HONG KONG WINNER - Cathay Pacific

More documents

Recommendations

Info

4 New airline role for Swire money man ‘Challenging and interesting’ time ahead for new Finance Director There’s a new face in the Executive Offi ce at Cathay City, with Martin Murray moving across from Swire Pacifi c to replace James Hughes- Hallett as Finance Director. CX World had a chat with the amiable Scot to fi nd out more about his professional background and his expectations on taking up a key role in the airline. You are a chartered accountant by profession – was that a career path cemented at an early age? The reality is that I never knew what I wanted to do! My father was an actuary and he suggested that if I was not really sure, why didn’t I do fi nance? He told me that once I was qualifi ed, “the world’s your oyster”. He was wrong; once qualifi ed you’re labelled “an accountant”! You studied accountancy at university – how did your career path develop? I joined Arthur Young after graduating from Glasgow University and became a chartered accountant, but I didn’t really enjoy auditing. I moved into training and an opportunity came up to work in the Hong Kong offi ce – I moved here in 1992. When did you switch to Swire? I joined the Swire group in January 1995 and my early postings included Treasury, Hongkong United Dockyards and the Trading and Industrial division – in both Hong Kong and the United States. By 2001 I was moved to Swire Pacifi c Off shore which thankfully was going through a period of rapid expansion – prior to that my roles had either been selling things or cost-cutting! I moved to Sydney in 2003 to be Finance Director for John Swire & Sons Pty and in 2009 was brought back to become Deputy Finance Director of Swire Pacifi c. Did you expect to be moved to CX? To be honest the Cathay job came as a big surprise – James’ decision to relocate back to the UK came out of the blue. I was ready for a move but wasn’t expecting this! I was very ex- cited when I got the news from the Chairman. I’m helped by already having some understanding of Cathay and the airline business through being in the group role at Swire Pacifi c. Investors always ask a lot of questions about the volatility of the airline business, and I had to be up to speed with the general workings of the airline business when presenting to the group insurers. Is this a challenging time to be put in charge of an airline’s fi nances, given the economic climate? Challenging and interesting at the same time! Cathay Pacifi c is a very well managed company that has a strong balance sheet, so in terms of where we sit in the industry we’re in a very healthy position. While we’re entering into what is, hopefully, a short-term cycle, and there may be challenges in terms of sourcing attractive funds and managing risk, we have policies and procedures in place to manage things diligently through a downturn while maintaining our medium- to High-level visits spread the CX message Chief Executive John Slosar and Chief Operating Offi cer Ivan Chu led a delegation to visit the Commissioner’s Offi ce of China’s Foreign Ministry in the Hong Kong SAR (MFA) on 14 November and were warmly received by Commissioner Lu Xin Hua and other senior offi cials at the MFA. During the lunch meeting, John introduced the airline’s business plans, as well as the close cooperation between Cathay Pacifi c and Air China. Also joining the delegation were Director Corporate Aff airs Quince Chong, General Manager International Aff airs Arnold Cheng and Dragonair’s Chief Executive Offi cer Patrick Yeung. Earlier in the week on 11 November, John and Ivan visited the Hong Kong and Macao Aff airs Offi ce of the State Council in Beijing and met with Vice Minister Mr Zhou Bo and Vice Director Mr Zhong Yi. During the courtesy visit, John talked about CX’s current performance and future expansion plan. John also stressed the airline’s commitment to Hong Kong, especially its investment in the new cargo terminal and the orders for new aircraft. long-term plan for growth and investment. What benefi ts will Project Horizon – the restructuring of the Finance and Purchasing functions – bring? First of all, it’s not just about FIN and APD – it will impact the whole company. It is about looking at being as effi - cient as we can from an end-to-end point of view. Project Horizon should free up a lot of our accountants to be much more forward looking and become service providers to the business rather than historic bookkeepers. What excites you about being in this new role? James set a vision for the FIN team to be the best fi nancial partners to the best airline in the world, and that in itself is quite exciting – it gives you scope to do things diff erently. And I have the advantage of working with a great team. Being part of the airline’s growth process will also be very exciting. In terms of where Cathay Pacific sits in the industry we’re in a very healthy position. MEETING OF MINDS: (Above) John with Commissioner Lu (third from right), Deputy Commissioner Li Yuan-ming (second left) and the CX delegation; and (top) John with Vice Minister Mr Zhou Bo in Beijing. ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■
Expansion in view Asia Miles targets more non-air redemptions, more active members Expanding recruitment, activating members, growing the Mainland China market and extending non-air redemption items are just some of the things Director & General Manager Asia Miles Stephen Wong will be concentrating on in 2012. “There’s a lot to focus on!” he says. “On the membership side, if you look at our passenger profi le you can see a number of CX and KA passengers who are entitled to earn miles but aren’t doing so. We need to turn those fl yers into our members,” Stephen adds. “We also want to help the outport teams to make recruitment easier at diff erent touch points and ensure we have the tools to help them do a better recruitment job.” Once members are on board, they then need to be encouraged to “earn and burn”. “As Asia Miles has diversifi ed, we are looking at increasing the options for members to earn and burn with both air and non-air items, and we’ve been working on getting that message across,” Stephen says. “Early on when we fi rst developed the programme the focus was on air rewards but, over the past few years, we have put a considerable eff ort into the non-air items and the response has been very positive. Fashion leap for charity event The CX and Swire Paci c-sponsored Life Education Activity Programme (LEAP) held a stylish event, the “88,000 Reasons to Celebrate – a Vivienne Tam Charity Fashion Show”, on 3 December to raise funds for the charity. CX cabin crew were featured in the fashion parade. For the rst time, renowned fashion designer Vivienne Tam helped raise funds for a local charity by showcasing her latest designs – the Spring/Summer 2012 “Zen Garden” collection. The event was held at the Peak residence of Chairman Chris Pratt. Chris was joined by his wife Francesca Pratt, a former LEAP Chairman, as well as current LEAP Chairman Quince Chong, to support the fundraiser. “We support LEAP because we believe its preventive drug education programmes are making a very real di erence to the future well-being of Hong Kong’s young people,” Chris said. LEAP has reached about 88,000 students in both of the past two academic years in its preventive drug education work. The fundraising e ort will continue into 2012 with a specially-designed Vivienne Tam tote bag being sold on ights during the rst quarter, with all proceeds going to LEAP. MILES TO GO: Stephen has big plans for the loyalty programme in 2012. “It’s great to see this as it also lessens the dependence on the air reward side,” he adds. Stephen says in key markets the shift to non-air redemption is now about 30%, going up to 80%. “The trend is especially clear in the long-haul markets,” he says. As part of the commitment to growing this sector, four staff have joined the non-air recruitment team, taking it to eight members. “It needs more work in terms of partnership development and you need the resources to talk to potential partners and be strategic in whom to talk to. “Ideally you want a partner that has global presence and have one deal that covers six or seven diff erent countries,” Stephen says. Brand awareness and recruitment in China is another focus, though Asia Miles faces stiff competition from the big three domestic carriers. “It’s a big country and media costs are expensive, so you have to be creative,” Stephen says. “But we have a special proposition of off ering 20 partners as well as four carriers – Cathay Pacifi c, Dragonair, Air China and China Eastern – that they can all earn miles from,” he adds. ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ Search for the face of Asia Miles An innovative online photo campaign was launched in October to nd an Asia Miles Ambassador in Mainland China. Members were asked to incorporate their own pictures into one of eight photo frames created by renowned illustrators such as Dorothy Tang and then ask their friends to vote for them. The campaign ran until 23 November and attracted 230 entries, with the top photo receiving 10,000 votes. The minisite attracted more than 800,000 visits. “China is a key market for us with a lot of growth potential,” says Director & General Manager Asia Miles Stephen Wong. “We expect that market to grow by approximately 30% in 2012,” he adds. The winner will become the face of the 2012 Asia Miles campaign and be own to Hong Kong for a photo shoot, which will be featured in some of Mainland China’s top fashion magazines. He or she will also win 80,000 Asia Miles. 5
Page 1 and 2: WIN A 747-8F MODEL! 10 die-cast Das
Page 3: Many challenges, more opportunities
Page 7 and 8: itor body, the ICAC. Following thei
Page 9 and 10: eried Hong Kong Trader as it enters
Page 11: Airline gets ready for EU emissions
Page 14 and 15: 14 Laying down foundations in Yunna
Page 16: 16 The hills are alive Customer Rel

HONG KONG WINNER - Cathay Pacific

You also want an ePaper? Increase the reach of your titles

Delete template?

Save as template?