Key competitiveness indicators and drivers of full-service airlines operating in Malaysia

Full-service airlines play a key role in creating a prosperous and successful tourism industry. They are now faced with fierce competition in domestic and international markets. However, there is a lack of knowledge concerning the competitiveness of full-service airlines. Hence, this research was aimed to identify the key competitiveness indicators and drivers of full-service airlines to help them to evaluate and improve their competitiveness, respectively. Using the Delphi technique at the first phase of the research, the study revealed that full-service airlines need to pay attention to the 12 key competitiveness indicators, including price, quality,profitability, productivity, cost, market share, timeliness, safety, connectivity, flight frequency, customer loyalty, and revenue growth to evaluate their competitiveness status against their rivals. Additionally, the research findings suggested that fullservice airlines need to implement and manage the 15 key competitiveness drivers to reinforce these key competitiveness indicators and as a result improve their overall competitiveness. They include bargaining power of customers, bargaining power of suppliers, rivalry among existing competitors, physical resources, financial resources, human resources, technological resources, reputational resources, flight operations capabilities, engineering and maintenance capabilities, marketing and services capabilities, finance and property capabilities, personnel capabilities,government policies, and strategic alliances. Further, the results of the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) technique at the second phase of the research revealed that profitability is the most important key competitiveness indicator, closely followed by productivity. In contrast, flight frequency is the least important key competitiveness indicator that was ranked twelfth. Furthermore, it was found that the bargaining power of customers is the most powerful key competitiveness driver, closely followed by financial resources. On the contrary, government policies ranked fifteenth has the lowest effect on the competitiveness of full-service airlines. Thetudy also indicated the relative importance weight and ranking of the key competitiveness drivers with respect to their influence on each indicator. Furthermore, it determined the implementation priority of the key competitiveness drivers in terms of several groups using the Hierarchical Cluster Analysis (HCA) technique. The findings of this research provide important implications for the evaluation and improvement of the competitiveness of full-service airlines.

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