What happened to Elena?

This is the e-mail I’ve got yesterday worth of public and relevant authorities’ attention.

Dear,

I am also former Emirates crew. I had a pleasure to fly with Elena (the girl that was fall from emirates aircraft 2 days ago) couple of times and also we were meeting usually in costa for smoking every couple of weeks. She was one of the best people i have met in dubai. We talk a lot about her life , family and work. She was a strong woman. She was not taking bullshit from anyone. She was following the rules and regulations of the company because she like it and didn’t want to apologize for anything. She wanted to be purser one day. But even though she have been in the company for 21 years she was still SFS. As she told me they were considering her as too old and they wanted younger people for this role. This woman she was in Dubai sooo long doing her job that she really loved. And thats how they treat her. They haven’t make any investigation. In one hour and a half i consider that is not enough time for this, and they took off with the crew that just witness what happened They just didn’t want to leave the customers or the crew there to talk with any one. My question is did she suicide ? Did she fall ? Or was she pushed? As customers told they heard the crew arguing. What happened? .how can she open the 777 door with one hand and push it and fall if the media mention that she had in one hand a glass bottle.
She didn’t deserve this. She was a strong independent respectful woman.
Please get to the bottom of this.
Use your connections. Do what you can.
Best regards
…

 

Scandalous data breach in EK

I’ve promised not to post new stories unless something really big or serious happens and it just did.

I’ve found out about a serious data breach in Emirates Airline. Namely, a whole list of crew, with their personal data, became available online!

I will not say where this list was uploaded, but I’ve got a confirmation that it’s legit and authentic.

Now imagine the quality of EK’s IT and data security experts when anyone with the access to the EKHQ’s computer can download and e-mail this crucial business data which supposed to be a strictly guarded secret for many reasons, especially in one airline company.

I guess that nepotism, wastas and corruption in EK are starting to leave deep and irreversible consequences for EK. Shame for Emirates Airline. I really wanted to love that place and I really wanted it to heal itself from devastating business politics as a proof that people are capable to think ahead and to take care for each other more than they care about money and power.

I am curious to read Mr. Tom Burgess’s comment on this news.

 

A person who posted the crew list on Facebook

 

Excel file with crew’s data (I’ve covered crucial data)

5 Emirates dark secrets revealed – from a perspective of a former EK cabin crew

 

The glamorous life of Emirates cabin crew: sleeping on the airport floor

This is an e-mail I’ve got a few days ago. I will let you draw the conclusion about safety, EK’s organizational culture and fatigue. I will also let you wonder where the pilot and co-pilot slept that night.

Hello,

Thank you for your blog. Emiarets is a terrible companyy to work for.

Please, do not display my email address or my name…..

This is a picture of Emirates Airline Crew sleeping on the floor. The JFK airport was closed and the company asked us to leave our hotel and go to the airport anyway and wait on the airbridge until they open the airport…..

The fact was that the airport was closed because of the heavy snow and we had to wait on the floor for several hours, more than 6hours…… We could not even use the

emirates lounge at the jfk airport. They told us to wait at the airbridge.

.

.

Redundancies in Emirates Group: Why does Dnata fire its employees?

Since I never looked forward to Emirates Group falling apart, on this occasion I will not write a long article about the fact that we all knew that management’s eternal arrogance and incapability will lead to employees massively losing their jobs and Emirates Airline slowly vanishing from the map of succesful airlines.

To be honest, Emirates had a potential. That potential has grown to greedy company’s growth and abuse of labour and human rights. There were many warning signs, including this blog, but there was nobody to listen.

Now, some announced changes may improve the alarming situation, but people will lose their jobs and the company lost its reputation so the damage is already irreparable. It could all be prevented if there were just a few people in the top management who didn’t lose their touch with reality and who respected the front line employees who, actually, do the job, instead of caring only about their bonuses and power.

I’ve got these few photos from a Dnata employee. They present e-mails which Dnata employees got recently, notifying them that DnataTravel’s revenues are down 13% and that sales have decreased 14% and that there will be redundancies. Shame.

I wish Emirates Group good luck and I wish them to get rid of all the corrupted managers who threaten their employees with prison. I also advise them to pay their employees deserved end of service money and to treat them with dignity.

 

 

Update from former Senior Vice President of Emirates Airline

History of serious mismanagement in Emirates Airline lasts for many years now. Like in every basket, one or few rotten apples spoil the whole basket of fruit.This process manifests itself as systematic disposal of honest and ethical managers and staff, who are not willing to comply to rottenness. This process went out of control since Sir Maurice Flanagan left the rudder to others.

So what happens with one company when honest people leave? It is left with network of dishonest, incapable and weak managers who abuse the company and its staff to get profit and benefits for themselves, especially when they know that they have to leave the country one day. Of course, these managers are not capable to create, conduct and successfully finish most of their projects as most of the good and skilled people left or they are kept quiet, blackmailed and threatened with warnings and service terminations.

I already wrote about Ms. Anoma Manuel’s (former Divisional Vice President Airport Services) failed project with new ABC check in and boarding system. Ms. Anoma is so rampant that she decided to forcefully implement this project although the feedback on it was very bad. But, as Ms. Anoma told me once – her seniors are friends of hers. So, she is protected. And her bonus is protected. But who will protect the company and its staff from this kind of incompetent and bully managers? Who will stop the absurd waste of money on meaningless projects, which their innovators falsely present as “successful and useful” or they just cover all the traces of projects’ failures?

Mr.Tom Burgess’s (former Senior Vice President in Emirates Airline) blog.

People criticized me for asking Ms. Anoma about her salary. I was fired for asking her about her salary. But I would ask her again. And again. And again. Because she doesn’t care about the sufferings of her staff. She would rather waste huge amounts of company’s money on unnecessary projects, just to look good in her superiors’ eyes and to ensure her bonus, than to take care of her staff.

Unfortunately, she is not the only manager who wastes company’s money just as I am not the only former employee who writes the blog about injustices and management’s incompetency in Emirates Airline.

As I wrote at the beginning of this article, EK’s rotten management apples systematically spoil or get rid of their best managers. Mr.Tom Burgess is one of these managers. I will let you read his blog and decide about his intentions, skills and motivation. Today I want to re-publish his newest article which describes the exact mechanism on how managers waste company’s money on ludicrous projects while underpaying, bullying and punishing their hard working staff at the same time. This example is on the much higher level of management as Mr.Burgess had an important and responsible role in Emirates Airline.

Mr.Burgess was employed in higher management of Emirates Airline as Senior Vice President in EG IT department with Mr.Patrick Naef as Divisional Senior Vice President. On Mr.Burgess’s blog you can read everything on poisoned and backstabbing organisational culture in Emirates IT department, where Mr.Patrick Naef uses some questionable methods to get rid of all the managers who “stand on his way” of deceiving the top management about the real condition of his department.

DSVP of EGIT department Patrick Naef

This is just the part of the article. You can read the whole article here.

No winner, many losers.

***

Seeing the many comments on the web about the way staff are treated in the Emirates group, including a focus on salaries, led me to do a rough calculation.  I believe that if the money wasted on Mercator Asia had been diverted to EKAS budgets, all ground staff could have enjoyed a 20% pay increase for every one of the four years of Mercator Asia operation.  And this is only looking at the cost of one failed initiative – try to imagine how much money has been poured into the IT drain over the last nine years!

The most odious of problems facing the Emirates group is the bullying of staff by managers, but perhaps the biggest issue is that front line staff, critical to the business, are overworked and underpaid.  But it would not be difficult to take a broom to the numerous support areas (not just EG-IT) and divert the proceeds to much better use.

***

Fundamental changes are essential, but some people are still thrashing around in the depths of the denial stage of the change curve.  At least there has been recognition that there is a major problem, but real progress will not be possible until some time is spent looking in the mirror.  It will take true leadership to get the ball of change rolling and then, when it comes, the really difficult challenges will emerge.

Mercator Asia project is mentioned very often at Mr.Burgess’s blog.

Perhaps the biggest task will be to convince staff that the company is serious about change.  To illustrate this point, what will Patrick Naef need to do to persuade you to trust him?

And will anyone know what to do?  Adopting a policy of being open and honest will be a major start.  But, in my experience, the further people rise up the corporate ladder, the greater difficulty they have with the concept of being open and honest.  The line between what staff should be told (i.e. most things) and what they shouldn’t be (i.e. commercially or personally confidential information) is well understood by the majority of staff, but creates paranoia nearer the top.

And who will actually lead this essential change project?  Assuming someone who can be trusted is found, will they have the necessary skills?  Turning a corporate culture around is not a job for a bunch of external consultants, a genuine understanding of the issues is a prerequisite.  And he/she will also need the resolve to stand up to some pretty powerful figures, who I doubt will ever be genuinely convinced that a different way will be the right way.

However, the cause is far from lost because the company is blessed with tens of thousands of loyal, competent and hard working staff.  They want success for the company as much as they want it for themselves and I am sure they will be tolerant during what will be a lengthy process.  And for every bad manager in the company, there are numerous decent and capable managers.  They just need to be given more of a voice.

But delay is counterproductive.  As time moves on more evidence of the way Emirates treats its staff will emerge on the blogs and forums, more staff will resign, more careers will be wasted and more money will be poured down the drains of Dubai.

Posted by Tom Burgess at 22:37

 

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Loss of cabin crew

Hello Dragana,

I hope you are having a good day.

I would like to share an interesting fact with you. Please keep the name and source confidential xxx. I am providing you with his name so you know the information I am sharing is credible.

xxx

He stated that in 2014 the company recruited approximately  6000 new cabin crew. By the end of 2014, the total number of cabin crew in the entire cabin crew compliment had only increased by 1800. This is a clear indication of the high turnover and loss of cabin crew from the company. And this is only the figure for cabin crew. Imagine the number of employees that leave each year as a whole. The figures are staggering and are an indication of the poor working conditions and poor management.

No wonder the organisation spends so much time and resources on massive recruitment drives. They can’t maintain their people.

Thanks again.

xxx

 

 

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Cabin crew’s job satisfaction in Emirates Airline – survey results

It has been two and a half months since Head of HR department, very much respected Mr.Abdulaziz Al Ali, sent an e-mail thanking employees for participating in the company’s survey on job satisfaction and promised to share results. This survey was conducted soon after this blog started with its first post – Open letter to His Highness the Chairman of Emirates Airline (EK). And whilst three vice-presidents of Human Resources department were thanked for the service in EK and escorted out, they never sent a goodbye email, so we don’t know the reasons why their services were terminated. There is an assumption that they were fired for the devastating survey results. Despite the promise of sharing these results, employees didn’t get to find out what is happening in their own company so far. So, due to the lack of company’s survey results, this article will offer some poll results from independent third parties, conducted among EK cabin crew.

EK Employees asking for survey results on PPRuNE.org forum

Since there is a lack of communication between managers and employees, staff has no other way to find out about happenings in their own company than to use Internet websites such as, besides this blog, Emirates Illuminati (blocked in UAE), PPRuNE.org and few more.

Just in past 5 days 80,165 people came to this blog in search for the information on working conditions in EK: Some of these websites are used as a source of information on employees’ job satisfaction by third parties. I will not reveal my sources (it is enough to say that I can defend myself in the court of law with evidence if sued for publishing this data), but I am presenting some of the results of one such survey conducted on a representative sample of EK cabin crew.

Results of this research are not surprising for those who are working or who worked in Emirates Airline. So, what is the real state of the employees’ and customers’ satisfaction in Emirates Airline?

Mr. Abdulaziz’s promise to share survey results

The most vulnerable groups of employees in Emirates Airline are ground staff in Airport Services – check in and boarding agents and cabin crew, while pilot‘s dissatisfaction is in constant growth.

The biggest problem of EK in these departments is huge staff turnover. And while managers will always say that this turnover rate is “expected” in big companies, they don’t have an answer for how to deal with it. Their only solution is to pressurize already exhausted staff to work over their physical and mental capacities and law limitations, which is especially dangerous in the Airline Industry. Another threat to the airline safety is lack of experienced staff, which is, again, another consequence of huge staff turnover.

Emirates Airline recruits thousands of very young people to ground staff and cabin crew positions every year to replace employees who massively resign. These people can not be trained fast enough to meet all the criteria for safe flying. And while they have the physical appearance and smile necessary for customer service delivery (at least in the first couple of months of a honeymoon period within the company) their life and work experience is insufficient for more serious tasks in airline safety. And when they reach the satisfactory level of this experience, they are fed up with injustice and pressure inside the company and they resign.

I am not inclined to believe that disposable staff policy is an unofficial policy in EK because nobody is that unreasonable to cut the branch they are sitting on. Or are they?

Company, also, makes huge and unfair differences between ground staff and cabin crew. Ground staff (doing the same customer service job) are discriminated on every possible level compared to cabin crew, who have much better accommodation, salaries, medical care and benefits. Knowing this it is just a devastating fact that cabin crew resign in such huge number. It means that someone is not doing their job while getting huge salary for it. How bad is that for business?

According to mentioned research, the biggest dissatisfaction of cabin crew lies (not surprisingly!) in the way their managers treat them, while they are reasonably satisfied with their benefits, accommodation and salary. But when it comes to communication, superior – staff relations and personal contact between managers and crew, survey results are disappointing and poor.

This particular research was conducted on a representative sample of cabin crew using scientifically recognized statistical methods and tests. There were difficulties during the conduct of the survey as many employees are afraid that expression of their opinion on company will lead to the punishment or termination of their service.

80,165 visitors in 5 days

These are some of the survey results:

A Cabin crew’s satisfaction with benefits and working conditions:

• 68,12% of examinees are generally satisfied with the job of cabin crew in Emirates Airline. This is a solid result in Emirates Airline’s favour, although company should not underestimate dissatisfied percentage of crew.
• Only 37,68% of examinees find working conditions on board satisfactory, while the majority – 62,32% find the them unsatisfactory or remained neutral.
• 73,92% of cabin crew are satisfied with benefits (salary, accommodation, transport…). This is also a good result. It would be interesting to compare this number to the number of people satisfied with benefits but working in ground staff. I predict immense difference.
• 69,57% of examinees are not satisfied or remained neutral in answering the question about their rostering and flight time limitations. This result proves that cabin crew are pushed to their limits and overworked.

B Crew’s satisfaction with management style, communication and working atmosphere:

• This result is alarming: 56,52% of cabin crew find that their work is not acknowledged by the company. 27,54% of examinees remained neutral.
• 66,67% of examinees are not satisfied or they remained neutral when asked about their satisfaction about the way the company communicates information to them.
• 49,27% of cabin crew doesn’t feel that their company (managers) support them. 28,99% remained neutral, which makes the total number of 78,26% of cabin crew who are not satisfied or don’t know how to feel about the support they are getting from their superiors or they don’t want to tell. Very worrying number which demands immediate attention.
• Another terrible result is acquired in answering the question whether employees feel that they can voice their opinion without the fear of being punished for it. Disastrous 71,01% answered that they feel afraid to express their opinion on work while 14,49% remained neutral.
• Another destructive result: 66,66% of cabin crew feel maltreated by the company. 23,19% remained neutral.

C Cabin crew’s engagement in achieving company’s goals:

• 81,16% are interested in the company’s affairs.
• 85,51% of cabin crew are proud to work for the company (good result) and 72,45% would help the company to reach its goal of being among the most successful companies in the world (also very good result).

What can we learn from these results?

We can learn that cabin crew are fairly satisfied with their working benefits (salary, accommodation, medical care, face cards…). They feel pretty proud of working for such a big and known company. Most of them would help and are helping Emirates Airline to achieve its goals and vision. Most of them do care about the company’s image and are interested in internal happenings. So, what is the problem then?

Maybe this commenter described it in the best way:

Although my story in general was not sad, between 2006 and 2008 I witnessed many changes within EK, mainly the beginning of the “report” system, the increased workload, the switch from a personalized to a staff number relations and many more. I witnessed the jump to the new HQ, which contributed to the massive growth of overexcited managerial staff. All of them trying to prove themselves came with ideas, some were pure demonstration people’s servility with no positive benefits. I witnessed many of the qualified staff go, because they were fed up with the all growing number of restrictions, penalties, insane rosters, and last but not least the spreading fear. Many of these people were seniors who used to protect their staff. Eventually in 2008 I handed my resignation as well.

The comment about EK’s decline

Majority of cabin crew are not satisfied with their working conditions when it comes to the way management and superiors are treating them. The percentage of dissatisfied people is alarming and it is the reason why so many crew resign, despite their relative satisfaction with working benefits. This fact just proves the catastrophic state of human resources in Emirates Airline and rotten, bossy and authoritative organisational culture imposed by incompetent managers.

Rule of fear is evident and proved in the percentage of the crew who are afraid to express their opinion (around 70%!).

Majority of the crew doesn’t feel appreciated or supported by their managers, who are not capable to deal with the growth of the company and lack of staff in any other way than to exploit and overwork their crew, while not even appreciate or respect their efforts and hard work.

Even if nobody in Emirates Airline cares about humanity, they should understand that humanity and successful business are in direct relation. In Emirates Airline’s case it turned out that having so many disgruntled former employees willing to publicly provide their opinion on their ex employer was not a good idea. And it seems that it’s better that your employees do not leave the company hurt, angry and humiliated, because they are part of your image as well.

You should care about your staff. Even if they are staying in the company for just a couple of years and leave. Even if they are just in transit. Why? Because your customers’ dissatisfaction with demotivated crew attitude is growing in recent years. Just in EK business class negative feedback about your cabin crew makes 40% of all complaints. Because demotivated crew lead to lousy customer service and that leads to customers flying with another airlines. Because demotivated staff are not ready to go that extra mile that you need desperately to beat your strong competition. And unfortunately, a small piece of chocolate given during the forced training, which is Ms.Anoma Manuel’s idea of motivating her staff, will not work.

40% of complaints is a negative feedback

If you read this blog devoided of anger towards its author, you may be able to comprehend the extent of the human resources disaster in your company and to start with damage control and introducing some sustainable policies in order for your business to survive challenging airline industry conditions.

I will not write all of my ideas on how to improve your business, as it is an expensive knowledge and I worked hard to gain it. I trust you have enough money to employ some competent people to help you resolve the issues. And to help you even more, I hope that I will soon have survey results for the Airport Services ground staff, where are I expect a real tragedy.

Bottom line and the most important question for managers is: if your employees care for you and company’s image, how is it possible that you don’t care about them?

Emirates Airline was a nice place to be not so long ago. Even I feel proud for being a part of EK at some point of my life and was careful about its image while I was working there. But managers didn’t seem to understand the importance of respecting their loyal staff and dialogue, so in the same way they usually “push” people to resign, they pushed me in making this blog by forcing me to escape the country and by not paying me my EOSB.

 

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Workplace harassment in Emirates Airline

Harassment at work is an omnipresent thing in Emirates Airline. This is due to undeveloped organisational culture and lack of education among EK managers.

Emirates Airline had a bad luck (or bad HR department?) to get some people with “slave holder” mentality on top positions. And while this kind of mentality was certainly efficient in the disturbing times when people were forced to pick the cotton for their “owners”, these times are different and humanity agreed about something called The Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Unfortunately, it is possible today that some people reach high positions of VP, SVP, DVP, etc. still not being familiar with this Declaration. People with this kind of mentality are usually weak and always afraid that they’re not capable enough to cope with their responsibilities, so they use bullying and force, misusing their positions, to scare and threaten others, so that their incapability remains invisible. This is why I will write about harassment at work in this article which has the aim to raise the awareness of a workplace harassment in EK.

Workplace harassment is:

• the offensive, belittling or threatening behavior directed at an individual worker or a group of workers^[1]
• the odious dealing through pitiless, malevolent, hurtful or embarrassing attempts to undermine an individual worker or groups of workers.^[2]

Recently, matters of workplaceharassment have gained interest among practitioners and researchers as it is becoming one of the most sensitive areas of effective workplace management. In Oriental countries, it attracted lots of attention from researchers and governments since the 1980s, because a significant source of work stress is associated with aggressive behaviors at workplace.^[3] Third world countries are far behind oriental countries in that there are limited efforts to investigate the questions on workplace harassment. It is almost unseen and the executive leaders (managers) are almost reluctant or unconscious about it in the third world countries.^[2] Under occupational health and safety laws around the world,^[4] workplace harassment and workplace bullying are identified as being core psychosocial hazards.^[5]

This is a definition from Wikipedia. I would not use the term “Oriental”, since there are some really developed oriental countries (Japan, South Korea, China) which have implemented the concept of human and labour rights a long time ago. Nevertheless, I will use this definition and my case with former DVP EKAS Anoma Manuel as an example of a workplace harassment.

First of all, Emirates Airline has a policy on work related molestation of employees. Even if Ms.Anoma doesn’t read EK manuals, HR managers should know them by heart because they are the ones who write them. But it seems like EK HR high managers don’t read their own manuals as well.

For your information, this is the Emirates Airline Manual on Harassment which you can use if you are harassed by your colleague or boss.

C6-5 Avoidance Of Harassment

Context

1. Definition

2. Policy

3. Required Action By Employee

Context
The Company’s overall policy is to act with care and consistency in dealing with individual employees at all times. This is given as one of the principles in the Employment Regulation on “Code of Conduct and Business Ethics”. Details of how this policy/principle will be applied, are given below. This policy covers the work place only. The Company cannot extend the coverage to outside the work place unless there is a very clear overlap or linkage between events and/or persons, so as to adversely affect work performance.
1. Definition
1.1	Harassment is defined as a regular and repeated pattern of behaviour between people, during interactive situations in the work/business environment, which is considered intolerable or offensive, because it is based on or includes forms of behaviour given in paragraph 1.2.
1.2	Harassment takes many forms including, but not restricted to, physical contact ranging from touching to assault, domineering and bullying behaviour, verbal and written interaction through offensive jokes and language, gossip, threats, distasteful photographs or pictures, mimicking, anonymous letters, emails, sms, telephone and mobile  calls.
1.3	Harassment does not exist merely on the basis of setting regular or repetitive performance targets, unless the method of describing these is accompanied by forms of behaviour given in paragraph 1.2.
2. Policy
2.1	The Company accepts the right of every staff member to a working environment free from harassment and will take appropriate steps to promote and maintain such an environment.
2.2	The Company will not accept that any employee should give or be subject to any form of harassment. The Company will provide protection for employees who consider that they are being harassed.
2.3	The Company is opposed to any form of harassment being practised against its employees or potential employees on the grounds of their race, creed, nationality, gender, marital status, age, colour, physical or mental disability, religious or sexual persuasion, or as given in the Definition above.
2.4	The Company will provide the means to address problems as quickly as possible, and as near as possible to the level at which the problem arises. All reports will be treated seriously and without prejudice to employees or their careers.
2.5	An employee who in good faith, reports an incident of alleged harassment of whatever form, will not suffer any penalty for doing so.
2.6	Retaliation against an employee for having complained of being involved in harassment will be deemed to be harassment itself and will be treated as a disciplinary offence.
2.7	An employee who repeats harassment action after an initial warning, will be subject to disciplinary action which could include termination.
3. Required Action By Employee
3.1	Employees should ensure that they do not harass a colleague or colleagues.
3.2	Employees should report any form of harassment as outlined under “Definition” above, provided it is supported by recorded factual details of each incident. The report should be to the appropriate Line Manager or Manager Human Resources.
3.3	Employees who observe what they consider to be unacceptable behaviour, are encouraged to report factually on behalf of the harassed colleague.

You can hear my whole story on the audio record from Termination Appeal Meeting with Ms.Michelle Carswell and Mr.Mohammad Mattar.

Long story short – the whole “molestation situation” with Ms.Anoma Manuel began when I have “replied to all recipients” in the e-mail which I got from admin, notifying me that I have to go to the training on my day off otherwise “penalty applies”.

This is the point where Ms.Anoma showed a serious lack of knowledge about labour rights and her staff’s contracts (this is nothing new, since Ms.Anoma also didn’t know that her staff has a 7 hours shift without a break. You can hear that on the audio record from the Open Forum).

Uneducated and weak personality managers are the huge sore point of Emirates Airline, because they make this gigantic company look like a concentration camp. At the same time, there are many, many check in agents, for example, who are much more educated and better mannered than former DVP EKAS and many EKAS managers. This situation was the core of the catastrophe which happened in EKAS. That department is ruined, so now a new DVP Walter Riggans has to repair the damage. He started with cancelling the new “ABC” check in and boarding system which was implemented forcefully while Ms.Anoma was there.

So, Ms. Anoma called me for a meeting several times “to talk about my e-mail” and several times she cancelled the meeting. I don’t know if Ms. Anoma is aware, but this is a pure psychological harassment (intimidation) – employee has to prepare for the meeting with nobody else but the very DVP, and DVP is prolonging the stressful situation by delaying the meeting. By doing this, Ms.Anoma showed very severe disrespect for her staff. Third time when Ms.Anoma scheduled the meeting, I called sick due to heavy headache and nausea. At the same time I was constantly “warned” by my supervisors and duty officers that I am “monitored” by the management.

I went to the forced training, under the stress, and I didn’t agree with the trainer that we “have two options in the company – to find the happiness inside or to resign”. I disagreed in a very civilized manner, but majority of trainers and managers in EK are not aware of the concept of “civilized discussion” and the fact that “if you are not with me, you are against me” is not true. (Local) trainer complained on me, and Ms.Anoma was happy to give me the warning, although all the witnesses from the training confirmed that there was no arguing at the class and that we were just discussing Richard Branson’s thesis about the importance of staff’s happiness.

ASM (airport services manager) who gave me the warning told me that it is “from Ms.Anoma” and that she told me that this time “I have to schedule a meeting with her” if I want to talk about my warning. This was already even beyond bullying, as it was, by my opinion, a pure revenge because I didn’t come to a third scheduled meeting with her.

Anoma Manuel, former DVP EKAS

I left it as it was. I didn’t go to Ms.Anoma and I kept quiet, continuing to do my job. But, I was already under the huge pressure, shaken by meetings, interrogations and stress.

I have got my final warning for a (local – this is important thing to say, because staff is often given a warning when a passenger with a western or local passport complains on staff) passenger. Passenger went against my instructions aggressively, I told the staff that passenger is not checked in and not to check her in, because I have instructed her where to go, and the passenger made a whole drama which nobody, from a supervisor, via duty officer, ASM and MAS (manager airport services) COULDN’T RESOLVE. This speaks a lot about management capability. Hysterical passenger got an upgrade, and I got a final warning, although I was just doing my job (guiding the passengers to the right counters), I didn’t offend or yell at the passenger. Many passengers know that if they make a fuss, they will get everything they want, so passengers use that strategy a lot. Management, on the other hand, doesn’t want to take the responsibility and stop this practice. Instead, they are wasting company’s money and punishing staff.

Ms.Anoma was happy to arrange this warning as well.

Only after all of this torture I came to the Open Forum and asked Ms.Anoma about her salary. After all the “inappropriate behaviour” that she consciously did, mine was almost benign, provoked by serious bullying that Ms. Anoma and EKAS management conducted over me.

This is a pure example of a ruthless workplace mobbing and I hope that it will serve to all managers and staff to get familiar with this concept as it is very harmful for such an ambitious company as EK is.

Paradoxically, the final move on this whole story was made by HR management which didn’t make a tiniest effort to respond to the complaint of mine, let alone to take some actions. They fired me instead. And wanted to put me in prison.

If you ever decide to file a complaint on harassment (I hope that after all that happened with my complaint, HR managers will not dare to fire harassed complainants again), this is how it should look like (remember to read the Manual first and to mention all the parts of the Manual which were violated in your case, describing the way they were violated and all the events). I also hope that outstations’ staff will not be endangered by Ms.Anoma Manuel’s and her bosses’ bullying behaviour, as much as hub staff was.

If Emirates Airline is serious in becoming the biggest and the best airliner in the world, they will have to stop the practices where their own management (including HR managers!) violates company’s manuals.

This complaint was sent to (former?) SVP HR Sophia Panayiotou, SVP HR Masooma Hassan and EVP/COO Adel Ahmad Al Redha.

Nobody replied.

Dear Ms Sophia, Ms Massooma and Mr Redha,

My name is Dragana and I work as a check-in agent. I was regruted abroad and my profession is graduated HR Manager with a master degree.

Forgive me for not being specific in chapters of the Employee Regulations Manual below in the text since I only have a copy of couple of relevant pages with me in the moment of writing this e-mail.

I would like to file an official complaint of harassment over me done by EKAS DVP Anoma Manuel in accordance with:

No 1 Employee Regulations Manual – Disciplinary – 2. General Guidelines – 2.3.2. Gross Misconduct – Discrimination or harassment of employees or member of the public

I would like to report serious violation of Employee Regulations Manual done by DVP Anoma Manuel in accordance with:

No 2  Employee Regulations Manual – Chapter missing – 1. Personal Conduct – 1.2. Employees are prohibited from using their position and authority to further their personal interest.

No 3  Employee Regulations Manual – Disciplinary – 3. Disciplinary hearings – 3.2.2 For formal hearings  the employee will be given written notice as is reasonable given the nature of the misconduct and the preparation time required. This, however, will not be less than 24 hours so the employee can prepare for the hearing. The notice will contain details of the alleged misconduct.

No 4  Employee Regulations Manual – Disciplinary – 4. Disciplinary Action Sequence – 4.2 Written warning

No 5  Employee Regulations Manual – Disciplinary – 4. Disciplinary Action Sequence – 4.3 Final written warning

No 6  Employee Regulations Manual – Disciplinary – Section C6-3 (C) – 1. Appeals – 1.2. The employee will be given five working days (from the date the decision is conveyed) to appeal against the decision in writing to the Appeal Authority. If a written appeal is not received within this period, the action taken will be deemed final and binding.

No 7  Employee Regulations Manual – Disciplinary – Section C6-3 (C) – 1. Appeals – 1.6. The Appeal Authority will generally give a decision within 5 working days after the hearing.

And I would like to seek your immediate protection from torture that I am exposed to at my working place in accordance with:

No 8 Employee Regulations Manual – Chapter missing – 12. Respect for the individual – The company will act with care and consistency in dealing with individual employees at all times.

I have already asked an appointment with a Group psychologist, since I am feeling depressed and very stressed out.

I will try to explain what happened, although this unbearable situation is lasting for almost half of a year now, with culmination in the last few days.

As you may or may not know, in answer of every day complaints and resignations of staff at EKAS department, DVP Ms Anoma Manuel organized Open Forums for all staff to give them “opportunity to be heard”. I was attending the last forum in series, which was conducted on 21St of July. During the forum I asked Ms Anoma several questions. My feeling was that I was ignored, bullied and silenced during the whole timings of the forum.

After the forum I was called for the Disciplinary Meeting. I was notified that the reason is “Inappropriate behaviour”, without any other given details. I have assumed that I am called regarding my participation on the Open forum. Now, I have an audio record of everything that was happening at the forum, so everyone can conclude and decide who was behaving unprofessional and inappropriate during the forum, that is a separate issue. But this is the moment when I want to report that the Disciplinary procedure from the Employee Regulations Manual (No 3 in above text) was violated. I should receive any written notice about Disciplinary Hearing 24 hours in advance. I have received a text message by Shaher Banu on my phone at 3:02 pm inviting me for the Hearing on the next day at 12:00 am. Since I had duty yesterday from 5pm, I saw the message only when I came to the airport at 4:50 pm.

When i reached the airport I have opened my e-mail and I saw an invitation for a Disciplinary Hearing from Shaher Banu (with Mr Rami El Samra and HRM Amanda Maxwell in cc). I have replied to that e-mail, explaining that it is impossible for me to come at 12am next day, since I am working until 3am, that I need my sleep and I need time to find available witness. Mr Rami El Samra answered my e-mail, notifying me that I will be released from my duty at midnight. I answered to that e-mail that it is still impossible for me to prepare psychologically and to find my witness. Mr Rami did not send any reply after that.

Around 9pm I have got the call from RTC notifying me to go to MAS office. When I went there, MAS notified me that Ms Anoma sent him an e-mail in the early afternoon about my early release. I have told to MAS that I have already notified Mr Rami about my difficulties to attend the Disciplinary meeting. MAS sent e-mail to Ms Anoma and I stayed at my duty until 3pm.

Now, this is a very painful and stressful situation for me. I was not given a legal notice for preparation and I was feeling forced to come to the meeting (after my tiring night shift), although I did not have time to find my witness (given the fact that most of my friends and colleagues are afraid to be witnesses because of the constant latent threat that they will lose their jobs if they support me).

I am also feeling prosecuted and punished for saying my opinion on the Open Forum that had an aim to enable staff to tell their opinions and ask questions. This is outrageous for me, I am not used to this severe violation of my right to express my opinion in a polite way. I am shocked by this Disciplinary Meeting invitation since I did absolutely nothing wrong and I have a proof for that. I consider this for a ruthless harassment at my working place.

Reading Employee Regulations Manual, I found out that I haven’t done any of Misconduct or Gross Misconduct acts.

I am constantly punished and called for meetings and hearings for the last couple of months. It is happening since I have expressed to Ms Anoma my desire to be treated as a human being and not a slave.

1. Ms Anoma is forcing me to come to work on my days off.
2. Ms Anoma is giving me shifts of 12 hours with one hour break (which gives me the chance to eat only once in 14 hours, including transport).
3. Ms Anoma is giving me the whole shift of 7 hours without any break.
4. Ms Anoma is making me attend trainings on my day offs, and then, if I do not show up, she is taking 500 dirhams from my salary to punish me.
5. Ms Anoma is giving me only 5 hours to sleep, depriving me from my sleep.
6. Ms Anoma imposed rule of fear at the airport where everyone are afraid of warnings and terminations.
7. A few days ago my e-mail account was restricted for communication with all grade 4 and 5 staff. I am not sure who did this, but it is a very serious attempt to isolate me from my friends and colleagues.
8. I have a lot more issues with Ms Anoma, but the most important one, which violated Employee Regulations Manual is when she violated Written Warning procedure.

Recently, I had an issue with a passenger who would not listen to my instructions, behaving aggressive and dangerous. In accordance with company safety rules, I have instructed the staff not to check in the passenger and, since the passenger was shouting on me, I expressed my intention to call a police to protect myself. After this issue I was called for hearing, because passenger complained on my conduct. Several procedures were violated during this process:

1. My hearing was held IN FRONT of the passenger, so I did not have a proper chance to defend myself.

2. My solo hearing was not held on the same day when incident happened, but only several days later, in the presence of HR manager.

3. I have got a written warning for this incident (explanation was that “I have no right to refuse anyone’s check in since I am not security and that I have no right to call the police.” When I have expressed my feeling that I was psychologically attacked by the passenger, I got the answer from my ASM that “there is no such thing as a psychological harassment in this company”).

4. I had a witness to this incident whom nobody called to tell her perception of the incident.

5. I have got the copy and a notification about this Written warning on 20th June (Friday), but the Warning was dated 18 June. Since I had 5 days to appeal, I was left with only ONE day to send my appeal and I have a proof for that since MAS agreed to sign my actual date of getting the warning.

6. I had Appeal Hearing Meeting regarding this warning, where I have presented new evidences that procedure was not respected accordingly, in front of DVP Anoma Manuel and HR Manager Amanda Maxwell. It was around one month ago. I haven’t got any reply on my appeal, although the legal dead line is 5 days, as written in Employee Regulations Manual (No 7 in above text).

Since I have not got the answer to my appeal, this warning should be erased from my HR direct, but it is still there.

Ms Anoma Manuel is misusing her, almost unlimited, power to haunt me, bully me and scare me.

I am just a grade 4 staff and my hands are completely tightened. It is hard for me to my voice to even be heard, because my position is so much lower than Ms Anoma’s. I am tired and depressed of fighting for my voice to be heard. I am exhausted, and before I seek protection from my embassy or from some court of law (local or international), I have decided to ask you to stand in my protection, because I have no one other. I have left my whole life in my country, my parents, my friends and my job in order to come and work for Emirates. I have explained in this e-mail which parts of Employee Regulations Manual Ms Anoma has brutally violated and I have concrete proofs for all of them.

Please, help me. 

Sincerely yours,

Dragana

Culture of punishment in Emirates Airline

Last couple of days there were some talks about big changes in HR department in Emirates Airline. Some of them say that couple of senior vice presidents’ contracts were terminated. While it is certain that these changes happened, we deal only with facts and evidence on this blog, so I will not publish any names as I have no firm evidence about fired managers’ names. .

Talk about SVP and VP HR being terminated.

But this information did make me think about something that is very present throughout the whole company: very developed culture of punishments.

What is an organizational culture?

I will give you one simple definition from Wikipedia:

Organizational culture is the behaviour of humans within an organization and the meaning that people attach to those behaviours. Culture includes the organization’s vision, values, norms, systems, symbols, language, assumptions, beliefs, and habits. It is also the pattern of such collective behaviours and assumptions that are taught to new organizational members as a way of perceiving, and even thinking and feeling. Organizational culture affects the way people and groups interact with each other, with clients, and with stakeholders.

I am not sure if Emirates Airline had ever established organizational culture in terms of policies and civilized behaviour between employees. If they ever had it, it means that it was ruined for the last ten or so years, because a corporate culture which is devastated to the point that it is non-existent had to suffer from a lot of violations of policies and laws.

How does a corporate culture in Emirates Airline look like? 

1. There is all present sense of desperation and disappointment between overworked and underpaid employees, who are told, at a regular basis, that they “can resign if they are not satisfied, because thousands of people are waiting in line to take their place“. Even if you’re not an expert in the human resource field, you can predict devastating effects of this kind of disposable staff policy in the future (that future is now, unfortunately for EK).

2. EK is employing highly educated people from all over the world. Those people are used on mutual respect and ethical behaviour at work. Yes, every company has ethical and employees’ relationships issues, but when these issues become a prevalent problem which heavily affects customer service, profit and company’s reputation in public, company is already in deep crisis.

3. Warnings are given without discussion and almost at a spot. And if you are given a chance to explain yourself, it is only a formality. Managers consider punishments as desirable acts, because they are the “evidence” that they are “keeping things under control”. This is an out-dated way of thinking. Contemporary people know about their rights, especially educated ones.

4. Very high staff turnover is a huge problem in EK. I can’t imagine how did experienced and educated HR management ever think that it is profitable not to retain staff but to always recruit and train new staff in huge numbers. It’s an irrational waste of money! Is it better to waste money on hiring new staff (which is not as skilled and good as already experienced staff) or to just use that money to make your employees happy?

Seems that starry success of EK made those managers think that EK is a powerful entity beyond its people, that people are just replaceable servants of the company. How is it ever possible that a smart human being thinks that any company can exist without (good) people? Or did those managers start to feel so safe behind their office desks during the years spent there that they think they became the company itself?

5. Medical issues in EK are the painful point for many employees. After many years of working with EK and being loyal to the company, many people are fired and managers avoid to pay them their insurances for medical treatment. EK doesn’t provide any retirement plan, so when people get sick from hard working and badly planned tiring shifts, they go home sick and without money for hospitals and doctors. It’s a real tragedy for many loyal EK employees.

6. Constant fear from punishments (even managers have warnings in EK) causes managers to shift responsibility from their hands to lowest grades which, then, makes huge pressure on the lowest grade staff.

When I had a problem with an aggressive passenger (very common problem in EK) my supervisor, duty officer, airport services manager (ASM) and manager airport services (MAS) couldn’t deal with the problem on any other way than to interrogate me in front of the passenger (!), with all of them present in the room! I was the only one who got punished (passenger got an upgrade, so if you want to be upgraded in EK, just make a huge fuss during check in) and when I asked my manager why, he told me that he has a final warning as well! No wonder he didn’t want to take responsibility for this issue!

At one of the internal group discussions at grade 5 interview (which is almost the same as grade 4; grade 4 staff often does the work of grade 5 without being paid for it) Mr. Josuha Waltz, controller at the airport, asked what should be a “punishment” for those employees who don’t come back to work from their discounted staff tickets travels on time. I politely reminded him that not everything has to be “in terms of punishment” and that we can talk about consequences (taking a responsibility) as well. I don’t blame Mr. Joshua, this is a widespread culture in EK, he has just adopted it. But this is why EK managers need additional education.

7. Due to fear of being fired if they express their opinion, people live in silent desperation, being rude and indifferent towards passengers and backstabbing each other. There is an unwritten rule in EK: if you report your colleague, you are automatically right and managers believe whatever you say and you will even be promoted; your colleague, on the other hand, will be interrogated in a strict police interrogation way, and he or she will be punished because they’re automatically guilty if somebody (a colleague or a passenger) complains on them.

8. Autocratic way of seniors’ behaviour. There is a widespread culture of mutual disrespect and seniors have a “chain of command” military mentality. You are forbidden to question your senior in any way and if someone dares to ask a question or refuses to do what senior says (even if it is unethical or it violates labour rights) they will be punished and harassed.

There were several occasions when I have refused to do two tasks at the same time (denied boarding – very stressful task, and a regular check in). My managers called me for the unpleasant meeting first time and punished me by sending me to work in the busiest check in area second time. They never asked me if I am capable and fresh enough to deal with a stress of denied boarding counters and a check in of loads of regular passengers at the same time.

9. There is a lot more to describe in these patterns of behaviours inside EK, but these are the highlights.

I have no intention to criticize laws of UAE. I have already explained that I have a huge respect for its people, I find them good-hearted and generous. But, as I have written before Emirates Airline is NOT a subject of a Federal Labour Law in Dubai. This alone is a ground for all sorts of unethical and ruthless behaviour of those on a higher managerial positions, because there is almost absolutely no one or nothing to regulate their behaviour or to stop them from violating ethical, moral, human and labour rights.

This is a terrible ground for doing a modern business.

Second reason of a corporate culture devastation is the fact that UAE and Dubai are ruled uncompromisingly by a royal family and a man who can’t be judged or questioned. With all due respect to every each member of a royal family I dare to say that it is very wrong to silence every benevolent criticism inside the company. Strong people and strong companies are not afraid of criticism. They use them to perceive their own weak spots and to be bigger and better. But if you treat every opposite voice as “disobedient” and you silence it with punishment, after couple of years you will get a network of poltroons and scared managers without bravery and boldness to lead your company forward, towards your goal of being the best. As the matter of fact, this network of like-minded managers will likely be a death sentence for your company.

I really hope that those changes in HR department from the beginning of this article represent an intention of the presidency to make real changes instead of a simple punishment for managers who didn’t do their job well.