Transavia
The first project our honors team worked on was the project for Transavia. The scenario revolved around Schiphol's proposal to introduce a night curfew, where flights would not be allowed to depart or arrive between 00:00 and 05:59 in the morning to reduce noise pollution. The government aimed to limit Schiphol to a maximum of 440,000 flight movements per year, intending to achieve a 20% overall noise reduction during the day and 15% at night. Transavia extensively utilizes night slots (late arrivals and early departures) to schedule as many flights as possible with their available aircraft. However, with the proposed plan of both the night curfew and the general reduction at Schiphol, the continued existence of Transavia in its current form could be at risk. Our group was tasked with:
The assignment was divided into three research directions:
Customer & Proposition (Commerce): This group focused on generating revenue and understanding customer needs. They investigated what customers wanted and which offers and services matched these needs. The aim was to create an appealing proposition that added value for Transavia's customers.
Network & Resource Planning: This group focused on strategically deploying Transavia's fleet and crew. They explored how to optimally use the aircraft and crew within the airline's network. This involved exploring bold strategies and new possibilities within the operational network.
Operations: This group concentrated on the operational aspects of the business. They looked into ensuring smooth operations despite the constraints of night slots and reduced flight movements. This included identifying necessary adjustments, efficiencies, and operational optimizations.
As part of a group of five students, we chose the Operations task within the scenario. It seemed the most engaging and challenging to me. Although we quickly started, questions arose about what fell under Operations and how it overlapped with the other groups. Did our ideas need to align, and should they be immediately executable? These were discussions we had as a group before moving forward.
It proved difficult to come up with realistic but non-existent ideas. Eventually, I proposed speeding up the turnaround process to conduct more flights during the curfew. After numerous impossible ideas, I suggested simultaneous boarding and disembarking of passengers, and shifting cleaning and maintenance tasks to the night when no flights were scheduled.
It was a challenging task, but I felt our group ultimately produced valuable ideas. However, during the presentation sessions, I noticed the three groups hadn't used a uniform presentation format. It seemed as though we hadn't aligned anything and the whole presentation lacked coherence. Nonetheless, the presentation itself went reasonably well. Although Michael from Transavia wasn't very enthusiastic about my ideas, I didn't receive negative feedback on my presentation skills.
I'm not fond of presenting and find it difficult to articulate my ideas effectively. However, feedback from my fellow students highlighted that I need to show more enthusiasm for my own ideas. When I'm more enthusiastic, others tend to be more enthusiastic about my proposals too. Nevertheless, my language, pace, and presentation content were mostly positively received.