“It was the spring of hope”:
Air France-KLM targets sustainability — November 2019

Paris in November saw the first Air France-KLM investor day for two and a half years. With a new CEO in place the group no doubt considered it was time to try to show that what has been Europe’s laggard airline group now really had something positive to say. What the markets really wanted to hear was the ability for the group to achieve financial sustainability.

Group CEO, Ben Smith, started off by thanking the group’s employees, emphasising that they are the group’s top asset, and stating the obvious that the business revolves round its customers. He continued by revealing that the group would pursue a new value-focused model for all stakeholders — a leading employee promoter score (the best place to work), a leading net promoter score (exceed customer expectations) and satisfy shareholders by reaching top financial performance. All this is to be surrounded by a “commitment to global environmental sustainability” (not that he went into the details on the subject in contrast to the IAG event in London).