How this airline saves almost 9,500 man-hours monthly by automating workflow processes

The global commercial aviation industry is facing a daunting challenge. Many airlines are facing staff shortages as travel demand rebounds strongly post-pandemic.

For award-winning Philippine airline Cebu Pacific, productivity platform Slack, has been a key partner in helping its workforce cope with increasing customer demands through automation and collaborative technologies.

With Slack, the airline has been able to automate routine tasks like sending flight schedules to crew members and updating pilots on passenger boarding status. It has also consolidated multiple IT systems and stakeholders onto one platform.

Collectively, these efforts help Cebu Pacific to save 114,000 work hours annually. The time saved allows employees to plan ahead for upcoming flights and events, and ensure teams have the bandwidth to deal with the unexpected - such as flight delays, maintenance issues or bad weather.

Streamlining operations to save manpower

To get a single Cebu Pacific flight off the runway it takes as many as a hundred people working behind the scenes. The different teams from ground staff to cabin crew now use Slack's Workflow Builder to automate routine and labour-intensive tasks.

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Workflow Builder is used to address common pain points and create automation sequences between different apps. This cuts the likelihood of human error while freeing up time for other value-added tasks.

For example, Cebu Pacific uses Workflow Builder to automatically generate dedicated channels for each flight at least three hours before the scheduled departure time. This enables cabin crew to easily access basic flight information, fuel quantities, maintenance and security statuses, personnel names and gate details - before their duty even begins.

The tool also made it easy for flight crews to sign-in for their flight. "We recently built a geo-fencing sign-in system for our cabin and flight crews using a workflow in Slack," says Michael Brady, Cebu Pacific Air's group director for network control and operations.

The geo-fence creates a virtual geographic boundary around an area with GPS or RFID technology. This enables software to trigger a response when a flight crew's mobile device enters or leaves the area.

"This enables them to check in for their duty and go straight to their gate, which saves us time," adds Brady. Time is saved from not having to manually check-in at a fixed location, as the automated geo-fencing system allows crews to check-in directly from their mobile phones.

Compounding small productivity gains

Another pain point that Workflow Builder addresses is the issue of employees having to juggle multiple work tools.

On average, Cebu Pacific workers use up to 52 different apps and software each week. While each tool can provide value, constantly switching between so many platforms is time consuming and creates friction and frustration. Workflow Builder helps address this problem with the Connectors feature that allows workflows to interact with third-party apps, such as Google, Salesforce and Zoom, without needing to leave Slack.

In addition, Slack's features have allowed Cebu Pacific to create processes that connect legacy airline software systems. In doing so, the airline can coordinate and automate its operations without throwing out years of investments made in developing its unique airline software systems.

Apart from automating routine tasks, Slack also helps Cebu Pacific's staff save time by reducing miscommunication and duplicated conversations across different platforms. Slack allows teams stationed in different airport terminals to collaborate in real-time, more efficiently than what was possible in the past.

With Slack, Cebu Pacific's staff collaborate in real-time through channels, boards and software, and a surprisingly effective daily time-saver is the emoji reaction.

With multiple teams involved for each flight, staff can feel overwhelmed by noise generated from the sheer amount of replies, questions and acknowledgements to a single message or instruction.

The airline gets a set of custom emojis - each holding a specific meaning - which helps to streamline communication and prevent misunderstanding.

"We use the two-eyes emoji to indicate we're investigating an issue, and the heart emoji to when a solution has been found," explains Angelo Maria Berbano, Cebu Pacific's director of operations systems.

The custom emojis are just one of the many ways Slack has transformed the work culture at Cebu Pacific.

For Cebu Pacific, adopting and implementing Slack has clearly boosted efficiency and productivity, transforming the company culture in the process.

The benefits go beyond the number of hours saved.

"What number isn't out there is the huge impact it has on our people," says Berbano. "It just makes things easier and more efficient. Happy people are productive people."

This is the second of three articles on how Cebu Pacific uses Slack to streamline its communications and operations. Find out more about how Slack can help companies enhance productivity here.