Full Video: American Airlines CEO at Skift Aviation Forum 2022

25.08.2023 - 14:35 / skift.com / Robert Isom / Edward Russell / Matthew Parsons / Airlines

The inaugural Skift Aviation Forum welcomed Robert Isom, the CEO of American Airlines, as its first speaker at the Statler Hotel in downtown Dallas. During the interview he shared how the world’s biggest airline was prepared for the upcoming Thanksgiving vacation, and already looking ahead to the future with a focus on recruiting and training pilots, and staffing the carrier back up.

On stage, he also commented on Twitter’s turmoil in relation to the airline’s customers, and why Dallas Fort Worth Airport “will be the cornerstone on which American will grow.” 

Watch Isom’s full on-stage interview with Airline Weekly editor Edward Russell, as well as read a transcript of it, below.

Edward Russell: Well, good morning everybody. As Rafat said, welcome to the first inaugural Skift Aviation Forum here in Dallas. I’m Edward Russell, the editor of Airline Weekly, and my guest today needs almost no introduction. Robert Isom leads American Airlines, the largest airline in the world. He has been CEO since March after six years as president and chief operations officer at American and US Airways before that. So welcome, Robert.

Robert Isom: Yeah, it is good to be here. Thank you.

Russell: Excellent. Well, we are an aviation conference, so I want to kick things off. Says you’re a big AV geek in your bio, so I got to ask, what’s your favorite plane?

Isom: A favorite plane right now is planes that deliver on time. Look, we have all flavors. So I think we’re the world’s largest operator of Embraer aircraft, the world’s largest operator of the old Bombardier aircraft. We’re one of the biggest operators of Boeing and Airbus. So you’re asking me to choose among all the children? No way, buddy. Not going to happen. They’re all really great. I like the ones that deliver on time. I like the planes that arrive on time. So that’s my favorite flight.

Russell: Right? A very diplomatic answer for sure. The best flights are always the ones that, yes, arrive on time and you don’t remember a day after. But of course, speaking of operations, we’re here a week before Thanksgiving. So operations have been in the news a lot this summer, this spring, there were issues, things have gotten better. Is American ready for the holidays?

Isom: Well, first off, I just like to say thanks for holding a conference in DFW, Dallas. Okay? That is a big deal to us. Anytime you want to come, I’m happy to come and talk to anybody. Bringing people in on my aircraft, that’s a great deal. So are we ready? Look, we’ve had three hurricanes in the last few months. We’ve had all sorts of issues that come our way. Yet the last month, October, was one of the best months in our company’s history in terms of on time performance and in terms of completion factors.