In February, Joanna Geraghty became the CEO of JetBlue.
The promotion made the JetBlue veteran the first female CEO to lead a major U.S. airline. But to Geraghty, what could be called both a career and industry milestone is instead all about the business.
“It means that I’ve got to deliver,” she told me last month at a luncheon for Concern Worldwide U.S., a nonprofit she chairs. “It’s about results.”
Geraghty warned in JetBlue’s first-quarter earnings call, her first as CEO, that the company would miss investor expectations this year as competitors pour into Latin America, a critical region for the airline.
The airline’s priority is a return to profitability. With those headwinds, it’s perhaps unsurprising that Geraghty is focused on the business rather than the significance of her promotion.
Still, she acknowledges that a female CEO is meaningful in a historically male-dominated industry. bit.ly/4bE9zwp