Best & Worst: Northwest should have tossed "dumpster diving" advice along with laid-off employees

I AM EMPLOYED WITH ANOTHER AIRLINE WHO IS TRYING TO MERGE WITH NORTHWEST AIRLINES READING THIS INFORMATION IS SCARY. WE AT MY AIRLINES HOPE THAT THE PEOPLE WE WORK FOR CARE A LITTLE. ONLY TIME WILL TELL. AIRLINE EMPLOYEE FOR 12 YRS AND COUNTING.

Emily, Who are you calling "my friend?"
30 years of experience keeping aircraft full of people maintained and operating safely and in good mechanical order......that's called the highly trained AMERICAN worker.....a laborer worthy of his or her wages MY FRIEND!!!

I know it's a completely different situation, but I am a public high school teacher. Dumpster diving, especially on the last day of each semester, provides my classroom with hundreds of dollars worth of unused notebook paper, pens, pencils, folders... you can't imagine the things I find. NWA should be ashamed for its disrespectful insinuation, but for many people, "dumpster diving" is much more of a goldmine than an insult.

I HAVE WORKED FOR NWA FOR OVER 30 YEARS. THEY HAVE ALWAYS HAD LABOR PROBLEMS. THEY SHOULD USE NORTHWEST AIRLINES HAS HOW NOT TO RUN A BUSINESS.
THE THING THAT UPSETS ME THE MOST IS THE PEOPLE THAT HAVE SUFFERD FOR THE GREED OF THOSE AT THE TOP. THERE HAVE BEEN SEVERAL FAMILIES THAT HAVE LOST THEIR HOMES AFTER WHAT THESE PEOPLE HAVE DONE. THERE HAVE BEEN PEOPLE IN THE LAST YEAR THAT HAVE TAKEN THEIR LIVES AS THEY DIDN'T SEE A FUTURE OR A WAY OUT FOR THEIR FAMILIES. THESE PEOPLE LIKE STEENLAND, AND OTHERS AT THE TOP KNOW THEY WILL NOT HAVE TO ANSWER TO THE EMPLOYEES, BUT THEY WILL HAVE TO ANSWER TO GOD ON JUDGEMENT DAY.

what NWA is doing to their employees is absolutely criminal!!!This used to be a great airline 20-30 years ago,to-day it is crap!With the pillaging upper management is doing to the company and the total lack of respect it has for its employees it makes ENRON look like amateuers.

OK, I read the 101 tips and yes some might be a bit insensative but they ARE helpful for people looking to cut costs. I really don't see what all the fuss is about.

Dumpster Diving is only the tip of the iceberg on how Northwest management vaules their workers. I experienced this first hand in the eleven years I worked there. At first I thought I would apply for a management position when I was tired of flying- then I relized I could never treat people that way. It takes a person without ethics and no reguard for their employees to be in management there. Northwest has alot of intelligent, talented and hardworking employees. I worked with alot of amazing coworkers there-its to bad Northwest will never value the backbone of the company. You cant expect good employees to stick around with that type of management.

So I take it noone is going to fly Northwest ever again. I am not. I am also going to email, and call, AND write their corporate headquarters to explain that they are never getting my business!

Come on everyone.. make them squeal like a pig.

I have over the years seen this type of booklet suggesting penny pinching ideas, and I think that the NWA story may have gotten a little over-baked by the media and saddened/dismayed employees that found themselves without a job. Truth is, there is a great deal of valuables discarded. I don't believe they meant to use dumpsters as your new department store, but to stop and think before tossing out something seemingly worthless, and not be afraid to pick out that $50 dollar bill that someone just threw in the trash. There are many people as we all know, who make a good living at reselling everything from broken cars to broken stereos, heck when I was a kid in the sixties, we had a blast looking for treasures discarded by those with more money than sense, some stuff fairly new and many times in excellent condition. I don't think NWA meant "dumpster diving" as some homeless people would refer, where they actually glean food from fast food dumpsters, and by the way I have talked to homeless people about this very subject and they say many food joints throw away clean fresh cooked food. Don't get me wrong, I'm not suggesting that hard working people experiencing a job upset become trash diggers, and I'm one who truly believes that Corporate America is indeed financially raping hard working Americans, but I also think a thrifty little booklet reminding us of our wasteful ways during lean times might be worth it's weight in gold. BON APPETIT.......

Yes Dumpster Diving can save money, but it is very crude to include that as a suggestion to loyal employes you have just laid off. Better to help organize a local recycling program like www.Freecycle.com. Freecycle dot com makes reusable items available before they are thrown into the waist streem. www.Freecycle.com redirects people to locally based groups who share items no longer in use. I have used freecycle to Offer and Recieve things ranging from used computer parts, school supplies, canning jars, clothing, books, cleaning supplies, tires and even food. American's have become very wastfull. www.Freecycle.com helps to reuse things before they are thrown in the trash. Reducing waste can help the economy, the environment, and improve the lives of those who are unemployed.

it really is appalling to see how far northwest has gone. as an 21yr airline veteran, i have seen how my own airline has changed. we have been through a few mergers and acquisitions and it all still sux... the salaries have not gone up, & yet the consumer prices sure have! what was once a great job has been turned to one of vagueness. not sure where and what will happen next. my heart goes out to the northwest family and i hope they fare thru the storm. i was recently told that even my airline was considering a merger with northwest... i dont think it will happen.....but whoever allies with this company will surely get a fine prize of rich routes and labor problems

Coming back from a three week fishing and sight seeing trip in Alaska on Northwest airlines my checked bagage was broken into and my leathermans tool and swiss army knife disappeared. Since there is considerable time diference between my home Michigan and Alaska I had jet lag and spent the next day sleeping before I unpacked and noticed the items were missing. Northwest said they were not responsible since they were not notified within 24 hours no exceptions.

To those who don't see what the fuss is about, even though some of those tips are insensitive.

You are working to support your family. You have worked for the same company for a decade or more (or less, does it matter?). Due to the current management's inability to cut costs where they SHOULD be cut, they instead dump you like a hot potato and give you a lovely pamphlet telling YOU how to cut costs. What an insult. "Thanks for your years of service...oh, and we'll be putting the garbage from the executive dining room out at 8, if you want to sift through it for food to fill your childrens bellies."

Well, I guess it would have more fuss value if it happened to you, instead of to someone else.

If this is the way Northwest treats its employees thank god my travel agent booked my flight to Disney on Delta. I hope one day all the CEO's in this country that delight in laying people off find their next homes on the street where they belong

This shouldn't surprise anyone.
The truth is that very few top executives even understand the industry. Period. There is only one model of comparison currently, and that is the now retired CEO at Continental, Gordon Bethune, who understands, as well it seems as his successor(s), that the way NOT to make profits in the airline industry is by cutting costs eliminating the things that make an airline attractive to want to travel with. The idea is to SPEND money, to incur expenses -- including proper incentives for good employee performance -- to provide the things, the personality of an airline, if you will, that will draw customers and INCREASE market share.
These guys cut expenses, eliminate everything, and what they save they put in their own pockets as "executive bonuses" for saving money, not realizing at the same time they're driving customers away. Rather than being in an executive suite, they should be in another kind...with bars. And then they wonder why the airline is in "Eleven" or is facing outright collapse, putting thousands out of work. Why should it be a surprise to anyone?
Unfortunately, this is the story not only with Northwest but for many others. Wherever you see a failed airline, you "scratch the skin" and you find the bad blood in its bad management...people who just don't understand the industry.
When you find people who DO understand the industry and have them where they should be, you find dramatic turnarounds. Such, again, as the traveling public sees with Continental Airlines, the only "legacy" carrier not in bankruptcy (hasn't been in 15 years or so), and in fact a company with stock shares that increased in value 181% in one year.
You have to know that somebody knows how to do things right! When will the rest of the airline industry learn this?

Douglas Shachnow
Boca Raton, Florida

I work for a major airline also, they are all a joke if the public knew how we were treated in the background they would stop yelling at us and instead be kinder to us. Everything we do comes from the top, when we start to orgranize and stand up they come at us with anti labor meetings, and follow us around then give us back some of our benefits and shut us up. We cant leave because of Insuranse benefits mostly, I have 2 years left before I can walk away, it will not come soon enough. Never ever apply for airline jobs, it is not worth your sanity, they do not care about us, now they send the jobs to India just to show us we can be replaced and shut us up.

I CAN'T WAITE FOR ONE OF THESE SMUCK AIRLINES TO GO OUT OF BIZ.....ie: NW, UA AND HP.......
THESE PREDITORS NEED TO GO.

I' was an airline mechanic for 38 yrs and have heard many anti-union stories about Northworst. The one that sticks in my mind was about the company removing the lavatory doors at the maintenance hangars so the foremen could check on the mechanics.
Thus the dumpster story doesn't surprise me at all, but it does take away some of my positive outlooks for the human race.