1)

The leadership displayed in crisis management (in general).

In the past, many organizations assumed that a part of being successful is to have the skill and wit to
handle unexpected crisis. But the reality is that, each organizations that currently exist now are shattered
by how leaders handle situations in the twenty-first century. As leader are unable to be flexible enough to
handle crisis situation, it led to some organizations to its downfall.

Case MH370

Flight MH370 from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing carrying 227 passengers and 12 Malaysian crew
members has disappeared in less than one hour after it get off the ground. After MH370 has disconnected
for around 5 hours, the initial news responding to the disappearance of flight MH370 was released.
Malaysia Airlines crisis communication operation has faced an unprecedented challenge due to the
delayed response. The crisis communication of Malaysia Airlines Public Relation team was placed under
scrutiny. The 239 passengers family are sitting tight for the answers.
Malaysia Airlines made a swift decision at the time and chose to deal with the digital assets, which
includes its official site and social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter to handle the panic. They
managed the crisis by sharing the new found information about the crash to the social media and to the
victim's family member respectively. In the mean time, Malaysia Airlines also had a Dark Site for quick
release of information during the crisis. They also removed all advertisements that was deemed insensitive
and graying it out of social media channels. An official website for updates about the MH370 case was
activated to provide and update any related information of flight MH370.
There are also dark sides about using social media as a way of communication, even though it can
be an effective. But a real-time discussions response would be more ideal, as updates could be on real time
and anybody within the social media would receive a direct information, rather through publishers. Which
also allows for a faster respond and correct to any misinformation.
Malaysia Airlines assigned an information representative, Malaysias Transport Minister
Hishammudin Hussiein to a position as to handle the crisis of MH370. He took up the responsibility to meet
and comfort the victims families and the staff of MH370's family members, and advise them not to lose
hope. Which was an act of uplifting their morale as to counter depression.

Case QZ8501

Air Asia Indonesia Flight QZ8501 was scheduled an international flight from Indonesia to Singapore
on 28 December 2014. It lost contact with the air traffic controllers immediately after the aircraft
operating the route was just over 40 minutes into its flight. 155 passengers and 7 crews on board was killed
after the aircraft crashed into the Java Sea. Tony Fernandes, the Air Asia CEO was stepped up to the plate to
deal with the situation. Air Asia conformed to using the Image Restoration Theory. Benoit (1995) brought a
rhetorical perspective of crisis communication to light by emphasizing that similarly, to individuals,
organizations enact image restoration attempts when they perceive that their reputation is being
threatened. As we know, reputation is an important issue if the organizations wanted to be perceived by
their stakeholders.
th

There are five main categories in Image Restoration Theory: denial, evasion of responsibility,
corrective action reducing offensiveness and mortification. Air Asia adopted the reducing offensiveness and
mortification strategy.
With the reducing offensiveness strategy, they paid out compensation to minimize the level of
negative effect for those affected and unaffected. In addition, with the mortification strategy, Tony
Fernandes who said he would honor the airlines obligations has made a public apologize, I apologize
profusely for what they are going through. I am the leader of this company. I take responsibility. That is why
I am here. I am not running away from my obligations. The first thing that Tony Fernandes did was
responded quickly with real actions. He managed the crisis by tweeting that they would have a statement
soon using the Air Asias own twitter account, barely an hour after it happened. The tweet said, We will be
putting out another statement soon. Thank you for all your thoughts and prayers, we must stay strong.
He was then on a flight to Surabaya three hours after the tweet, with clear intentions of what he
was doing. He was in the city to meet and comfort the passengers and crews families. He was available to
the media and made himself to become the focal point of the whole incident. He demonstrated his and the
organizations support and care towards those of whom were affected by the incident. He succeeded
because he responded with real and quick actions. He do not put the blame on anyone else and most
importantly he is sincere and transparent to public. All of which, Air Asia is very successful in their crisis
management strategies.

2) The leadership displayed in terms of media relations.

In the case of MH370, it was seen that the flight had no survivors, and satellites have lost track of
the aircraft. The MAS (Malaysian Airlines) eventually declared the aircraft has crashed. Which led to mass
dismiss of position within the company. In a media statement, National Union of Flight Attendants Malaysia
(Nufam) has urged Putrajaya to reconsider the status of Ahmad Jauhari as the CEO because of failure in
dealing with problems related to the interest of cabin crew, which also led to Ahmad Jauhari to be criticized
by the mass. The Nufam statement also criticized MAS of their bad administration and handling of the case.
Malaysias inability to execute a search and rescue effort of the missing flight exposed a weakness on the
nations leadership skill. International news agency claimed that the tight control of information flowing in
Malaysia was becoming a bane in handling the situation.

On the other hand, Air Asia faces its most serious crisis which was the missing QZ8501 flight. Tony
Fernandes, CBE of Air Asia apologized to all affected victim's family members with :On behalf of Air Asia
my condolences to all. Words cannot express how sorry I am. Which also led Tony Fernandes to rally the
staffs in Indonesia and raised their morale to get through this tragedy together. With that rally, Air Asias
team of public relations rejected any request of specific information about the rally that was gathered in
Indonesia. Although Mr Fernandes's action caused the share price of Air Asia plunged 8.5%, but the results
was that he created an air of reassurance to pass through this tough time, which then resulted in positive
feedback by the public.

After the incident of QZ8501, Tony Fernandes quickly stepped out, along with CEO of Indonesia Air
Asia, Sunu Widyatmoko, speaking at the crisis center at QZ8501 departure airport in Surabaya and explain
everything about the case. Although this is the first time Air Asia has experienced this kind of incident, but
different with how others handle the case of MH370, Mr. Fernandes has been regularly in the highlight and
sent his condolences to the families. Since he uses Twitter and he has a lot of followers, he quickly took to
social media to show his sadness, unite his demoralized staff and post updates and. He mentioned that he
is the leader of this company and will fully take the responsibility for what they are going through this
period. Also that he apologizes for the loss of the life, encourages the family and relatives of the flights
crew and passenger to stay strong and remain positive through the media.

This situation was deemed in a format as being killed by no killers. For example, in the case of
MH370, they have failed to send their message quickly, as the latest news of the case kept being delayed.
As a leader, the messages should be responded immediately after verification of any information . The
public will not show their anger and frustration if the handling procedure were better, in the case of MH370.

On the other hand, Air Asia did a good job in offering a quick response to the media. They
immediately held a press conference and explain what is currently happening about the case after they
have gotten the information on the QZ8501 that supposed to be at Singapore at 8.30 in the morning but
still not at the destination yet. Besides, Mr. Fernandes also conveys his feeling through the social media, try
to encourages the families and also he is a responsible leader after the tragedy of QZ8501 happens. It can
be clearly seen that Tony Fernandes is a more responsible and a wiser leader in handling the QZ8501 case
better than the others.

3) The leadership displayed in engaging with family members of victims.

Case MH370

In light of the event of the MH370, the engagement towards the suffering friend and family member
of the victim in MH370 by MAS(Malaysian Airline Service) brought their condolences to the affected
families and friends. Within the engagement of engagement with the victim's family members, there were
2 main groups that were engaging with the family member in comforting, bringing condolences, and giving
support. The first group is MAS (Malaysian Airlines) and the other group is the Buddhist Compassion Relief
Tzu Chi Foundation.



MAS's engagement with the victim's family members was a rather bitter one, although at the start
of the engagement between both parties when the initial confirmation of the crash has been announced,
MAS was able to provide their condolences and support to the victim's family through affordance of basic
needs. But as of the confirmations of debris begin to show up and MAS released their side of information to
the affected victim's family member, it caused a negative impact where it affected the information that was
released by MAS and the Government, and deemed to be questionable by the victim's family member.
Which also led to the break down and disbelief towards MAS altogether.



The Tzu Chi Foundation on the other hand came in as support group to provide emotional support
to the suffering family members. The Tzu Chi were brought in by MAS along as to provide emotional
support t suffering family member. Tzu Chi were an international humanitarian group and a nongovernment group with an international network of volunteers and employees, the volunteers and
employees at the time were deployed to provide support for the victim's family members.


At the start of the initial statement about the crash at 8th March 2014, we can tell that both of this
group's mission were to provide support for the affected victim's family, then came the relay of new
information that's concerned about the MH370 flight. While Tzu Chi continuously provided emotional
support to the victim's family member, MAS on the other hand received a backlash as for coming up a
conclusion about the crash and nobody survived in the media release at 6th August 2015, which angered
most of the victim's family member.


In the case of this, MAS was ineffective in act of leadership, as the victim's family member would
deem them as a referent role, due to them being the only one providing information about the MH370, but
due to ineffective wordings or lack of evidence on MAS's part, it caused this kind of strangled relationship.
Tzu Chi on the other hand were just a passive group as to provide relief for the victim's family member, but
due to the relationship of MAS and the family members, it is seen that the emotional support that was
provided has been undone by MAS.

Case QZ8501

The very aptly responsible Chief executive of AirAsia - Tony Fernandes took the time out to personally touch base
with the affected families and parties, gathered his evenly dedicated employees, all while search and rescue teams did
all they could to recover victims and left no stone unturned for 2 days to locate Flight QZ8501. During an interview, he
was quoted saying, The passengers were on my aircraft and I have to take responsibility for that.
Fernandes response time was something very plausible as instantaneously after the relevant parties made an
announcement on debris that could very well be from the plane, he engaged the eager public through the social media
website Twitter and issued a very heartfelt and personal apology. "My heart is filled with sadness for all the families
involved in QZ8501," he wrote. "On behalf of AirAsia my condolences to all. Words cannot express how sorry I am."
Other than issuing an apology, the visibly affected Chief Executive had earlier used the same medium, Twitter, to
share that the incident was his worst nightmare and that his "heart bleeds" for the affected families of both the
passengers and crews. He also posted his sincere gratitude for their undying "support and love for AirAsia". I
apologize profusely for what they are going through. I am the leader of this company and I have to take responsibility,
Fernandes said at a televised news conference. Any form of leadership entails leaders openly accepting their
accountability for actions from their brand. The passengers were on my aircraft and I have to take responsibility for
that.
Following that, we soon came to see that Fernandes offline actions was definitely on par with his tweets for when in
personal contact with the families of the victims, he spoke to them in a very genuine and personal manner. He tweeted,
On my way to Surabaya where most of the passengers are from as with my Indonesian management. Providing
information as we get it. One of the most prominent examples he set was when he actually flew to Palembang as an
escort to a victims family who was a crew member.
Within merely hours of the tragedy unfolding, with the flight vanishing from radar after taking off from Surabaya in
Indonesia, he was already in the main city to hold meetings with the affected families of crews and passengers.
Simultaneously, AirAsia and their Indonesian team were issuing statements on the entire tragedy in real time in
multiple languages and had a hotline introduced for families perusal. The most lauded fact about AirAsia was how
amazing they were at communicating instantly with affected parties and going through every hole with detail and
precision. Everyone saw the amount of effort they made to ensure everything was transparent without reluctance to
withhold information that could be detrimental to their reputation. Instead, they provided all they could to the Indonesian
government to assist with the search and rescue mission. Mentioned elsewhere, however, in Ad Age, the Indonesians
havent been as secretive or defensive, or as hostile toward outside criticism as compared to Malaysias way of
handling their MH370 mission. When put together with Fernades quick thinking hands-on methods to the crisis from
the beginning of it, this has been impeccably important to Air Asias current position in the view of the world. Mr
Fernandes' extremely pro-active attitude shines in comparison with the unsure and poorly acted actions shown by
Malaysia Airlines CEO Ahmad Jauhari Yahya when MH370 went missing in March.
Mr Fernandes will definitely have no trouble with continuing his legacy of an amazing leadership he has shown from
the time he acquired the brand for RM1 way back then.

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