On Wednesday, June 12, more than 500 leaders from across the WestJet Group gathered for the airline’s annual leadership summit. With a focus on celebrating past-year accomplishments and creating energy, alignment and momentum for the months ahead, the day proved to be one of team building, storytelling and anticipation for continued success.
Strategy Update
Alexis von Hoensbroech, WestJet Group, Chief Executive Officer
WestJet Group capacity has now fully recovered and is exceeding 2019, proving the airline’s resilience and continued growth. With a refreshed strategy, shared in 2022, WestJet has a clear identity as a value carrier, providing the best value to our guests in every segment, serving the most price sensitive guests, premium guests and everyone in between, across its entire fleet while maintaining a foundational focus on a low-cost operation.
The airline celebrated its position as the #1 carrier in Western Canada; #1 leisure carrier providing the most capacity for Canadians to access Latin and Caribbean markets; and five consecutive profitable quarters.
While the year ahead will have challenges, including fierce competition, constrained capacity due to aircraft delivery delays and ambitious cost targets, WestJet leaders are up for the challenge all in service of ensuring friendly, reliable and affordable air travel.
Successes in Operations Through Technology
Tanya Foster, WestJet Group, EVP and Chief Information Officer, Diederik Pen, President, WestJet Airlines and WestJet Group, Chief Operating Officer and Christian Novosel, WestJet Group, EVP and Chief Digital Officer
WestJet has made a concerted effort to advance guest self-serve options among other technology improvements. The collaboration between the airline’s Digital, IT and Operations team has delivered a number of improvements since last year’s leadership summit. A few examples celebrated include:
Passport scanning to reduce line ups at airports
Rewind 365 days, WestJet launched a new passport scanning feature on the WestJet app, allowing guests to more seamlessly check-in and verify their identification prior to their airport arrival. Over the past year, this feature has been used by 77 per cent of WestJet’s guests, significantly alleviating guest traffic for airport agents, allowing them to better support guests with more complex needs prior to embarking on their journey.
Investing in self-serve
As a proud Canadian carrier, WestJet is no stranger to bad weather. Sometimes bad weather leads to operational impacts, delays and, at times, cancellations. Over the past year, WestJet has seen its investments into self-serve options pay off, with 70 per cent of itineraries providing guests with the option to alter or cancel their journey in the midst of irregular operations via the WestJet app. Looking ahead, the airline will pursue and deliver a goal of enabling self-serve options for more than 95 per cent of guest itineraries.
As a fundamental pillar of its strategy, WestJet will continue to leverage technology to further improve operational efficiency and the overall guest experiences across its operation.
Sunwing Update
Samantha Taylor, Sunwing Vacations Group, Chief Marketing and Digital Officer and Andrew Dawson, Sunwing Vacations Group, President
Where air travel meets tour operations, you find the complementary businesses that are the WestJet Airlines and Sunwing Vacations Group, under the collective umbrella of the WestJet Group. Sunwing Vacation Group Leadership talked product, excursions, food, sand and the infamous seaweed, sargassum (word of the day!), complete with a contest to name a new iconic drink to be featured at the hotel lobby bar at Planet Hollywood Cancun.
Where People & Culture translate into brand
Brianne Sly, WestJet, Director, People Strategic Initiatives and Governance
Joining WestJet isn't just about flying planes. It's embracing a passion for connecting people, cultures, and dreams across the skies. Work with WestJet and you choose to be part of something greater—a force that propels dreams, defies gravity, and inspires the world to reach new heights. It has always held true that WestJet is at its best when WestJetters are at their best.
Community Impact
Mark Rubinstein, Hope Air, Chief Hope Officer, Rahul Singh, Global Medic, Founder and Executive Director and Charles Roberts, Live Different, Chief Executive Officer
Air travel is essential in a country as vast as Canada, and even with WestJet’s mission to make it affordable, there are still those who cannot access it when they need it the most. To have meaningful impact at a community level, WestJet works with national charitable partners and local organizations in their missions to serve the needs of Canadians, with hundreds of organizations benefitting through the airline’s Airport Giving program and the hundreds of WestJetters who have volunteered collectively more than 35 thousand hours in 2023.
At this year's Summit, the airline hosted three of its long-standing partners who shared first-hand accounts of the impact of their work: Hope Air, providing free travel and accommodations for Canadians in financial need who must access medical care far from home; GlobalMedic, providing swift, pivotal intervention during critical moments of disaster and turmoil; and LiveDifferent, focused on youth empowerment, humanitarian work, and leadership development.