Grappo v. Alitalia Linee Aeree Italiane, S.p.A.

975 F. Supp. 297, 1997 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 12762, 1997 WL 527342
CourtDistrict Court, S.D. New York
DecidedAugust 18, 1997
DocketNo. 93 Civ. 8810 (CBM)
StatusPublished
Cited by1 cases

This text of 975 F. Supp. 297 (Grappo v. Alitalia Linee Aeree Italiane, S.p.A.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, S.D. New York primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Grappo v. Alitalia Linee Aeree Italiane, S.p.A., 975 F. Supp. 297, 1997 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 12762, 1997 WL 527342 (S.D.N.Y. 1997).

Opinion

[298]*298FINDINGS OF FACT

MOTLEY, District Judge.

The Parties

1. Plaintiff Gary Grappo is a citizen of the state of Florida. (Pretrial Order “PTO” at 2).

2. Plaintiff is an author of business books and periodicals and a customer service culture development consultant who has over ten years’ experience in the fields of human resources and customer service training. (Tr. at 28-30.)

• 3. Defendant Alitalia Linee Aeree Ital-iane, S.A. (“Alitalia”) is an airline incorporated under the laws of the Republic of Italy, with its principal place of business in Rome, Italy. Alitalia’s executive office for North America is located in New York City. (PTO at 2-.)

4. Defendant Gianfranco Bianchi was Ali-talia’s Personnel Manager for North America during the time that plaintiff worked for Alitalia. (PTO at 2). Defendant Bianchi has since retired and is no longer employed at Alitalia. (Tr. at 353).

Guest*Star

5. By 1988, based upon his experience in human resources and customer service training, plaintiff developed a customer service training processing program which he entitled “Guest*Star.” (Tr. at 30.)

6. The purpose of Guest*Star is, in plaintiff’s words, “to create a service-culture within the organization, a service-minded culture where individuals think of servicing the guests rather than just doing their jobs.” (Tr. at 31.)

7. The implementation of Guest*Star involves a number of fairly time-consuming steps. (Tr. at 34.) First, the employees of the business in question are told to complete surveys in order to determine the strong and weak areas within the organization. (Tr. at 32.) The surveys are then analyzed and presented to the senior managers of the business in the form of a report. (Tr. at 33.) Finally, feedback is received from the senior management and the process of training the employees begins. (Tr. at 35).

8. Prior to being employed by Alitalia, plaintiff Grappo had tailored his Guest*Star program in the manner described above for a number of companies, including the Four Seasons U.S.A., the Boca Raton Hotel and Country Club, and the Breakers of Palm Beach. (Tr. at 312-13). Plaintiff was not employed by any of these organizations but rather worked as an outside consultant. (Tr. at 313).

Plaintiffs Employment with Defendant

9. In the late fall of 1991, plaintiff, responding to an advertisement in the Miami Herald, applied for a job with defendant Alitalia as a manager for operations at the Miami International Airport. (Tr. at 36.) Plaintiffs application was rejected, but his resume was retained by defendant. (Tr. at 36.)

10. In January of 1992, an employee of defendant Alitalia called him and informed him that the airline had a position available that required his skills. (Tr. at 36.) Specifically, defendant was seeking to purchase a customer service training program created by a company called Systema (the “Systema program”) and it needed personnel to assist in its implementation. After interviewing with defendant Bianchi and another employee of defendant Alitalia, plaintiff was given the job at the end of February, 1992, and he began work several days later. (Tr. at 37, 40.)

Defendant’s Discontinuance of Systema and Subsequent Adoption of Guest*Star

11. In early March, days after his arrival at defendant Alitalia, plaintiff was informed that, due to the relatively high cost of the Systema program, it was appearing increasingly unlikely that defendant Alitalia would be implementing it. (Tr. at 51-52.)

12. Plaintiff then told defendant Bianchi that he thought that his Guest*Star program could be implemented for a fraction of the cost of the Systema program. (Tr. at 52.)

13. Within a day of being so informed, defendant Bianchi told plaintiff that the two of them were going to go to Rome to make a presentation at Alitalia headquarters regarding his Guest*Star program. (Tr. at 53-55.)

[299]*29914. No promises were made at that time that plaintiff would be separately compensated if defendant Alitalia were to choose to adopt plaintiffs program. (Tr. at 54-55.)

15. Within a few days of returning from Rome, plaintiff was told by defendant Bian-chi that the directors in Rome were pleased with his proposal. Plaintiff was then asked by defendant Bianchi to make a similar presentation to the directors of North America, which he soon did. (Tr. at 56-58.)

16. Defendant Bianchi made no promises at that time regarding plaintiffs receipt of compensation for tailoring Guest*Star. (Tr. at 58-59). In fact, plaintiff, himself, testified that until June of 1992, he thought that the company might still purchase the Systema program. (Tr. at 226.)

17. In June of 1992, plaintiff gave to defendant Bianchi a formal proposal for the implementation and use of Guest:!;Star by defendant Alitalia. (Pl.Ex. 3; Tr. at 61.) In that proposal, plaintiff requested a promotion to “Level One Status”, an $80,000 salary, a project bonus of $120,000, and a computer for his exclusive use. (Pl.Ex. 3, p. 4.)

18. Defendant Bianchi orally indicated in response to that proposal that defendant Ali-talia would not be able to pay $120,000 as plaintiff had requested but that $50,000 would probably be a more acceptable figure. (Tr. at 316-17.) Defendant Bianchi said he would talk with Mr. Carli, Alitalia’s Vice-President for Human Resources, regarding the proposal and inform plaintiff shortly as to Mr. Carli’s decision about whether Guest*Star would be implemented.

19. In July of the same year, defendant Bianchi gave plaintiff a handwritten memo which directed plaintiff to begin tailoring the Guest:i!Star program for defendant Alitalia’s needs and goals. (Pl.Ex. 4; Tr. at 68-69.)

20. However, though Mr. Bianchi had preliminarily directed plaintiff to proceed with implementation of the Guest*Star program, he had yet to speak with Mr. Carli regarding the project but said that he would do so in September. (Tr. at 71.)

21. In October of 1992, just before plaintiff was to enter the hospital for minor surgery, Mr. Bianchi informed plaintiff that he had obtained final approval from Mr. Carli to pay plaintiff $50,000 as well as promote him to a Level One position and give him a computer for his own use, in exchange for which plaintiff was expected to implement the Guest*Star program for defendant Alita-lia. (Tr. at 72.)

22. The terms of this contract were never set down in writing, but on November 13, 1992, defendant Bianchi and Orazio Corallo, the General Manager for Alitalia’s North American office, sent plaintiff a letter indicating that they were giving him a promotion because they were intending to implement his customer service program. (Pl.Ex. 10; Tr. at 228-29.) As a result of the promotion, plaintiffs salary was increased from $4000 a month to $4835 a month. (Pl.Ex. 10.)

23. Moreover, defendant Bianchi included the $50,000 he intended to pay plaintiff in the budget documents which he prepared in October or November of 1992 for fiscal year 1993. (Tr. at 356-57.) These documents were brought with him to Rome for approval by Alitalia headquarters, though top corporate officials in Rome only see a much more concise budget analysis which does not include such comparatively minor expenditures. (Tr. at 363.)

24. Alitalia’s 1993 budget for North America was approximately $10 million. (Tr. at 378-79.)

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975 F. Supp. 297, 1997 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 12762, 1997 WL 527342, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/grappo-v-alitalia-linee-aeree-italiane-spa-nysd-1997.