Southwest Airlines’ successful economistic, cost-leadership strategy examined in light of Paul Lawrence’s renewed Darwinian theory: An analysis

Abstract

This paper examines the successful business strategy employed by Southwest Airlines with special respect to the recent theories of Paul Lawrence. Long-time professor of organizational behavior at Harvard Business School, Lawrence posited that Renewed Darwinian theory reflected four basic human drives: acquisition, defense, comprehension, and bonding. Given Michael Porter’s assessment of the distinctions between cost leadership and differentiation, my analysis reveals that Southwest succeeded in maintaining its competitive market niche for the air-travel industry by engaging in a strongly economistic, cost leadership strategy that primarily incorporated and prioritized aspects of the drives to acquire and defend. In doing so it displayed greater vision and operational effectiveness than its competitors (such as Continental Lite, for example).