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Destined to fly
“I was always interested in airplanes but didn’t think I’d end up in the aviation industry,” says CEO of Fly Blue Crane, Siza Mzimela. “It’s only when I reflect on it that I can see there were a lot of events, even in my youth, pointing me in that direction. It was destiny I ended up in the travel business.”
As a little girl, one of Mzimela’s favourite pastimes was going to air shows. “It’s the most beautiful sight to see an aircraft take off. Everybody takes it for granted, but there was a time when something that huge couldn’t lift off the ground that easily. So many people, so much cargo – something must be said about the marvel of the mechanics behind it.”
Mzimela is the second-last born of her parents’ eleven children. She has five sisters and five brothers. Though born in South Africa, she was raised by her eldest brother in Swaziland. “My mother sent my brother to study in Swaziland and because he decided to settle there, he took the responsibility of raising some of his siblings. I attended school there and came back to South Africa after university.”
Mzimela majored in Economics and Statistics at university and first worked as a research analyst at Standard Bank for three years. She then worked at Total, whose offices happened to be across from SAA’s when she was employed there, she says.
“One day I got a call from someone who said SAA wanted to talk to me. I hadn’t sent them a CV or anything and thought, ‘why not – they’re across the road – I can go see them’ and that’s how I got into aviation.”
Mzimela started working at SAA as a route analyst. Her first interview was a particularly tough one and she describes how her two interviewers, one of them the current CEO of the Airlines Association of Southern Africa, Chris Zweigenthal, grilled her during the process. “If there is ever anyone to blame for me getting into aviation – it’s Chris,” Mzimela says.
She entered the industry at a very difficult time, she says. SAA wanted someone who could withstand the climate and Zweigenthal liked her independence. The other interviewer seemed to think she couldn’t do the job and that motivated her to take on the challenge. “Don’t dare me to do something – that’s dangerous.”
Taking on the industry
Once Mzimela joined the industry she completely fell in love with it. “We’re spoilt in the travel industry and a lot of us don’t actually know it because very few of us will leave it and try another, and those who do, quickly come back.”
In March 2015 Mzimela started her own airline, Fly Blue Crane, which took to the skies in September that year.
She says starting Fly Blue Crane taught her there is only so much she can control. “When you are dependent on other people and entities it never quite works out the way you planned.”
“Starting the airline was a natural progression. I had run a regional airline, I had run the biggest airline at the time and I was ready for the next challenge. It’s one thing to take over something that is already working but to start something from scratch is entirely different.”
She says there was a tremendous amount of work before the company could even call itself an airline. “To be effective, we had to hire the right staff – the most senior people – because they ensure you have the proper building blocks.”
As a new airline, especially in South Africa, you’re not going to enter the market with the same terms or contracts as every other established party she says. “Everyone says pay upfront – because they’re still very nervous about you.”
And to date it’s still the same challenge, she says. “Our whole team went through a learning curve.” Many of Fly Blue Crane’s staff are ex-SAA employees and find they are being treated very differently to what they had become accustomed to at SAA. “When you said you needed something by tomorrow you didn’t have to call ten times to have it delivered on time. Now we find ourselves at the bottom of the food chain and have to chase people, but that’s life and it’s a very humbling experience.”
Source: tourismupdate.co.za
