Benjamin Smith will assume his new position as Air France-KLM’s new CEO Sept. 17, bringing to a close a four month-period in which the airline group was without a permanent boss after the escalation of a labor conflict led to the departure of his predecessor Jean-Marc Janaillac.
Smith, previously Air Canada COO and president-airlines, and the first non-French national to head the Franco-Dutch group, was appointed Aug. 16, after a long drawn-out and tense search for a successor to Janaillac who resigned in May.
Janaillac had staked his future with the company on resolving a long-running labor conflict with Air France employees that had led to 15 strike days earlier in the year.
Smith will be faced with the difficult challenge of calming tensions with Air France unions and workers before turning his attention to a longer-term strategy for the group, which launched the Trust Together plan to improve competitiveness with peers and profitability in 2016 under Janaillac’s leadership…
