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Herb Kelleher Quotes

Article Overview: Herb Kelleher Quotes

Herb Kelleher Quotes

She treated me as an adult, and her interests were wide ranging. We would stay up till three, four, five in the morning, talking about business, politics, ethics. She was a splendid person, and she gave me a wonderful foundation.

There was this very dignified gentleman in our neighborhood, the president of a local savings and loan, who used to stroll along in a very regal way up until he was indicted and convicted of embezzlement. My mother said that positions and titles signify absolutely nothing. They're just adornments; they don't represent the substance of anybody.

Just the other day, when they gave me the B boarding pass, I said, ‘You know what, I’m going to call my mother and tell her I finally got a B.’

I had a little apartment on Washington Square, and you could just open your door and entertaining people would walk in and you’d have an instant party.

We have the best customer satisfaction record, based on Transportation Dept. statistics, of any airline in America, the fewest complaints filed per 100,000 passengers carried. So you’re not just getting low fares, you’re also getting wonderful customer service.

When deregulation took place, our fabulous Austin advertising agency, GSD&M…said to me: ‘Herb, now we have deregulation. Anybody can fly anyplace they want to. They can charge anything the want to. What’s special about Southwest Airlines?’ Our people…anybody can buy the tangibles, but nobody can replicate the intangibles very easily. And I'm talking about the joie de vivre - the spirit of our people.

If you’re wrong, you slit your own throat.

We’ve gotten one complaint in five years that said Southwest Airlines employees aren’t that way.

A guy calls our Dallas reservation center from St. Louis, and he tells the reservation agent that TWA has canceled its flight out of DFW to St. Louis on which his 85-year-old mother was supposed to fly, and that he's very concerned about her coming over to Love Field after having to make an intermediate connection in Tulsa. So the reservation agent says: I'm going to be off in five minutes. I'll pick her up at DFW, drive her to Love Field, and fly with her to St. Louis to make sure that she gets there ok.

We have a People Dept. That’s what it deals with, so don’t call it Human Resources – that sounds like something from a Stalin five-year plan. You know, how much coal you can mine. We say everybody is a leader, no matter what your job is. We want you to focus on customer service - and not just to the outside world - customer service to the inside world. If [employees] pollute our other people internally and they in turn savage the people who are doing the work outside, the whole company has just rotted.

I always felt that our people came first. Some of the business schools regarded that as a conundrum. They would say: Which comes first, your people, your customers, or your shareholders? And I would say, it's not a conundrum. Your people come first, and if you treat them right, they'll treat the customers right, and the customers will come back, and that'll make the shareholders happy.

We’ve always tried to be sensitive to the needs of our people and recognize the things that are important to them in their personal lives.

At Southwest Airlines, you can’t have a baby without being recognized – getting communication from the general office. You can't have a death in your family without hearing from us. If you're out with a serious illness, we're in touch with you once every two weeks to see how you're doing. We have people who have been retired for 10 years, and we keep in touch with them. We want them to know that we value them as individuals, not just as workers. So that's part of the esprit de corps.

Western Airlines asked to borrow a stapler in Los Angeles, and our customer-service agent went over with the stapler to their counter, and the Western ticket agent said: Why are you [waiting]? He said: Because I want the stapler back. That affects our profit sharing.

We feel that everybody, no matter where they work or what they do, should have an ownership position in the company. And we have seven, I think - or maybe eight - collective-bargaining agreements with our unions.

First of all, if you come here, you'll be happy. And No. 2, if you come here, you'll be the most highly compensated employee in the airline industry. Not compensated the way other airlines compensate people, but when you put it all together, why do you care?

We have a good many MBAs, but we look at them for attitude as well. We will hire someone with less experience, less education, and less expertise, than someone who has more of those things and has a rotten attitude. Because we can train people. We can teach people how to lead. We can teach people how to provide customer service. But we can’t change their DNA.

Humble MBAs – people who think they’re just starting out on their career and have a lot to learn.

Once they’ve done all that, then they’re ready to start doing planning and all those other things.

The core of our success. That’s the most difficult thing for a competitor to imitate. They can buy all the physical things. The things you can’t buy are dedication, devotion, loyalty – the feeling that you are participating in a crusade.

[I] learned it by doing it, and I was scared to death.

I stayed up all night familiarizing myself with its problems. PATCO (the air-traffic controllers’ union) had just pulled 13,000 controllers out of the towers. We had six new airplanes coming. One of the analysts with Oppenheimer downgraded the stock when I moved in because he said I was a lawyer – and lawyers couldn’t run anything.

I told him: [A top executive] from U.S. Airways is going to be peeved with you. And he said: How come? I said: He’s a lawyer. He said: I never knew that. So we chatted for a spell, and then he wrote another piece and said he thought Southwest was going to be ok – despite the fact that it was headed by a lawyer.

I was always motivated. Even the things I wasn’t supposed to do, I undertook with great energy, dedication, and perseverance.

Everybody in Texas would tell me that they thought I was nuts trying to start Southwest Airlines. There probably weren't 10 people in the state who would have given a plug nickel for our chances of making a dollar. So sometimes, you need a little courage, too, just to buck popular opinion.

I think it was easier to be an entrepreneur in the '30s than it was in the '60s and '70s, and I think it was easier in the 1890s than it was in the '30s. As society becomes more regulated, it becomes more difficult to launch entrepreneurial ventures. It’s harder today – but not impossible.

You must be very patient, very persistent. The world isn't going to shower gold coins on you just because you have a good idea. You're going to have to work like crazy to bring that idea to the attention of people. They're not going to buy it unless they know about it.

You're going to have to have probably five times as much capital as you thought you would. Because if you're an entrepreneur, you're optimistic by nature. So you think, in six months, we're going to be sailing. But that optimism causes you to raise a lot less capital than you need in most cases, and it's very lonely.

Nobody believed that it would work, and the other carriers thought that we were just an annoyance, not something permanent.

It turned into a marathon because the incumbent carriers – Braniff, Trans-Texas, and Continental, didn’t want any competition. I was involved in 31 separate administrative and/or judicial proceedings with those carriers over four or five years. I made three trips to the U.S. Supreme Court, and a judge at the District of Columbia Circuit Court of Appeals said: I have sat on this bench for 30 years, and this is the worst case of business harassment I've ever seen.

We ran out of money in 1969, and the board of directors said: Let’s just shut this down. And I said: I’ll pay all the costs out of my own pocket and work for nothing to see if we can get this thing going. And fortunately, it did go.

Every time I’d go up there, they’d give me a lecture, and they’d say: Well, Herb, now that we’re deregulated, you’ve got to be just like the other airlines. And I said: No I don’t think so. And after about maybe nine or ten years, [an analyst] with Credit Suisse First Boston got up at an investor seminar and said, ‘For 10 years we've been telling Herb Kelleher how to run Southwest Airlines, and for 10 years he's been telling us to bug off. Since they're the most profitable airline in America, how about if we all bug off?’

If they want to fight a war, we’re ready to go to two years or five years or ten years, whatever it takes – in order to be successful.

I took an aptitude test in college, and it said there were three things I’d be fairly decent at, being a journalist, an editor, or a lawyer.

Down in San Antonio, when one of our customers was railing at one of our customers services agents and said: Don’t you know I’m a shareholder of Southwest Airlines? And the customer-service agent looked at her and said: Lady, we all are.

Here's the kind of letter that we got: Herb, I went through El Paso the other day, and I was sold a ticket by a customer-service agent who just isn't like Southwest Airlines. There is something wrong with this agent. You see the distinction? Not that Southwest Airlines is a bad apple, but this person is a bad apple, and I don't understand how you can allow that person to continue to work for you.

One of the managers in our People Department once said, ‘The important thing is to take the bricklayer and make him understand that he’s building a home, not just laying bricks.’ So we take the building a home approach: This is what you’re doing not only for yourself but for society: giving people who’d otherwise not be able to travel the opportunity to do so.

For me, the cancer was never an issue. It was just something I had to get through, and I tried to keep my sense of humour about it.

When I start to have more time, I have thought that I might write a few things. I might write about Southwest: It would be a fascinating story; I wouldn't change a thing.

Related Articles
  Lesson #5: You Have to Fight to Keep on Flying
  Flying High: How Kelleher Took Southwest to the Top
  Lesson #3: Personality is Power
  The King of the Skies: Herb Kelleher Gets His Start
  Lesson #2: Customer Satisfaction is Your Secret Weapon

Article Tags: adult, advertising agency, airline, apartment, boarding pass, business politics, customer satisfaction record, customer service, dept statistics, deregulation, embezzlement, ethics, gentleman, herb kelleher, low fares, neighborhood, savings and loan, transportation dept, washington square



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Facebook application - Hi Kevin - thanks for the suggestion! The two that we were thinking of were Famous Entrepreneur Quotes and Which famous entrepreneur am I most like? I like your idea as well. We've got a rollout schedule of new features for the site that we are working on first before we can get to the Facebook app. We're also not sure how hard it is to integrate into Facebook. It looks like there is a php way to do it which is great because that is our core competency.
Facebook applications - ....[quote:36s714h1]The two that we were thinking of were Famous Entrepreneur Quotes and Which famous entrepreneur am I most like? [/quote:36s714h1] So far my own foray into Facebook has been a complete bust, though I expected that from the start. But if I do an Application for my own particular field of interest, such as Your Favorite Sci Fi movie...that might get people going. So Evan when you figure out how to do this please let me know how complicated it is!!
Re: Herbert Elwood Gilliland III: I Invented YouTube - Hi Herb, Thanks for sharing with us! While continuing to be impartial, I think it's wrong but definitely understandable why many onlookers will simply write these claims up as "baseless" and "delusional" without doing their due diligence. 1. I think the Web 2.0 space is a great platform to voice any concerns [u:1j6c9q4p]where the public feels like they're involved[/u:1j6c9q4p]. Many causes and charities, for example, have been able to connect with the public on a much deeper level than simply being informative. I mean it is a story, but why should others care? 2. I can't imagine much can be done without some solid legal and technical facts. Discovery! 3. Get as many facts as possible. Probably use some kind of unconventional tactics to leverage the public's awareness on this matter. [u:1j6c9q4p]Tech blogs, Facebook, Web 2.0 blogs, authority sites on social media, technology law blogs etc. [/u:1j6c9q4p] Good luck Herbert!
Top 50 Entrepreneurs Ever! - And the Top 50 Entrepreneurs of all time are… (In no particular order) Hugh Hefner – Obvious. Oprah – Born to a single mother in rural Mississippi, did what she loved and never let up. Popularized and revolutionized the tabloid talk show genre. Simon Cowell – Guy made millions off Karaoke. Jenna Jameson – Worth $70 million using only what god gave her. Henry Ford – Standardized efficiency. Thomas Edison – Numerous failures on the road to success. Perseverance! Adrian Block - 1612 establish the first known brewery in the New World on the southern tip of New Amsterdam (Manhattan). I live in a city with more than 30 breweries operating in the city limits…think these guys were onto something. Hans Christiansen – Partners with Adrian Block. Adam Osborne – Creator of the 1st personal computer. Howard Hughes – Say what you want about him the man had a vision and stuck to it. Madame C.J. Walker – 1st Female African American Millionaire…and she did it in early 1900’s. Safe to say she had a lot of obstacles, but persevered and prospered. If you think you have more working against you than Madame C.J. Walker did, think again. Mary Kay Ash – The woman behind Mary Kay cosmetics. Redefined affiliate marketing. Howard Schultz – Who’s gonna’ pay $4.00 for a cup of coffee? With $2.5 billion plus in total revenue the answer at Starbuck’s is a lot! Alexander Graham Bell – Inventing the telephone in 1876 was about as wacky an idea as teleportation is today…did that stop him? King Croesus – Minted the world’s first coin in 6th century. Benjamin Franklin – Author, printer, inventor, businessman. Ray Croc – Where do you go for dinner when you spent all your money on $4.00 Starbuck’s coffee? McDonald’s! Franchising and national expansion (both stores and waistlines) would never be the same. Sam Walton – Speaking of saving money and expanding like crazy. Sam Walton found a niche and filled it, regardless of what you think of the extra traffic Wal-Mart brings to your neighborhood. Ernest Gallo – Took what was once an exclusive product and repackaged it for the masses. I was 20 years old before I knew wine came in anything but a “jug”. William Middlebrook – Giving William the nod for inventing the paper clip, although some debate remains. However, you have to include the inventor of the paper clip in this list since we’ve all said, at one time or another, “and whoever invented the paperclip is rich, and I’m still working in this crappy office!” Bill Gates – Took a risk and was a first mover in a market that exploded. Steve Jobs – Make your products easy and people will love to use them…making a dead sexy laptop doesn’t hurt either. Mayer Amschel Rothschild – Started the world’s first international bank in the mid 1700’s. What did you do today? Scrooge McDuck - Scrooge has emerged from being a mere supporting character to a major figure of the Duck universe. Parlayed early success into his own comic book series, television appearances, films, and video games. As big as David Hasselhoff in Europe, he seized opportunity when it arose. Russell Simmons – Worth $325 million, and started as a teen street hustler. A hip hop pioneer and visionary who has shaped the hip-hop scene of the early 80’s, has branched off into fashion, television and film. And I don’t care if you grew up in Brooklyn or Beverly Hills you remember “Russell Simmons Def Comedy Jam”. Ron Popeil – Net worth in excess of $100 million dollars. A consummate salesman, he had us believing we NEEDED a food dehydrator and spray paint to cover our bald spot! The Phoenicians – Inventors of the sail boat, and could be credited then with giving our early explorers the means to take over the western hemisphere. H. Ross Perot – Used a $1,000 loan from his wife in 1962 to start Electronic Data Systems. Became a billionaire as computer systems drove the need for electronic data storage. JP Morgan – How many people get credited with having saved or rescued the U.S. national economy in general—and the federal government in particular—on two separate occasions? Not many, and JP was a merger monger legend in his time. Charles Schwab – Founder and CEO of the Schwab Corporation, made having a broker cool and accessible. Worth $5.5 billion for his efforts. Larry Page – Google, need we say more? Sergey Brin - Google, need we say more? Philip Knight – In partnership with Bill Bowerman created Nike. What’s the reward for taking a product everyone uses and making it functional and fashionable? Try a net worth in excess of $9 billion dollars. George Lucas – Start with a vision, add some talent, and never waiver. Stars Wars is as well known on this planet as Coca-Cola, and Lucas is worth a cool $3.6 billion. Doctor John Pemberton – Pharmacist who in 1886 invented Coca Cola. Forced to change his formula from including wine due to prohibition his elixir with “tonic and nerve stimulant properties of the coca plant and cola nuts sweetened with sugar” became a sensation. Eberhand Anheuser- Founder of Anheuser Busch Brewing and Budweiser beer…thank you sir for the many mornings where I regretted the night before. Adolphus Busch - Founder of Anheuser Busch Brewing and Budweiser beer…bless you for allowing me to think I am funny, great looking, and a fabulous dancer for a few hours every Saturday night. Jeff Bezos – Founded Amazon.com in 1994, and wrote up the business plan for his company on a cross country drive from New York to Seattle. Was a .com entrepreneur before there was even a term for it. Thomas Kinkade - Americas most collected living artist. Marketing works people. Erno Rubik - Invented a puzzle only .000001% of the world population could solve without cheating, and sold millions! Marketing works people. Alex Tew - 21 year old entrepreneur made $1,000,000 off the “Million Dollar Homepage”. Adding him to the list to illustrate that great ideas are sometimes in plain sight. Didn’t we all think, “I wish I had thought of that”? Henry Hassenfeld - Owner of a textile plant in 1923 his company struck gold when they developed a way for kids to play doctor. The first toy the plant ever produced led the way for the likes of Mr Potato Head, GI Joe, Life, Yatzee, Candyland, and just about any other game we played as kids. Partners with his brother Helal Hassenfeld. Helal Hassenfeld - Thanks for the memories man, I still get misty eyed thinking about Cobra Comander and the words “YO Joe” will live with me forever. Rollin King - In 1965 started a regional airline serving 3 Texas cities. 40 years later Southwest Airlines has 3500 flights a day and is the number one airline in the United States and the World by number of passengers carried. Herb Kelleher - Partnered with Rollin King to start Southwest Airlines. The guy started an AIRLINE COMPANY for crying out loud, that’s ballsy. Guy Laliberte - Made the circus cool again. Founder and CEO of Canda’s Cirque du Soleil, Laliberte founded Cirque in 1984, and revolutionized the idea of what a circus could be. Cirque du Soleil has toured more than 100 cities around the world. Admiral Zheng He - Built the vaunted Treasure Fleets, comprising dozens of ships and tens of thousands of sailors, and led them in trade missions across south Asia and as far west as Africa and the Strait of Hormuz in the Persian Gulf. In seven voyages from 1405 to 1433, Zheng He spread China’s goods across the world and returned with treasures for the Ming Dynasty. Andrew Carnegie - The Scottish immigrant and weaver’s son built a steel empire whose mills churned out the railroads, ships, and structures of post-Civil War America. Milton Hershey - In 1905 built the worlds largest chocolate factory. His name has become synonymous with chocolate, which Americans consume more than 11 pounds of each year. Gary Dahl - A millionaire for selling rocks, pet rocks, enough said.


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