Dubai Airports’ Operational Costs Reduction Proposal

Proposal Summary

Airports can be viewed as the venues that contribute to a direct contact between various businesses all over the world (Derudder et al. 91). Whether airports are used as the tools for transporting people or products, they create the link between organizations that would have not otherwise existed, and the Dubai Airports company is one of those organizations. However, the firm has recently been experiencing significant issues as far as its operational and manpower-related cost are concerned.

Moreover, in the contemporary world, airports are powered by a set of complex operations, which must be carried out so that the services provided to the target denizen of the population could be of the highest quality. Going into details, one must mention the need for companies to meet the increasingly high service expectations from individuals and legal persons alike, the necessity to provide constraints on aeronautical charges, and the significance of maintaining quality at every level, including the local, the national, and the municipal ones.

Herein the necessity to invest in the areas of the Dubai Airports’ development such as its operations and human resources lies. Specifically, it is imperative to provide financial support or the areas such as HRM and the essential operational processes so that the costs for the areas in question could be reduced significantly and that the financial resources retrieved in the process could be used for improving the customer services.

Topic Literature Review

The significance of the strategies used for managing human resources and operations in the context of the airport environment can hardly be overrated (Federal Aviation Administration 1). Because of the need to process an increasingly large number of demands on a daily basis, an airport must function in accordance with a set of rigid regularity requirements, ICAO being the guidelines to use as the criteria. The personnel licensing and certification is especially crucial for the Dubai Airports’ operations at present because of the need to uphold the standards of efficient staff performance and the reduction of costs spent on operations maintenance (“Safety Oversight Manual” 2-3).

A closer look at the subject matter will reveal that the process of reducing manpower-related costs will require the redesign of the current HR approach. Particularly, the adoption of the tools allowing for a more efficient process of internal communications should be viewed as a necessity (Sun and Lai 54). The given strategy will permit increasing the funding for quality assurance, which aligns with the current vision of the company aimed at expansion and quality improvement: “We are driven to change the course of aviation history and to achieve our vision to be ‘the world’s leading airport company’” (Dubai Airports par. 1).

In addition, the interests of the target stakeholders will also have to be taken into account. Studies show that the costs of the Dubai Airports’ operations hinge on meeting the needs of the stakeholders such as the airline, the police, the customs service, and the immigrations (Basu 16). The promotion of the communication tools mentioned above helps coordinate the actions of the people involved, thus, making the work of the staff members from different departments organized.

When defining the strategy for assessing the quality of the Dubai Airport performance, one must give credit to the device known as the ACI Ranking system. Traditionally defined as the tool for locating the “International passenger traffic monthly ranking” (ACI Monthly Ranking par. 1), the specified system creates prerequisites for carrying out an analysis of an airport’s performance based on the number of requests processed, the passengers transported, and the comparison with the indices identified to the performances of similar firms worldwide.

According to the current ACI rankings, the Dubai Airports organization could use a significant improvement as far as its operations are concerned, as the entrepreneurship is currently ranked as the top airport company, its passenger traffic is getting increasingly high (from 6,400,70 in 2014 to 6,895,668 in 2015 (ACI Dubai Airports par. 1)). Therefore, the introduction of a sustainable strategy for managing the current HRM issues is critical to maintaining the firm’s position in the global ranking and creating premises for its successful development.

Objectives

• Carrying out financial analysis of the airport’s activities and defining the current issues in the entrepreneurial strategies for cost management;
• Evaluating the efficacy of the Dubai Airport as far as the provision of the suggested services is concerned;
• Identifying the role of manpower in the company’s success or the lack thereof;
• Locating the means of reducing the manpower-related costs by reconsidering the current HRM strategy;
• Analyzing the current operational issues in the company by comparing the vision thereof to the process of tasks execution;
• Suggesting the means of bringing the rates of operational costs down by addressing the staff’s efficacy;
• Defining the strategy for addressing the above issues by applying the ACI Ranking comparison tool (ACI Monthly Ranking par. 1) to the analysis;
• Considering the role of the HRM initiatives as the crucial tool for improving the company’s performance and promoting its sustainability in the global economy.

Project Outcomes

It is expected that the project should return the following results:

• The capabilities of the Dubai Airport are identified and incorporated in the analysis for improving its current cost management approach and the HRM strategy;
• An HRM initiative is designed so that the Dubai Airport’s operations could be enhanced;
• An assessment of the company’s cost efficacy is carried out;
• He existing loopholes in the cost management approach related to the usage of manpower and carrying out operations are identified;
• The initiatives that will presumably help introduce a sustainable use of the company’s manpower and resources in relation to improving its foundational operations are suggested;
• The new HRM strategy and the tools for reducing the operational costs are linked directly to the entrepreneurship’s current vision statement.

Reasons for Being Interested in the Project

Being a member of the Dubai Airports organization and representing its HRM department, I am concerned about the current state of affairs regarding the reasonability of the manpower strategy, and I have several suggestions that I believe will improve the firm’s performance considerably.

Questions to Be Answered

• How can manpower costs be reduced by shaping the existing HRM strategy?
• How can the operational costs be reduced by changing the HRM strategy adopted in the organization?
• In what way can the HRM approach and the manpower cost management be linked to the company’s vision?

Research Methods

To carry out a full overview of the entrepreneurship’s operations and the existing issues in the HRM department, a mixed approach is strongly suggested. The qualitative assessment will serve as the foundation for identifying the connection between the company’s vision and the current HRM and operational strategies used by the managers. The qualitative method, in its turn, will help quantify the results and define the existence of a positive correlation between the suggested strategies and the possible improvements in the airport’s performance.

Questionnaires will be used as the main tool for data collection, open-ended questions being used for retrieving qualitative data, and closed-ended ones being the means of acquiring quantitative information. A matrix analysis will be incorporated into the qualitative study setting so that the essential outcomes of the suggested cost-reducing strategies could be identified. A Pearson correlation tool will serve as the foundation for the quantitative analysis since it helps locate the connection or the absence thereof between two or more variables, i.e., the suggested strategies the company’s vision, and its costs (manpower- and operations-related ones). In other words, the quantitative part of the study will prove the significance of the methods and tools designed in the course of the qualitative research.

Primary and Secondary Data Sources

The responses to questionnaires retrieved will serve as the primary data source for the analysis. The secondary data sources will include reports on the subject matter. Particularly, it is suggested that the performance reports issued by the Dubai Airports Company should be used for the purposes of the analysis. It is recommended that the 2010–2016 time slot should be embraced when studying the reports in question.

Works Cited

ACI 2016, Dubai Airports. Web.

ACI 2016, Monthly Ranking. Web.

Basu, Gautam. “Combating Illicit Trade and Transnational Smuggling: Key Challenges for Customs and Border Control Agencies.” World Customs Journal 8.2 (2014): 15–27. Print.

Derudder, Ben, James Faulconbridge, Frank Witlox, and Jonathan V. Beaverstock. International Business Travel in the Global Economy. Burlington, VT: Ashgate Publishing, Ltd., 2012. Print.

Dubai Airports 2016, Our Vision. Web.

Federal Aviation Administration 2010, Airport energy efficiency and cost reduction. Web.

Safety Oversight Manual 2006. Web.

Sun, Kai, and Weng Chio Lai. “Integrated Passenger Service System for Ideal Process Flow in Airports.” Electrical Review 8.3 (2012): 54-59. Print.