Markets

United/Continental Merger: Three Exec Appointments That Stand Out

By Brett Snyder

Updated on: September 2, 2010 / 8:41 PM EDT / MoneyWatch

The next layer of appointments for the post-merger United has been released, and there are few surprises. The commercial side of the house is primarily a Continental (CAL) shop while United (UAUA) seems to be taking the reigns more on operations. That being said, there are a few choices here that go against the grain.

The exec team had already been announced as follows:

Mike Bonds, who joined Continental in 1995, will be responsible for human resources and labor relations
Jim Compton, who joined Continental in 1995, will serve as chief marketing officer
Jeff Foland, who joined United in 2005, will lead the combined carrier's loyalty program
Nene Foxhall, who joined Continental in 1995, will oversee the communications and government affairs functions
Keith Halbert, who joined United in 2008, will be chief information officer
Pete McDonald, who joined United in 1969, will be chief operations officer
Zane Rowe, who joined Continental in 1993, will be chief financial officer
Tom Sabatino, who joined United in 2010, will be general counsel

Looking at that list, you would expect things to fall mostly as they have. The Continental execs have chosen Continental VPs for the most part, and the United side has also gone with nepotism. That, however, is just a generalization. The two that really stood out for me as going a different way were Labor Relations and Alliances.

Doug McKeen, United; Labor Relations Quick, which airline has the worst labor relations in the US? I know it's hard to choose, but United has to be toward the top of the list. Yet, the United Labor Relations chief is staying. What?

It's important to remember that Doug isn't a legacy United guy. He only joined the airline in 2008 to try and clean up the mess that had been created in years before. I suppose the good news is that these negotiations couldn't be more difficult than the ones Doug has already been working on. The Continental folks, however, might be wary about this since United employees tend to be less happy.

Mark Schwab, United; Alliances Other than the Loyalty Program, which we knew would be United-focused thanks to the initial executive announcements, Alliances seem to be the only commercial area under United's control. And really, there's good reason for that. With the exception of the ground-breaking Northwest/KLM deal in the 1990s, United has led many alliance innovations.

It was a founding member of Star Alliance, the first global airline alliance. It created an early revenue-sharing program with Lufthansa long before it became fashionable. And Continental? Well, it tagged along into SkyTeam because part-owner (at the time) Northwest didn't give much of an option. Only recently has Continental branched out on its own into Star Alliance. United has the experience here and should be running it.

There is one other notable appointment here, but it's not a surprise. It's more of a relief.

Dave Hilfman, Worldwide Sales, Continental Sales has been one of the more discussed topics in this merger. In general, corporate partners love Continental's sales team and have, um, slightly less nice things to say about United. I think that just about everyone is happy to see that Continental will be running the sales side of the house.

So there aren't any huge surprises here other than possibly Labor Relations. But it seems to be unfolding largely as expected considering the early executive appointments.

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