Foran: The invisible man?

It’s hard not to feel a tinge of sympathy for Greg Foran.

In December the former Walmart executive moved back to New Zealand in preparation to starting his new role as Air New Zealand chief executive.

The Kiwi executive was taking on an airline that had been on a growth trajectory, opening new routes, ordering new planes and developing exciting new products, such as its Skynest economy sleeper bunks.

But a few weeks before Foran was due to start in early February dark clouds started building over the aviation sector and the global economy as a whole. A novel coronavirus, which we now all know as Covid-19, was spreading out of control and rapidly becoming a global health emergency.

Foran had intended to spend his first 100 days on the job reviewing the business and putting together a new strategy. Instead, he’s spent it in crisis management mode, navigating the national carrier through one of its darkest chapters and figuring out how the airline will survive Covid-19.

While Foran didn’t bring any aviation expertise to the role, he does have plenty of clout as a world-class leader. Foran was the president and chief executive of Walmart US, where he had been since 2014.

Foran was regarded as a man of the people, often working on the shop floor or going undercover as a mystery shopper at Walmart to gain a better understanding of the company and insights into staff and customer experiences.

He brought that same approach during his induction to Air New Zealand asking workers and customers how the airline could improve and flying around the country meeting staff and rolling up his sleeves serving tea and coffee and cleaning planes.

But the honeymoon was interrupted by a nasty virus. What started for Air New Zealand as a few suspended routes to Asia in early February quickly escalated into a full-blown catastrophe with the airline shedding around 4000 staff, grounding entire fleets, axing routes and working towards being an airline 30 per cent smaller than what it was pre-covid-19.

On March 30 Foran told staff the company’s annual revenue was expected to fall from about $5.8 billion to less than $500m – a 90 per cent reduction – as a result of Covid-19.

During the crisis Foran has kept a low public profile, only fronting for one press conference, in late March, on the same day it was thrown a lifeline by the Government with a $900m loan.

It was the first time the airline had held a crisis press conference since an Air New Zealand Airbus crashed into the Mediterranean in 2008, killing all seven aboard.

Stuff requested an interview with Foran, but he did not make himself available until June 5 when the airline unveiled its ‘‘survive, revive, thrive’’ plan, which could result in 2000 more ‘‘Air New Zealanders’’ joining the 4000 that have already left the company.

Rather, Air New Zealand’s chief revenue officer Cam Wallace has largely been the public face for the airline throughout the crisis, including answering questions about the airline’s decision not to provide cash refunds for customers whose flights were cancelled.

Frequent traveller Matt Richardson has been angered by Foran’s low profile during the Covid-19 crisis, and responded to Foran’s email to customers to announce the ‘‘survive, revive, thrive’’ plan.

‘‘I am a frequent Air NZ customer and was very disappointed in this email – not only do we never seem to hear from Greg Foran the invisible CEO, there is absolutely no acknowledgement in this email about the issues the company is creating for its customers with the poor management of credits, inability to contact Air NZ about anything and the insistence they won’t refund people.’’

Foran’s reaction to being called invisible was: ‘‘You’ll see me when it’s appropriate. When it isn’t, I’ve got a job to do to run the business.’’

Aviation consultant and former Aviation Industry Association chief executive Irene King said Air New Zealand’s handling of customer refunds, or lack thereof, had been Foran’s biggest blunder. ‘‘At the moment they are behaving like possums in the headlights,’’ King said. ‘‘Where is the strong comprehension and understanding of how to deal with customers issues?’’

King said she was surprised Foran had let the issue drag out for as long as it had considering he had such a strong customer service background. ‘‘Their absolutely appalling handling of this problem is going to cause some really serious problems for them. It’s doing enormous brand reputation damage.’’

Even if Air New Zealand was unable to offer refunds, it should be providing greater flexibility around how credit could be used, she said.

Foran said the airline had added more flexibility about how credits could be used, but could not afford to pay cash refunds. ‘‘It’s just not affordable to open the floodgates on that,’’ he said. ‘‘It’s painful, difficult, but it is the right thing for us to do.’’

Foran said stress was not leading to sleepless nights. ‘‘You get on with it. The situation is what it is. You don’t get to pick the conditions. No-one did, and so you have to play the conditions you are given,’’ he said. ‘‘We’re holding up well, and we’ll get through this.’’