Human Resource Management of Sia
Introduction
Most of the people around the world would be familiar with the sarong kebaya uniform worn by the Singapore Air stewardess of the Singapore International Airlines (SIA). It gave birth to the image of the ‘Singapore Girl’. Tracing back to its roots, SIA was previously known as the Malayan Airways Limited which was incorporated on 1st May’ 1947. It was operating in the then Singapore Kallang Airport with flights to Kuala Lumpur, Ipoh, Penang and over the next few years, it went to places in Indonesia, Vietnam and Myanmar. On 16th September 1963, the airline changed its name to Malaysia Airways Limited with the Federation of Malaysia incorporated. 1st October 1972 sees Malaysia Airways Limited splitting to the current Singapore International Airlines (SIA) and Malaysian Airlines System (MAS). After the split, SIA ownership was transferred to the Singapore Government under its investment arm Temasek Holdings. Even though SIA was a government owned company, it had to pay taxes and make itself profitable. As SIA did not have any domestic routes to rely on unlike MAS, it had to strategize its business and had to come out with a branding that will make itself visible in the airlines industry. SIA’s fleet of aircrafts in the beginning had only a handful of old Boeing 707s and 737s, so it had to acquire more fuel efficient aircrafts. SIA added Boeing 727s and 747s to its fleet of aircrafts and started long haul flights to London, San Francisco and a few other Indian Subcontinent and Asian countries which are mostly long haul flights. In 1976, SIA formed its subsidiary SilkAir which serves the short haul flight to mostly Southeast Asian countries (Singapore Airlines, 2013). SIA till date has also other airline investments in Tiger Airways (49%), Virgin Australia (10%) and the most recent Scoot which was formed as a budget airline by SIA to break into the budget airline industry.
SIA focuses on two main important assets in their business. One of the emphases
Most of the people around the world would be familiar with the sarong kebaya uniform worn by the Singapore Air stewardess of the Singapore International Airlines (SIA). It gave birth to the image of the ‘Singapore Girl’. Tracing back to its roots, SIA was previously known as the Malayan Airways Limited which was incorporated on 1st May’ 1947. It was operating in the then Singapore Kallang Airport with flights to Kuala Lumpur, Ipoh, Penang and over the next few years, it went to places in Indonesia, Vietnam and Myanmar. On 16th September 1963, the airline changed its name to Malaysia Airways Limited with the Federation of Malaysia incorporated. 1st October 1972 sees Malaysia Airways Limited splitting to the current Singapore International Airlines (SIA) and Malaysian Airlines System (MAS). After the split, SIA ownership was transferred to the Singapore Government under its investment arm Temasek Holdings. Even though SIA was a government owned company, it had to pay taxes and make itself profitable. As SIA did not have any domestic routes to rely on unlike MAS, it had to strategize its business and had to come out with a branding that will make itself visible in the airlines industry. SIA’s fleet of aircrafts in the beginning had only a handful of old Boeing 707s and 737s, so it had to acquire more fuel efficient aircrafts. SIA added Boeing 727s and 747s to its fleet of aircrafts and started long haul flights to London, San Francisco and a few other Indian Subcontinent and Asian countries which are mostly long haul flights. In 1976, SIA formed its subsidiary SilkAir which serves the short haul flight to mostly Southeast Asian countries (Singapore Airlines, 2013). SIA till date has also other airline investments in Tiger Airways (49%), Virgin Australia (10%) and the most recent Scoot which was formed as a budget airline by SIA to break into the budget airline industry.
SIA focuses on two main important assets in their business. One of the emphases
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