airways’ competitors (Jet Airways 2014g),
Uniquely, domestic flyers will gain tier recognition and will be able to
gain domestic miles on international operated flights under both Jet
Airways and Etihad Airways (Jet Airways 2014g). The airline also plans
to expand the benefits to all Etihad Airways partners in the period to
come (Jet Airways 2014g).
It may seem strange, that only a couple of years ago, Jet Konnect was
launched, as the airline did not foresee the demand for a full service
product within the Indian domestic market. The thought was that it

would malign Jet Airways as a full service brand to an extent, which
was the reasoning for creating Jet Konnect (Jet Airways 2014g).
In the past year, Jet Airways has stepped out of three markets in the
Indian market (Jet Airways 2014g).
According to the senior management (Jet Airways 2014g), the objective
remains to consolidate, squeeze more out of their assets and get to
higher levels of operational efficiency.
During the last six months of 2014, Jet Airways are planning to add six
more aircraft to their fleet and over the slightly longer term, some of
their wide-body aircraft will also be coming back to their fleet. Further
additions to the fleet will be on a case-by-case basis (Jet Airways
2014g).
In the short term, Jet Airways is planning that the net additions of
aircraft mostly will get used for further international expansion (Jet
Airways 2014g).
At present Jet Airways are planning to introduce Boeing 787 into
service from 2018 and beyond (Jet Airways 2014g).
4.2.3 Structural decisions
Two months after Etihad bought 24% stake in Jet Airways, Gary
Toomey, a former Qantas CFO, was appointed Chief Executive Officer
of Jet Airways. Mr. Toomey was associated as a consultant with Etihad
before being appointed CEO of Jet Airways (Business Standard 2014).
In January 2014, the Jet Airways Chief Executive Officer, Gary Tooney,
quit the airline with immediate effect, only six months after having been
appointed CEO (Business Standard 2014).
Factors behind his resignation were his differences with Chairman
Naresh Goyal (Business Standard 2014) and his inability to get along
with the Jet Airways culture (Cruising Heights 2014).

In addition to the resignation of the Jet Airways CEO, several high
profile senior executives had also resigned in the months before. This
included the vice president of investor relations and the Chief
Commercial Officer (Business Standard 2014).
Naresh Goyal’s wife, Anita Goyal, was re-designated advisor to the
chief executive and group executive officer Abdulrahman Albusaidy,
responsible for gulf markets, was appointed Chief Strategic Planning
Officer, and given wider powers (Business Standard 2014).
In June 2014, Mr. Ball was appointed Chief Executive Officer
(Designate) of Jet Airways (Jet Airways 2014f).
Mr. Ball, a former regional manager (Asia-Pacific) of Etihad, had prior to
joining Jet Airways, held the post of CEO of Air Seychelles, after Etihad
bought a stake in Air Seychelles (Business Standard 2014), (Cruising
Heights 2014).
During his time in Air Seychelles, he was leading a major restructuring
program that returned Air Seychelles to profitability (Jet Airways 2014f),
The Jet Airways board of directors also has two members from Etihad,
Chief Executive officer James Hogan and Chief Financial Officer James
Rigney (Business Standard 2014), (Jet Airways 2014h).
The organisation in Jet Airways can be characterised as a divisional
structure (Mintzberg 1983).

5 Theory
This chapter we will account for the different theories and tools we have
used to analyse our data
5.1 Strategy process theory
Mintzberg (Mintzberg et al. 1998a) defines several different schools of
strategy process, and divides them into two groups, the prescriptive
group of strategies, and the descriptive group of strategies.
The prescriptive group of strategies are more concerned with how
strategies should be formulated than how the necessarily do form
(Mintzberg et al. 1998a).
Within the prescriptive school of strategies, what he calls the design
school, at its simplest, proposes a model of strategy making that seeks
to attain a match, or fit, between internal capabilities and external
possibilities (Mintzberg et al. 1998a).
The design school (Mintzberg et al. 1998a) covers well known MBA
strategic tools such as the SWOT analysis (David 2012), (Johnson and
Scholes 1997). Subsequently, what Mintzberg (Mintzberg et al. 1998a)
calls the planning school saw the strategy process as a systematic
process of formal planning.
The planning school (Mintzberg et al. 1998a), where the strategy
process is a systematic process of formal planning, was followed by the
positioning school, less concerned with the process of strategy
formation than with the actual content of strategies. The positioning
school (Mintzberg et al. 1998a) focuses on the selection of strategic
positions in the economic marketplace and argues that only a few key
strategies – as positions in the economic marketplace – are desirable in
any given industry: one that can be defended against existing and
future competitors.

The positioning school (Mintzberg et al. 1998a) covers well known MBA
strategic tools such as Porters five forces (Porter 1980), Porters generic
strategies (differentiation or low cost) (Porter 1985), Porters value chain
(Porter 1985). Further theory on Porters value chain analysis (Porter
1985) in the aviation industry, the aviation industry value chain and the
airline value chain can be found in Appendix K, Appendix L and
Appendix L1.
In stark contrast to the prescriptive strategy schools, we find the
descriptive strategy schools. The descriptive schools consider specific
aspects of the process of strategy formation, and have been concerned
less with prescribing ideal strategic behaviour than with describing how
strategies do, in fact, get made (Mintzberg et al. 1998a).
One school is particularly relevant in this case, the entrepreneurial
school (Mintzberg et al. 1998a). In the entrepreneurial school, the focus
of strategy formation process is exclusively on the single leader, and
also stresses the most innate of mental states and progress – intuition,
judgement, wisdom, experience and insight (Mintzberg et al. 1998a).
The entrepreneurial school promotes a view of strategy and perspective
associated with image and sense of direction, namely vision (Mintzberg
et al. 1998a).
According to Mintzberg (Mintzberg et al. 1998a) this strategic
perspective is not so much collective or cultural, as personal, the
construct of the leader. In the entrepreneurial organisation, power is
centralised in the hands of the Chief Executive (Mintzberg 1973) and
key decisions concerning strategy and operations are together
concentrated in the office of the chief executive.
In this way of strategic perspective, the organisation becomes
responsive to the dictates of that individual, subservient to his
leadership; and the environment, if not exactly subservient, becomes
the terrain on which the leader manoeuvres with some ease, at least in

terms of directing the organisation into a protective niche (Mintzberg et
al. 1998a).
The most central concept of this strategic school is vision; a mental
representation of strategy, created or at least expressed in the head of
the leader (Mintzberg et al. 1998a).
That vision serves as both an inspiration and a sense of what needs to
be done – a guiding idea.
True to its label, vision often tends to be a kind of image more than a
fully articulated plan in words and numbers.
Creating a vision often as a kind of image, more than a fully articulated
plan in words and numbers leaves it flexible, so that the leader can
adopt the vision to his or her experiences (Mintzberg et al. 1998a).
This suggests that the entrepreneurial strategy is both deliberate and
emergent; deliberate in its broad lines and sense of direction; emergent
in its detail so that it can be adapted en route (Mintzberg et al. 1998a).
In our analysis, we will argue that there has been a radical change from
an entrepreneurial prescriptive school to the descriptive school in Jet
Airways.
5.2 Lewin’s model for change
According to the change model proposed by Lewin, change involves
three separate activities: Unfreezing, refreezing and change (Burnes
2006), Hatch (Hatch 1997) , (Mintzberg et al. 1998b), Stacey (Stacey
1996).
Within Mintzberg’s different schools of strategy, Lewin’s change model
is found in the configuration school (Mintzberg et al. 1998a), where
strategy formation is a process of change.
The first step of any change process is to unfreeze the present pattern
of behaviour as a way of managing resistance to change (Goodstein
and Burke 1991).

Once unfreezing has occurred, the moving or change state involves
making the actual change that will move the organisation to another
level of response (Goodstein and Burke 1991) by influencing the
direction of movement in the new unbalanced system (Hatch 1997).
Strategies for influencing the direction of change includes training new
behaviour pattern, altering reporting relationship and reward systems,
and introducing different styles of management (Hatch 1997).
On the individual level you would expect to see people behave
differently, perhaps demonstrating new skills or new supervisory
practices (Goodstein and Burke 1991).
On the structural level you would expect to see changes in actual
organisation structures (Goodstein and Burke 1991), such as replacing
an authoritarian management style with a participative management
style (Hatch 1997), changes in reporting relationships and reward
systems that affect the way people do their work (Goodstein and Burke
1991).
Finally on the climate or interpersonal-style level, you would expect to
see behaviour pattern that indicate greater interpersonal trust and
openness and fewer dysfunctional interactions (Goodstein and Burke
1991).
The final stage of the change process, refreezing involves stabilizing
and institutionalising systems that make these behaviour patterns
relatively secure against change (Goodstein and Burke 1991).
An example of a refreezing strategy would be establishing new
recruitment policies to assure that new recruits share the new
organisational culture and will work within the new structure and reward
systems as well as the new management style (Hatch 1997).
The concept of Lewin’s 3-step model for change is illustrated in Figure
5.1.

Figure 5.1 Lewin's 3 step model for change
Source: http://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/newPPM_94.htm
Just as Burns (Burnes 2006) argues, it would appear that although the
change model of Lewin, has a modernistic perspective (Johnson and
Scholes 1997), it is by far an as outdated and obsolete change model
as suggested by Hatch (Hatch 1997).
In our analysis of Jet airways, and we will highlight the remarkable
resemblance between the application of Lewin’s model with which
Goodstein and Burke analysed the changes initiated at British Airways
in 1982, (Goodstein and Burke 1991), (Hatch 1997) and the present
changes happening in Jet Airways.
We will argue that the CEO Mr. Ball is in fact using Lewin’s 3 step
model for achieving organisational change in Jet Airways (Burnes
2006), (Mintzberg et al. 1998a), by deliberately influencing the
corporate culture of Jet Airways.
5.3 Cultural theory
When most of us hear the word culture, we typically relate to national
culture such as, The Dutch, The Germans, The Indians; or we relate to
sociological culture, such as The Americans, The Europeans, The
Africans.
According to Virkus (Virkus 2009b), Kroeber and Kluckhohn complied in
1952 a list of 164 definitions of “Culture”. Organisational culture is a
widely used term but one that seems to give rise to a degree of
ambiguity (O'Donnel and Boyle 2008).

Particularly slightly more traditional textbooks on organisational
behaviour have a very vague definition of culture, defining culture as
institutionalised traditions (Mishra 2001).
The development of corporate culture within organisational theory was
significantly influenced by Hofstede’s book Cultures Consequences
(Brown 1998).
According to Hatch (Hatch 1997), Hofstede analysed and compared in
the late 1970’s different international affiliates of IBM and found
evidence of national culture differences within IBM’s organisational
culture.
The four dimensions that Hofstede argues national cultures differ along
are:
Power distance
Uncertainty avoidance
Individualism (vs. collectivism); and
Masculinity (vs. femininity)
Hofstede later, in 1991, added a fifth element to his theory, confucian
dynamism (Long term vs. short term orientation) Bertsch (Bertsch
2012), Virkus (Virkus 2009a), (Brown 1998).
Hofstede’s dimensions of national culture is a tool to identify national
cultural differences (Javidan and House 2002).
The GLOBE project has later suggested nine unique cultural
dimensions (House et al. 2004).
According to Brown (Brown 1998), it was Edgar Schein’s book,
Organisational Culture and Leadership (Schein 1992) that has become
one of the key foundations of corporate culture.
Certainly a lot of textbooks on strategy and Leadership (Johnson and
Scholes 1997), (Hatch 1997), (Brown 1998) all quote Schein’s model for
culture (Schein 1992).

Although Tropenars and Hampden-Turner (Trompenaars and
Hampden-Turner 1999) do not actually quote Schein, they also have a
three-layered model of culture identical to Schein (Schein 1992).
Schein (Schein 1992) identifies cultures at three different levels:
Artifatcs
Espoused values
Basic underlying assumptions
The three different layers of culture are illustrated in Figure 5.2.

Artifacts
These take the form of stories,
myths, jokes, metaphors,
rites, rituals and ceremonies,
heroes and symbols
Espoused Values
Beliefs, Values and attributes
Basic Underlying
Assumptions
These concern the
environment, reality, human
nature, human activity and
human relationships
Deepest Level of
Culture
Taken for granted
invisible
The most superficial
manifestation of culture
Visible but often undecipherable
Greater level of
awareness
Figure 5.2 Levels of culture
Source: Adapted from (Schein 1992) P. 17, (Hatch 1997) P. 211, (Brown 1998) P. 12
5.3.1 Artifacts
Artifacts are at the surface of culture (Schein 1992). Artifacts are visible,
tangible and audible parts of culture (Hatch 1997). Categories of
artifacts include physical objects created by members, verbal
manifestations seen in written, spoken language, rituals, ceremonies

and other behavioural manifestations. Members of a culture may or may
not be aware of their culture’s artifacts, but the artifacts themselves can
directly be observed by anyone (Brown 1998), (Hatch 1997), (Schein
1992). This level of culture is the easiest to observe but also difficult to
decipher (Schein 1992). An observer can describe what he sees and
feels but will not be able to reconstruct what the artifacts mean to a
given group or if they even reflect important underlying assumptions
(Schein 1992).
5.3.2 Espoused values
Values are the social principles, goals and standards held within a
culture (Hatch 1997).
They define what members of an organisation care about, such as
freedom, democracy, tradition, wealth or loyalty. Values constitute the
basis for making judgements about what is right or wrong (Hatch 1997).
Values are intimately connected with moral and ethical code, and
determine what people think ought to be done (Brown 1998).
Members of an organisation are able to recognise their values fairly
easily and become especially aware of them when someone tries to
change their culture in some fundamental way (Hatch 1997).
5.3.3 Basic underlying assumptions
When a solution to a problem works repeatedly, it comes to be taken for
granted (Schein 1992). Basic assumptions are held unconsciously and
are very difficult to surface (Brown 1998).
Basic assumptions tend to be those we neither confront nor debate.
Basic assumptions represent what members believe to be reality and
thereby influence what they perceive and how they think and feel
(Hatch 1997). Basic assumptions are therefore extremely difficult to
change (Schein 1992).

Basic assumptions are implicit, deeply rooted assumptions that people
share. The basic assumptions guide perceptions, feelings and emotions
about things (Brown 1998).
In our analysis we will uncover the artifacts, the espoused values and
the basic underlying assumptions in the corporate culture of Jet
Airways.
5.4 What is leadership?
Just as with culture, leadership has had a huge number of different
meanings throughout the last 100 years. According to Yukl (Yukl 1998),
Steadgill concluded that there are almost as many definitions of
leadership as there are people that have attempted to define the
concept. Northouse (Northouse 2013) has not surprisingly the same
reference. Yukl (Yukl 1998) lists 8 different definitions of leadership
which has been used in the last 50 years. Northouse (Northouse 2013)
also refers to the study of Rost finding more than 200 definitions of
leadership in written material between 1900-1990.
Traditionally the traits approach for defining leadership was used (Yukl
1998). Slightly more traditional textbooks define leadership as the
quality of a good leader (Mishra 2001).
Kotter (Kotter 1999) defines and distinguishes between management
and leadership. Management is a set of processes that can keep a
complicated system of people and technology running smoothly (Kotter
1996). Management is about coping with complexity (Kotter 1999).
Good management brings a degree of order to dimensions like the
quality and profitability of products (Kotter 1999). Without good
management, complex enterprises tend to become chaotic in a way that
threaten their very existence (Kotter 1999).
Leadership is coping with change (Kotter 1999). Leadership is a set of
processes that creates organisations in the first place or adopts them to
significantly changing circumstances (Kotter 1996).

Leadership is different from management and the primary force behind
successful change of any significance is leadership, not management
(Kotter 1999).
That the concept of leadership is still subject to many interpretations
can be seen from the fact that participating scholars in project GLOBE
found it a daunting task to define leadership (Dickson et al. 2012).
The GLOBE researchers who studied leadership worldwide were able
to agree on defining leadership as the ability of an individual to
influence, motivate and enable others to contribute toward the
effectiveness and success of the organisations of which they are
members (House et al. 2004), (Dickson et al. 2012).
Northouse (Northouse 2013) defines leadership as a process whereby
an individual influences a group of individuals to achieve a common
goal.
Although the GLOBE project’s definition of leadership is likely to be
more academically correct, we feel that it does not in the same way as
Kotters’s definition of leadership provide a tangible way to actually
exercise leadership.
Extrapolating the three previous definitions of leadership and applying a
cultural dimension we can then manufacture three modified definitions
of cross cultural leadership.
Cross cultural leadership - is coping with cross-cultural change
(Modified Kotter).
Cross cultural leadership - is the ability of an individual from one culture
to influence, motivate and enable others from another culture to
contribute toward the effectiveness and success of the organisations of
which they are members (Modified GLOBE).
Cross cultural leadership - is a process whereby an individual from one
culture influences a group of individuals from another culture to achieve
a common goal (Modified House).

Defining leadership in these procedural ways means that we distance
ourselves from the perspective of leadership as a trait and make it
available to everyone, not only to formally designated leaders in a group
(Northouse 2013).
As Kotter notes, no one has yet ever figured out how to manage people
effectively into battle, they must be led (Kotter 1999).
5.5 Leadership and change
Adopting Kotters view of leadership as change; Kotter observes that
when managers today produce successful change in organisations
people move through eight steps (Kotter 1995), (Kotter 1996), (Kotter
and Cohen 2002), (Cohen 2005), (Kotter 2008), (Kotter 2014).
Initially Kotter defined the eight errors that prevent successful change
(Kotter 1995). In his later books, he defines the necessary steps to be
taken to ensure successful change (Kotter 1996), (Kotter and Cohen
2002), (Cohen 2005), (Kotter 2008), (Kotter 2014).
These eight steps for successful change are listed in Table 5.1.
Cohen (Cohen 2005) later developed a field guide providing concrete
tools, advice and insight for successfully achieving lasting change using
Kotter’s 8 steps for large-scale successful change.
Kotter (Kotter 2008) notes that the single biggest mistake people make
when they try to change, is that they do not create a high enough sense
of urgency among enough people to set the stage for making a
challenging leap into some new direction.
In our discussion we will argue that the change process in Jet Airways
is also following Kotter’s eight steps for successful large-scale change
(Kotter 1995), (Kotter 1996), (Kotter and Cohen 2002), (Cohen 2005),
(Kotter 2008), (Kotter 2014), and that there are indications of the first 4
steps being underway.

Table 5.1 Kotter’s eight steps for successful large-scale change
The eight steps for successful large-scale change
Step Action New behaviour
1 Increase Urgency People start telling each other “Let’s
go, we need to change things!”
2 Build guiding team A group powerful enough to guide a
big change is formed and they start to
work together as well
3 Get the vision right The guiding team develops the right
vision and strategy for the change
effort
4 Communicate buy-in People begin to buy into the change,
and this shows in their behaviour
5 Empower action More people feel able to act, and do
act, on the vision
6 Create short-term
wins
Momentum builds as people try to fulfil
the vision, while fewer and fewer resist
change
7 Don’t let up People make wave after wave of
changes until the vision is fulfilled
8 Make change stick New and winning behaviour continues
despite the pull of tradition, turnover of
change leaders, etc.
Source: Adapted from (Kotter and Cohen 2002), Page 7.
5.6 The GLOBE Project
The GLOBE project is an empirically study based on survey of more
than 17.000 managers across 62 societal cultures (House et al. 2004)

According to Grove (Growe 2014) the GLOBE study exceeds all other
studies in scope, depth, duration and sophistication, even Hofstede’s
IBM study.
The meta-goal of GLOBE was to develop an empirically based theory to
describe, understand and predict the impact of specific cultural
variables on leadership and organisational processes and the
effectiveness on the processes (House et al. 2002).
Northouse later simplifies this explanation somewhat and explains that
the overall the purpose GLOBE was to determine how people from
different cultures viewed leadership (Northouse 2013). They also
wanted to find out how differences in culture were related to differences
in approaches to leadership.
As part of their study of culture and leadership, GLOBE researchers
developed their own classification of cultural dimensions. Instead of
Hofstede’s 5 dimensions, GLOBE researchers identified 9 cultural
dimensions, as follows: uncertainty avoidance, power distance,
institutional collectivism, in-group collectivism, gender egalitarianism,
assertiveness, future orientation, performance orientation, humane
orientation. An elaboration of each of these is found in Appendix B
GLOBE Project - 9 cultural dimensions.
GLOBE researchers identified twenty-one primary dimensions of
outstanding leadership, empirically derived from their survey. A
second-order factor analysis produced a set of six global leadership
dimensions, which comprised the culturally endorsed implicit leadership
theory.
The six global leadership behaviours are listed in Table 5.2.
The six global leadership dimensions resulting from GLOBE project
along with the twenty-one primary factors are detailed in Table 5.3
According to Northouse (Northouse 2013) one of the most interesting
outcomes of the GLOBE project was the identification of a list of

leadership attributes that were universally endorsed by 17.000 people is
62 societies as positive aspects of leadership.
Respondents to the GLOBE study identified 22 universally desirable
leadership attributes and these attributes were universally endorsed as
characteristics that facilitate outstanding leadership, these are listed in
Table 5.4.
According to Northouse (Northouse 2013) we can draw a portrait of an
outstanding leader, based on the universally desirable leadership
attributes. The portrait of a leader whom almost everyone sees as
exceptional is: High integrity is charismatic and value based, and has
interpersonal skills.
The GLOBE project also identified a list of leadership attributes that
were universally viewed as obstacles to effective leadership. These are
listed in Table 5.5.
These characteristics suggest, according to Northouse (Northouse
2013), that the portrait of an ineffective leader is someone who is
asocial, malevolent and self-focused. People from all cultures find these
characteristics to hinder effective leadership.
In our analysis we will use the results of the GLOBE project to analyse
the differences in national cultures between the Australian-born CEO of
Jet Airways and the Indian national culture which he finds himself in.

Table 5.2 GLOBE six leadership behaviours
GLOBE six leadership behaviours
1 Charismatic/Value based leadership reflects the ability to
inspire, to motivate, and to expect high performance from others
based on strongly held core values. This kind of leadership
being visionary, inspirational, self-sacrificing, trustworthy,
decisive and performance oriented.
2 Team-oriented leadership emphasizes team building and a
common purpose among team members. This kind of
leadership includes being collaborative, integrative, diplomatic,
non-malevolent and administratively competent.
3 Participative leadership reflects the degree to which leaders
involve others in making and implementing decisions. It includes
being participative and non-autocratic.
4 Humane-oriented leadership emphasizes being supportive,
considerate, compassionate and generous. This type of
leadership includes modesty and sensitivity to other people.
5 Autonomous leadership refers to independent and
individualistic leadership, which includes being autonomous and
unique.
6 Self protective leadership reflects behaviours that ensure that
safety and security of the leader and the group. It includes
leadership that is self-centered, status conscious, conflict
inducing, face saving and procedural/bureaucratic.
Source: Adapted from (Northouse 2013), chapter 15.

Table 5.3 Globally culturally endorsed implicit leadership dimensions and twenty primary
factors
Globally culturally endorsed implicit leadership dimensions and
the twenty-one primary factors
Charismatic/value based Team oriented
1. Charismatic 1: Visionary 7. Team 1: Collaborative team
orientation
2. Charismatic 2: Inspirational 8. Team integrator
3. Charismatic 3: Self-sacrifice 9. Diplomatic
4. Integrity 10. Malevolent (reverse scored)
5. Decisive 11. Administratively competent
6. Performance orientation
Self protective Participative
12. Self centered 17. Autocratic (reverse scored)
13. Status conscious 18. Non-participative (reverse
scored)
14. Conflict inducer/internally
competitive
15. Face saver
16. Procedural/bureaucratic
Humane oriented Autonomous
19. Modesty 21 Autonomous
20. Humane orientation
Source: Adapted from (Javidan et al. 2010), Table 13-2

Table 5.4 Universally desirable leadership attributes
Positive leader attributes
Trustworthy Just Honest
Has foresight Plans ahead Encouraging
Positive Dynamic Motive aroused
Confidence builder Motivational Dependable
Intelligent Decisive Effective bargainer
Win-win problem
solver
Communicative Informed
Administratively skilled Coordinative Team builder
Excellence oriented
Source: Adapted from (Northouse 2013), P. 404
Table 5.5 Universally un-desirable leadership attributes
Negative leader attributes
Loner Asocial Non-cooperative
Irritable Non-explicit Egocentric
Ruthless Dictatorial
Source: Adapted from (Northouse 2013), P. 404
5.7 Culturally contingent leadership factors
Although the GLOBE study is the biggest of its kind today, it continues
to contribute to significant attention amongst scientists in the field.
Hofstede (Hofstede 2006) and Javidan are exchanging opinions on their
respective work. Other researchers, such as Brewer (Brewer and
Venaik 2010) comment on the different aspects of the results of Project

GLOBE. In his commentary to Project GLOBE, Smith (Smith 2006)
concludes that we now know more than we did about differences in
National culture.
Javidan (Javidan et al. 2010) criticises the GLOBE findings on mainly
two points.
The consolidation and aggregation has led to a very broad
categorisation of the six global leadership dimensions; and
They found that although the six global leadership dimensions
are valuable, these six dimensions give less than a precise
image of the aspects of leadership which are culturally
contingent, i.e. the aspects of leadership which are endorsed in
some cultures and rejected in others.
Based on the culturally endorsed implicit leadership dimensions and the
twenty-one factors Javidan (Javidan et al. 2010) found seven primary
leadership dimensions to be culturally contingent leadership factors.
From a cross-cultural perspective, the most interesting attributes and
dimensions, out of the 21 factors, are those that are culturally
contingent, i.e. which are endorsed or desirable in some cultures and
rejected or undesirable in other cultures (Dorfman et al. 2012).
The overall results of their analysis are listed in Table 5.6.
Javidan made elaborate statistical analysis of the GLOBE findings to
substantiate a number of hypotheses regarding the relationship
between national and organisational culture; and leadership attributes
(Javidan et al. 2010).
An overview of Javidan’s findings are listed in Appendix B and in Table
5.7 on page 46.
The analysis of Javidan (Javidan et al. 2010) show that national culture
and organisational culture greatly matter with regard to culturally
contingent leadership (Dorfman et al. 2012).

Referring to Javindan’s findings (Javidan et al. 2010) listed in Table 5.7,
it can be found that power distance values at the national or
organisational level are predictive of three culturally contingent
leadership dimensions: status conscious, bureaucratic and internally
competitive. Countries with high power distance values, such as India
(Northouse 2013), desire leaders who behave in a rule-oriented
somewhat secretive manner and who are highly aware of status
differences among themselves and their followers.

Table 5.6 GLOBE culturally contingent leadership factors
GLOBE culturally contingent leadership factors
1 Status conscious: This dimension reflects a consciousness of
one’s own and others social position; holds an eliteist belief that
some individuals deserve more privileges than others.
2 Bureaucratic/procedural: This dimension emphasizes
following established norms, rules policies, and procedures;
habitually follows regular routines.
3 Autonomous: This dimension describes tendencies to act
independently without relying on others. May also include self-
governing behaviour and a preference to work and act
separately from others.
4 Face saving: This leadership dimension reflects the tendency
to ensure followers and not embarrassed or shamed; maintains
good relationships by refraining from making negative
comments and instead uses metaphors and examples.
5 Humane: This dimension emphasizes empathy for others by
giving time, money, resources and assistance when needed;
shown concern for followers’ personal- and group welfare.
6 Self-sacrificial/risk taking: This dimension indicates an ability
to convince followers to invest their efforts in activities that do
not have a high probability of success, to forego their self-
interest, and make personal sacrifices for the goal of vision.
7 Internally competitive/conflict Inducer: This dimension
reflects the tendency to encourage competition within a group
and may include concealing information in a secretive manner.

Table 5.7 Relationship between culturally contingent leadership factors and cultural dimension
Cultural Dimension
Culturallycontingentleadershipfactors
Uncertainty
avoidance
Power
distance
Institutional
collectivism
Humane
orientation
Performance
orientation
In-group
collectivism
Assertiveness Gender
egalitarianism
Status
conscious
Contribute Contribute Inhibit
Bureaucratic Contribute Contribute Contribute
Autonomous Inhibit Inhibit
Face-saving Inhibit
Humane Contribute
Self-
sacrificial
Contribute Contribute Contribute
Internally
competitive
Contribute Inhibit

6 Country specific analysis
Having now clarified the concepts of culture using Schein’s 3-stage
model (Schein 1990), (Schein 1992), (Schein 2006), leadership using
Kotter’s 8 steps for successful change (Kotter 1995), (Kotter 1996),
(Kotter and Cohen 2002), (Cohen 2005), (Kotter 2008), (Kotter 2014),
we can now proceed with applying the findings of Javidan (Javidan et
al. 2010) and the GLOBE project (House et al. 2002) to elaborate on
the leadership style in the four different countries, Australia, India, UAE
and Germany.
6.1 The Southern Asia cluster
Southern Asia, which includes India, exhibited high score on humane
orientation and in-group collectivism. Southern Asia are characterised
as countries that demonstrate strong family loyalty and deep concern
for their families (Northouse 2013).
The Southern Asia leadership profile place importance on self-
protective, charismatic/Value-based humane oriented- and team-
oriented leadership and they find participative leadership ineffective
(Northouse 2013).
The southern Asia countries characterise effective leadership as
especially collaborative, inspirational, sensitive to people’s needs and
concerned with status and face saving. They believe that leaders who
tend to be autocrative are more effective than those who lead by
involving others into their decision making process (Northouse 2013).
In their study of the Southern Asia cluster, Gupta (Gupta et al. 2002)
find that India, as well as the South Asian cluster, are contrasted with
55 other societies in having lower levels of uncertainty avoidance, less
gender egalitarianism and lower levels of assertiveness.

In contrast to the other 55 societies, they have a higher power distance,
humane orientation, performance orientation and significantly higher
group and family collectivism.
In the South Asia cluster, transformational-charismatic and team
oriented leadership are according to Gupta (Gupta et al. 2002) the most
effective models for outstanding results in Southern Asia.
India as well as the rest of the South Asian cluster, finds self-protective
leadership much more accepted and less of an impediment than the
other 55 societies (Gupta et al. 2002).
Also humane leadership, where care and modesty are expected from
their leaders are much more prevalent in India (Gupta et al. 2002).
In contrast to the other societies, participative leadership is
considerable less in India (Gupta et al. 2002).
6.2 The Anglo cluster
The Anglo cluster, which includes Australia, exhibited high score in
performance orientation, institutional collectivism and in-group
collectivism. The countries are result driven and they encourage the
group working together over intended goals. People in these countries
are devoted and loyal to their families (Northouse 2013).
The Anglo leadership profile emphasize that leaders are especially
charismatic/value based, participative and sensitive to people. Anglo
countries want leaders to be exceedingly motivating and visionary, non-
autocratic and considerate of others. Leaders should be team-oriented,
and autonomous. The least important characteristic for Anglo countries
is self protective leadership (Northouse 2013).
They believe that it is ineffective if leaders are status conscious or
prone to face-saving (Northouse 2013).
Ashkanasy (Ashkanasy et al. 2002) found that the GLOBE results show
that the Anglo cluster, which includes Australia, is characterized by an

individualistic performance orientation. Further, although they value
gender equality, the Anglo cluster countries tend to be male dominated
in practice. Effective leadership in the Anglo cultures is affected by a
combination of charismatic inspiration and a participative style.
6.3 Middle East cluster
This cluster was made up of Qatar, Morocco, Egypt, Kuwait, and
Turkey. Although the UAE is not in this cluster, we believe the results
are also relevant for the UAE, as two neighbouring GCC countries,
Qatar and Kuwait are represented (Northouse 2013).
These countries scored high on in-group collectivism and low on future
orientation, gender egalitarianism, and uncertainty avoidance. People in
these countries tend to show great pride in their families and
organizations. They are devoted and loyal to their own people.
Furthermore, it is common for these countries to treat people of different
genders in distinctly different ways. Women often are afforded less
status than men, and fewer women are in positions of authority than
men (Northouse 2013).
In the Middle East, orderliness and consistency are not stressed, and
people do not place heavy reliance on policies and procedures. There is
a tendency to focus on current issues as opposed to attempting to
control the future (Northouse 2013).
The leadership profile for the Middle Eastern countries differs
significantly from the profiles of the other cultural clusters. Middle
Eastern countries find self-attributes such as face saving and status are
important characteristics of effective leadership. They also value being
independent and familial. However, they find charismatic/value-based,
team-oriented, and participative decision making less essential for
effective leadership (Northouse 2013).

To sum up, the Middle Eastern profile of leadership emphasizes status
and face saving, and deemphasizes charismatic/value-based and team-
oriented leadership (Northouse 2013).
6.4 The Germanic Europe cluster
The Germanic Europe cluster is included solely here for the purpose of
exemplification of the difference between the European Anglo cluster
and the Germanic Europe Cluster.
The Germanic Europe, which includes Germany, scored high in
performance orientation, assertiveness, future orientation and
uncertainty avoidance. They were low in humane orientation,
institutional collectivism and in-group collectivism. The countries value
competition and aggressiveness more and are more result oriented
than people oriented (Northouse 2013).
They enjoy planning and investing in the future and using rules and
laws to give them control over the environment. These countries are
more likely to be individualistic and less group oriented. They tend not
to emphasize broad societal groups (Northouse 2013).
The ideal leader in the Germanic Europe cluster has a style that is very
participative, while also being inspirational and independent. The ideal
leader would be a unique visionary person who is autonomous,
charismatic/value based, participative, humane oriented and team
oriented, but not status conscious or concerned with face saving. The
Germanic European countries think effective leadership is based on
participation, charisma and autonomy but not on face saving and other
self-centred attributes (Northouse 2013).
6.5 Differences among the clusters
In the following we emphasize some significant differences amongst the
clusters of the four countries, India, Australia, the UAE and Germany.

Selecting only the relevant clusters from our adaptation of Northouse
(Northouse 2013) Table 15.1, repeated in its entirety in Appendix C,
Cultural clusters classified on cultural dimensions, we get the following
short version covering India, Australia, the UAE and Germany.
Table 6.1 Cultural dimensions and high score clusters
Cultural dimension High score clusters Low-score slusters
Assertiveness
orientation
Germanic Europe
Future Orientation Germanic Europe Middle East
Gender Egalitarianism Middle East
Humane Orientation Southern Asia Germanic Europe
In-group Collectivism Southern Asia Anglo
Germanic Europe
Institutional Collectivism Germanic Europe
Performance orientation Anglo
Germanic Europe
Power Distance
Uncertainty Avoidance Germanic Europe Middle East
Source: Adapted from (Northouse 2013) Table 15.1
We see that in particular Germanic Europe scores mostly extreme
others, either high score (assertiveness orientation) future orientation.
Future ownership, performance orientation and uncertainty avoidance
or extreme low score (humane orientation, in-group collectivism and
institutional collectivism.
Anglo and Germanic Europe shares the same scores with Germanic
Europe on in-group collectivism and performance orientation
In stark contrast, Southern Asia, are opposite scores on the cultural
dimension of humane orientation and in-group collectivism.

In their study of differences in perceptions of leadership between US
and Japanese workers, and although Japan belongs to the Confucian
Asian and not to the south Asian cluster, Yancey (Yancey and
Watanabe 2009) found that Americans perceive personality
characteristics as more important for leadership, whereas Japanese
perceive skills and behaviour as more important for leadership.
In contrast to the southern Asia cluster, the Germanic European culture
sees self-protective leadership as extremely inhibiting to effective
leadership (Dickson et al. 2003).
The Germanic and Anglo clusters are particularly supportive of
participative leadership (Dickson et al. 2012), which is in stark contrast
to the lack of participative leadership in southern Asia (Gupta et al.
2002).
India is one of the most gender differentiated countries in GLOBE
(Javidan and House 2001) and it is also one of the most in-group
collective countries in GLOBE (Javidan and House 2001).
New Zealand the neighbouring country of Australia, even more than the
USA, is amongst the highest ranked countries on assertiveness and
performance orientation. It is in the middle range on all other cultural
dimensions (Javidan and House 2001).
Germany is amongst the highest ranked countries on assertiveness and
uncertainty avoidance, whereas Australia is in the middle (Javidan and
House 2001). However Germany is amongst the lowest ranked
countries on humane orientation (Javidan and House 2001)
According to a recent field study by Martin (Martin et al. 2013) the USA
place particularly strong emphasis on the consistency between
espoused values and behaviour (Value-behaviour consistency) and
being honest and possessing a clear moral compass, bound by strong
personal moral code and values; and on demonstrating consistency
between their words and deeds (word action consistency). They also

tend to view leadership as a characteristic of individuals who lead by
example.
Although Martin particularly studies the USA, we believe there is a
considerable resemblance with the rest of the Anglo cluster, as we
know from House (Northouse 2013) that these countries have similar
leadership profiles
In Germany emphasis on having a strong value system guided by
strong personal moral and values; on acting in accordance with the
system (value based consistency) word action consistency and how
these leaders treat others (sense of responsibility for an towards others;
and fair and just) captures the central beliefs about leader integrity.
Martin (Martin et al. 2013) found strong emphasis in social awareness,
social justice and responsibility towards the followers of the leader.
The Confucian Asian cluster, revealed a dominant orientation towards a
leaders treatment of others as reflected in the themes such as fair and
just, and a sense of responsibility for and towards others. Word-action
consistency was also identified as a component of leadership integrity.
Strong personal moral code and value and behaviour consistency were
absent in Martin’s survey of Hong Kong respondents (Martin et al.
2013), while honesty featured less prominently amongst Chinese
respondents.
Although Martin’s field study of Asia (Martin et al. 2013) related to the
Confucian Asia and not the southern Asia, it is still somewhat relevant
for southern Asia, as we know from House (Northouse 2013) that
Confucian Asia and Southern Asia have similar leadership profiles.
Southern Asia differs from Confucian Asia in that charisma is an
important leadership attribute (Northouse 2013).
In Figure 6.1 we have listed the 7 leadership profiles for India, Australia,
the UAE and Germany in a comparative manner.

0 1 2 3
Automonous Leadership
Charasmatic / Value Based
Humane Oriented
Team Oriented
Autonomous
Participative Leadership
Self Protective
India
Australia
UAE
Germany
Figure 6.1 Cultural Clusters comparison, India, Austraia, UAE and Germany
Source: Consolidated adaptations from (Northouse 2013), Tables 15.9, 15.10, 15.11
In particular we note the extreme differences between Australia and
India in terms of participative leadership and self protective leadership.
The graph serves to illustrate the differences in importance placed on
leadership profiles in each of the societies.

7 Strategy process and decisions in Jet Airways
This chapter presents the past strategy process in Jet Airways and
details recent strategic decisions Jet Airways.
The content of this chapter is based on answers to the questions,
intended to uncover the strategy process and recent strategic decisions
in Jet Airways, found in Appendix G, Interview guide - strategy process
at Jet Airways. It also uses the answers to the questions found in
Appendix H, Interview guide – onboard airline crew Jet Airways to
further support the recent strategic changes.
The questions were carefully crafted to correspond with the theories of
strategy processes and to uncover recent strategic changes occurring
in Jet Airways.
First we detail the strategic decision process which was found in Jet
Airways under Mr. Goyal prior to Etihad, and then we detail the recent
strategic changes which have been initiated in Jet Airways since Etihad.
7.1 Strategy process before Etihad
As stated by our respondents, prior to Etihad, strategic decisions in Jet
Airways were largely driven by Mr. and Mrs. Goel.
These strategic decisions would involve all operational aspects of the
airline, including which routes to fly, which aircraft to use and employing
a full-service profile or creating new subsidiary airlines with a low-cost
profile.
7.2 Strategy decisions after Etihad
Since Etihad has acquired a 24% stake in Jet Airways, considerable
strategic changes and strategic decisions have been initiated.
Our respondents confirmed that strategic decisions are being made in
the following areas:
Route network

Product
Services
Financial; and
Organisational
Each of these areas will briefly be covered in the following.
7.2.1 Route network
Our respondents have confirmed that the route network until now has
been focused on bringing international passengers to the two main Jet
Airways hubs, Mumbai and Delhi, in order to utilise Jet Airway’s own
domestic route network within India; and vice versa, to bring
passengers from the domestic Indian network onto the EU and the
USA. According to our respondents, point-to-point domestic traffic
accounted for approximately 40% of the traffic.
Our respondents confirmed that Jet Airways route network alignment is
being changed. The network is in the process of being aligned to Etihad
route network, and is being changed to a feeder network into Etihad’s
world wide hub Abu Dhabi (AUH). This seems to be confirmed by
recent speculations in the press (Times of India 2014).
7.2.2 Product
Our respondents confirmed that until 01 December 2014, four products
would be offered under the Jet Airways umbrella; Jet Airways, a full
service business and economy product; Jet Konnect, a full economy
product; Jet Konnect Select, a full service business class product
combined with a low cost no-service economy product; and Jet Lite, a
low cost no-service economy product.
Our respondents confirmed that from 01 December 2014, only one
product would be in existence, a full service business and economy
product, under the brand name Jet Airways. This is moreover confirmed
by a recent Jet Airways newsletters (Jet Airways 2014h) and (Jet
Airways 2014e).

Cross-cultural influences on Jet Airways' strategy following Etihad's acquisition

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