Alaska Airlines Reviews

Former Employee – worked at Alaska Airlines

Pros – Small but distinguished airline, no international travel except Mexico

Cons – The service cutbacks, passengers expect in-flight entertainment. The passengers flying Alaska expect a lot more but the airline is run more like a shuttle service.

Advice to Senior Management – Streamline the inflight service, cleaner planes

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend

Current Employee – been working at Alaska Airlines

Pros – Alaska promotes a real family atmosphere, but it's more preach than practice sometimes. If you happen to work for a decent manager, you can take advantage of flexible schedules, commuter benefits and telecommuting. They offer a very generous PTO program for management. This is all at the discretion of your manager.

Cons – Alaska has done a lot of hiring from the outside lately. It's become a reitrement home for people from other loser airlines, and that fosters bad feelings from employees trying to get promoted. Alaska also seems to think that anyone in a position of leadership is automatically a good employee, which is not the case.

Advice to Senior Management – Start hiring qualified people from within the company. They exist and know the culture and dynamic of the company better than anyone from the outside.

Current Employee – been working at Alaska Airlines

Pros – There is a ton of oppurtunity for growth/ upward mobility, if you choose to make Alaska Airlines a career. We have awesome bonuses , share profiting, and flight benefits. If you ever want to try a new job Alaska encourges you to go for it! If you don't like it, then you have three months to return to your previous position. You also get to meet a lot of different people, depending on what department you work in. Alaska is all about promoting from within the company and they love deidicated and passionate people who really want to be here.

Cons – Raises can be hard to come by if you are in a management position. Contracted positions get raises automatically. Also, if you are in a contracted position you are under a union which makes the incompetent, lazy people impossible to fire. Bill Ayer, the CEO loves to send e-mails about the financial position that the company is in to scare people into thinking that they are going to lose their jobs.

Advice to Senior Management – Good Job!

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend

Current Employee – been working at Alaska Airlines

Pros – The best thing about working at Alaska Airlines is the travel benefits (when you get to use them). Most of the systems are new and pretty easy to support. Those we have written in the past are getting a lot of attention and may be replaced soon. Most of our duties now consist of vendor relations and management.

Cons – Well although we are doing better than most airlines we still are not seeing much profit sharing. Planes are full but at such a low price per seat we are just barely able to cover the cost of fuel. Stocks are down to an all time low, So we are all hoping for a new destination that everyone is willing to pay top dollar to visit.

Advice to Senior Management – We need to diversify our brand into food products, snack boxes for company meetings, school lunches, etc...
Watch for our new hot wheels logo.

Current Employee – been working at Alaska Airlines

Pros – Everyone is very positive and friendly. It can be a tough job during peak travel times but the employees keep the mood positive. Alaska Air is truly a family organization.

Cons – The pay for my particular job is too low. We (CSA's) are the face of the company and should be compensated a little better.

Advice to Senior Management – Raise the pay of the Customer Service Agents. They are where the rubber meets the road and are under compensated. The flight benefits are great but they alone are not reason to stay in this position. Other positions within Alaska get the same benefits and much less headache than dealing with passengers who complain to you about something that is out of your control.

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend

Former Employee – worked at Alaska Airlines

Pros – Before working for Alaska Air I thought that they were the "Cadiallac" of Airlines. After working there not so much.

Cons – Flights were oversold, delayed or mechanicals and Supervisors were never around to support the front line employees the supervisors went into hiding. Alaska Air should eliminate the unions as they were only good for protecting poor preforming employees. Overtime was never distributed evenly amoung all employees. If you were a new hire and you didn't volunteer every 48 hours to work overtime you were automatically given mandatory overtime.

Advice to Senior Management – The hiring process was like the reality shows on television today. You have to pass rounds of interviews to go to the next round of interviewing. My day started at 800 and ended finally at 1800 that evening. I thought I was going to be hired for a job paying $100K plus, instead of $10.15 per hour. You know how to hire great people, you just don't know how to keep them.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

Current Employee – been working at Alaska Airlines

Pros – If you want to live and fly in Anchorage or Seattle and don't mind working for a company whose management team only wants to take care of themselves then this is the place for you.

Cons – Management continually fails to recognize the expertise available in day to day operations by current employees and makes decisions based on "focus groups" comprised of mid level managers who are out of touch with operations.
What little positive corporate culture and team spirit is left is rapidly decaying under management's remote and deaf leadership.
Constant reminders by leadership that they don't trust your judgement or ability to help lead the operation.

Advice to Senior Management – Start taking care of your people. I don't think it is too late to recover from the damage you have caused to this once great company. Go ride on SWA and see how their culture is. That culture and spirit is cultivated from above by a management team who actually cares about employees and the future of the company.
Use the expertise available from your employees in shaping the future of the company and day to day operations. We see what goes on every day and can help to fix things. Let us take some ownership of this company.
If things continue the way they are going the company is going to decay into another labor problem filled legacy carrier like NWA and when we reach that level there will be no turning around.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

Current Employee – been working at Alaska Airlines

Pros – They have nice new aircraft and the employees are great to work with.

Cons – Management is comprised of bean-counters who know nothing of leadership or accountability. Their only mission is to fill their pockets and thus only concern is shareholder returns. They put safety below their own interests and that is not good in the airline business. In their defense they have put out some great ideas like RNAV approaches and the "Airport of the Future." The milage plan is also good. Mainly, the way they treat employees is awful and there is no leadership.

Advice to Senior Management – Treat employees with respect and understand that customers and shareholders will be taken care of better by satisfied employees.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend