Jason's Experience
Strategies in Action
In these business stories, Jason shares some of the biggest challenges he has faced, reveals the strategies he adopted and reflects on what the outcomes were.
From Survival to Success: How Strategic Foresight Transforms
The Challenge
It was 2015, I had just taken over as Chief Executive Officer of Airservices Australia, Australia's air traffic management and aviation rescue firefighting service provider, and I was already faced with a significant crossroad. The organisation was grappled with rising costs, operational inefficiencies, and declining revenue caused by the end of the mining boom that had masked financial vulnerabilities. Despite revenue exceeding AUD 1.1 billion, it faced a forecasted AUD 13+ million loss.
It was also clear that the organisation's workforce and operating model carried a disproportionately high fixed cost base. Back-office staff outnumbered frontline operational team numbers, while newly established services, such as aviation rescue firefighting in Ballina and Port Headland, had been introduced without corresponding revenue. I knew the road forward demanded decisive action and transformative leadership.
Strategic Action: A Comprehensive Reimagining
My first step was to initiate a detailed diagnostic review of Airservices' operations and freeze service charges. A pivotal decision signalling Airservices commitment to industry customers and partners that its inefficiencies would not be passed on. My aim was to reduce costs by double digits—an unprecedented target for a highly regulated government owned monopoly such as Airservices.
The arrival of the detailed diagnostic report provided the focus areas that needed to be addressed. Using these, a holistic program known as the Accelerate Program, was designed to stabilise and reshape the organisation for sustainable success and be what I described at the time as "match fit". Accelerate focused on three pillars:
- A new operating model: Organising ourselves to work in a different way, with a simpler operating model based on customer needs, with less bureaucracy and more accountability.
- Asset and project refocus: Managing our assets and projects with more discipline to ensure we applied commercial standards.
- Technology: Making better use of our systems so people can get things done more easily and clearly see who’s accountable for what.
Delivering Tangible Results
Choosing to tackle these issues head-on and making hard, sometimes unpopular decisions to ensure survival of the organisation resulted in meaningful change and long-term sustainability. Now match fit, the organisation was positioned as a more agile, resilient, and customer-centric provider of essential aviation services. Notable outcomes of Accelerate included:
- An Optimised Workforce: Reduced headcount from 4,500 to 3,600, primarily through voluntary redundancies, while safeguarding 24/7 safety-critical services.
- Streamlined Management: Reduced management numbers by 53% and internal project labour costs by 40%, ensuring only essential projects received funding.
- Enhanced Operating Model: Implemented new frameworks to eliminate inefficiencies and align resources with core service delivery.
- Cost Efficiency: AUD 177 million was removed from the cost base within 12 months—a 17.6% reduction.
- Operational Resilience: Maintained and improved safety performance, even amid organisational restructuring.
- Industry Impact: Delivered a 25% real reduction in service charges over five years, alongside a AUD 200 million capital repayment to the government.
Universal Insights
The Accelerate Program reinforced that true transformation requires both strategic foresight and the willingness to make difficult but necessary decisions. While cost reduction was a key outcome, the real impact lay in reshaping Airservices into a more agile, resilient, and customer-focused organisation.
One of the critical insights from this transformation was the need for a disciplined, long-term approach to financial and operational sustainability. Simply cutting costs was not enough; the organisation needed a fundamental shift in how it operated, moving from a bureaucratic structure to one that was leaner, more accountable, and commercially disciplined.
Additionally, balancing cost efficiency with safety and service continuity was paramount. Despite a 17.6% reduction in the cost base and significant workforce restructuring, safety performance remained uncompromised. This emphasised the importance of aligning cultural change with operational excellence, ensuring that every efficiency gain enhanced, rather than diminished, Airservices’ core mission.
Final thoughts
Industry leadership is not about maintaining the status quo, but about proactively adapting to change. By choosing transformation over incremental adjustments, Airservices not only preserved its financial viability but also set a new benchmark for efficiency and industry responsiveness. The Accelerate Program was not just about survival, it was about positioning the organisation for long-term success in an evolving aviation landscape.
