How Southwest’s CIO modernized the airline through turbulence

Taking the helm as CIO is a significant shift for any IT leader, however Lauren Woods’ experience at Southwest Airlines differs.

2 months before she was formally called CIO in February 2023, Southwest experienced among the biggest functional disturbances in air travel history, right in the middle of the hectic vacation travel season, with out-of-date software application systems at the center of the disaster.

Southwest CEO Bob Jordan later on associated an imbalance in the business’s development frame of mind and an absence of financial investment in digital change as main reasons for the travel interruptions the airline company sustained throughout the December 2022 vacations. Concentrated on development, the business’s management had actually deprioritized improving internal systems, employing IT personnel, and upgrading internal procedures to equal its development program. The outcome was a PR firestorm with more than 15,000 cancelled flightsunmatched refunds and repayments, a $220 million income loss throughout Q4and a $140 million civil charge when the dust settled.

Woods was tossed straight into that deep end, with little time to get used to her brand-new management position. She calls it an “faster knowing chance,” keeping in mind that when you handle a brand-new function, you normally anticipate around 6 months to find out and become the position.

Woods didn’t have that high-end. Rather, she discovered herself dealing with not just a sped up knowing curve, however likewise “sped up exposure.” Practically instantly, all eyes were on her as she looked for to best Southwest’s operations.

“That was fascinating due to the fact that I believe a few of the leading management who understood of me and supported me into this function actually had not seen me,” she states. “So now they got to see me in action.”

Leading throughout unstable times

Woods’ background leading transformative efforts at Southwest, along with her method to management that she has actually established throughout her period leading IT groups, matched her well in taking control of IT as the airline companies was plunged into mayhem.

Leaning on those authentic, Woods rallied and assisted her groups to upgrade Southwest’s technical operations with a shared dedication to doing right by the consumer. Client services is where Woods started her period at Southwest 14 years earlier, having actually signed on to handle Southwest.com throughout a time when the business was transitioning from C++ to Java, and embracing nimble advancement approaches.

Woods invested the next years discovering the ins and outs of Southwest’s business side, supporting the shift to a brand-new appointment system, incorporating brand-new systems when the business purchased AirTran, and ultimately moving into more combination work throughout the business, before returning to the front-end part of business as a director.

When Kathleen Merrill, then SVP of innovation and CIO, tapped Woods to deal with functional systems, Woods was reluctant due to the fact that the bulk of her experience was on the business side. Merrill acknowledged that Woods comprehended software application advancement and had both a strong working understanding of the airline company and deep domain proficiency– all of which singled her out as a strong prospect to make the shift.

“I wound up leaning on my partners in business and discovering a lot from them about how our airline company worked and what it resembled on the functional side,” she states. “It offered me insights into how essential information, cloud innovations, and other things were that we truly required at that time.”

As Southwest started its cloud change, Woods was promoted to vice president of innovation platforms and architecture, handling bigger digital change and modernization obligations along the method. And in September 2022, Woods was revealed as inbound CIO, set to take control of the IT mantle from Merrill in February 2023.

Woods states the experience browsing Southwest IT through that rough duration was a time of severe individual development, requiring her to go into the executive function and determine what was required from her, appearing for her group, and leading them to much better organizational footing. While the occasions that caused Southwest’s latest modernization were regrettable, Woods and her associates take pride in what has actually come of their efforts.

“We’re a much better airline company for it,” she states.

Woods gained from the truth that Southwest IT had actually currently started a modernization journey when she was called inbound CIO. The December 2022 crisis merely pressed the business to speed up that procedure, with a concentrate on upgrading out-of-date and irregular operations throughout business.

One essential concern Southwest dealt with throughout the 2022 vacation crisis consisted of mass flights cancelations due to functional systems having a hard time to recuperate from the preliminary weather-related disturbances, rendering the business not able to find team members sometimes to personnel flights. Woods and her groups resolved this problem by constructing a tool called Crew and Aircraft Integrated Recovery and Optimizer (CAIRO).

According to Woods, CAIRO is “the very first of its kind,” making it possible for Southwest to automate, focus on, and reset the team and airplane networks all at once and flag possible flights that may require to be cancelled, while decreasing the prospective effect on team members.

Woods’ group was likewise supported by work they currently carried out in reaction to COVID-19, which pressed them to concentrate on core information structure modifications. These made it much easier to carry out real-time information streaming, lowering the time to pull information from an hour or more, to simply minutes.

Credibility and nerve

Woods likewise credits business management with assisting her group effectively speed up the work, keeping in mind that she had the complete assistance of the executive group, who were open to hearing what required to be updated, what required to be enhanced, and where the most significant financial investments required to be made.

“So that’s where we’re focused– ensuring we have these trustworthy and efficient systems so we can produce that competitive benefit where we wish to be concentrated on having the ability to produce a truly great item, due to the fact that we have truly fantastic consumers,” she states.

As CIO, Woods manages a “large breadth of work and focus,” as innovation contributes in every part of business, from airline company reservations, to personnel scheduling, to the monetary systems that keep the business afloat, she states.

Prior to pertaining to Southwest, Woods operated in consulting, an experience she feels assisted make her the leader she is today. As part of that work, Woods ended up being really knowledgeable about browsing scenarios in which she was the only female in the space– a truth she states she has actually never ever avoided. As she has actually advanced her profession, Woods has actually made a point to determine leaders she can gain from, in addition to those she does not wish to replicate. In spite of operating in a male-dominated market, Woods states she’s likewise been lucky to have a number of ladies leaders who came before her at Southwest, consisting of Kathleen Merrill, who was VP of technique when Woods signed up with 14 years earlier, in addition to EVP and CFO Tammy Romo, Chief Administration Officer Linda Rutherford, and SVP of Customer Experience Teresa Laraba.

“What was incredible about Southwest was that when I was available in, there was a great quantity of female management. That was a terrific chance for me as a young leader to come in and state, ‘Okay, I see myself there.'”

That representation showed to be a foundation as Woods established her management design, and seeing other ladies leaders in the company assisted her picture a comparable course forward for herself. She discovered herself drawn to genuine leaders, particularly females who weren’t worried about being “ideal,” and who appeared as their real selves at work.

“A great deal of times when we are showing up in our professions, we see individuals who appear really skilled,” she states. “You get the senior statesman, the really quaffed female leader, and I didn’t connect to any of those. I wish to be really genuine. I like to lean into being extremely bold, however I’m likewise quite not ideal.”

In establishing her management design, Woods has actually determined credibility and nerve as her main worths. To Woods, credibility is very important since she feels it’s the only method she can appear as her finest self; guts on the other hand allows her to deal with the tough elements of her management functions successfully, whether it is having challenging discussions or being important of procedures and platforms.

“I constantly wish to lean into that guts, however I wish to do it in a genuine manner in which matches my worths. I wish to be kind and considerate, even if I need to be difficult and tough. I wish to discover clearness in my function, and my group requires that clearness from me. And after that I require to look for that clearness from my stakeholders and executive leaders,” she states.

Those worths served Woods well as she browsed among the hardest shifts a CIO can sustain.

While Woods acknowledges that management techniques can be formed by those who came before you, when it concerns coaches, Woods recommends aspirational leaders to guarantee that they aren’t just looking above them for mentorship. While it’s crucial to gain from and make connections with leaders in the company, you can discover simply as much from peers in your company, or individuals outside your department or profession course, she states.

“I believe there’s a great deal of individuals who search for coaches to be your manager, or someone who’s currently in these positions,” she states. “And I ‘d actually motivate ladies to search for individuals happy to buy them no matter their position, due to the fact that a few of individuals who were most prominent to my profession aren’t executives.”