IN FULL: Alan Joyce on running Qantas, lobbying Albo & Lounge secrets

**Sacha Barbour Gatt** (0:08)
Hello, it's Sacha Barbour Gatt, welcome to my full sit down with the former Qantas boss Alan Joyce. Claiming he was never an aerosexual, you'll find out what that means soon. The Irishman has spent the better part of the last almost four decades working in airlines. After starting his aviation career in Ireland in 1988, he moved to Australia in 1996 to take on a role with the now defunct ANSET. And in 2003, he took over operations at Jetstar to oversee its Asian expansion.
By 2008, he was the CEO of Qantas and went on to lead the national carrier as it solidified its spot as one of the country's most trusted brands. Joyce's tenure saw him go toe to toe with rival airlines, preside over a highly successful shareholder first strategy, publicly champion social justice causes and become one of the first openly gay CEOs in Australia, all while cementing the flying kangaroos rock solid standing with the Australian people. But controversies and COVID have overshadowed his successes and some say his legacy has been permanently hurt by his actions and decisions during the pandemic. In this wide ranging chat with Alan Joyce, we cover all those topics plus juicy secrets from the Chairman's Lounge, how it felt to be physically attacked for his position on same sex marriage and the never-ending perks that come with being the boss of Australia's national carrier. And you can find a lot of these details in his new book. It's called Riding the Jet Stream, which is available at all good bookstores. But here is my chat with Alan Joyce.
Alan Joyce, welcome to The Briefing.

**Alan Joyce** (1:41)
It's great to be here. Great to talk to you.

**Sacha Barbour Gatt** (1:43)
Love having you in studio. I've seen your book. It's beautiful.

**Alan Joyce** (1:46)
It looks good. Shiny. It's very shiny.

**Sacha Barbour Gatt** (1:48)
I have the PDF copy, so obviously it's very nice to see it in the flesh.

**Alan Joyce** (1:52)
I think I've got the only copy at the moment, and then I think it gets widely distributed next week.

**Sacha Barbour Gatt** (1:58)
Beautiful. Look, let's start with, you know, you were once arguably the most powerful CEO in the country.

**Alan Joyce** (2:05)
Oh, that's a big title. I think it's fairly accurate.

**Sacha Barbour Gatt** (2:09)
Is it a job you'd recommend?

**Alan Joyce** (2:12)
Well, it was a job that I love because of the people.
I love working with the Qantas people, the Qantas brand. It's a national career, it's got an amazing history, it's got an amazing achievement over over 100 years. You know, the oldest continuous operating airline in the world. So I was extremely proud to have done that. But when you go into one of these jobs, there's a lot of pros and there's a lot of negatives. The, you know, the public scrutiny, you were out there and everybody knew who you were. There's not many jobs in the country that that entails. You also have the stress of having to make very big decisions continuously over a period of time. And when you're in the aviation industry, we're in constant shock syndrome. When a shock happens anywhere in the world, it impacts aviation. You know, the Icelandic volcano that went off, that grounded our flights and cost us tens of millions of dollars in Australia. So you were always worried about an event happening around the world. And then, you know, when you went to bed at night, there were over 10,000 people in the air.
And then you got up every morning to look at your text messages to see did anything happen overnight. And things like the QF-32 when an engine blew up on an aircraft and we got very close to having our first aircraft lost in the jet era. And that can really stick with you, it can have a big impact. And there's a big chapter in the book on the whole occurrence. So yeah, a fantastic job, great people, great organization.
But with anything, there's always a downside to it as well.

**Sacha Barbour Gatt** (3:50)
Look, you didn't want to work in airlines, your book's called Riding the Jet Stream, and you say you weren't aerosexual, which did you invent that term by the way? I've never heard it before.

**Alan Joyce** (3:59)
I have yet, no, in the industry it's there, an aerosexual is somebody that's really dedicated to aviation, it's somebody that maybe takes down aircraft numbers like people do with trains. And I say jokingly, you know, I'm maybe a homosexual, I was never an aerosection. That was very true, but then it gets into your blood.

**Sacha Barbour Gatt** (4:18)