My Day

Yvonne Muldoon - Sales manager, United Airlines

OUR OFFICE is based in South William Street, Dublin, and I live in Castleknock, so I get to drive through the Phoenix Park on my way to work which never fails to put me in a good mood. It’s just so lovely.

I’ll get in before 9am and after that it would be hard to give you a typical working day because each one is different. That said, they all start with me powering up the laptop and checking messages on my Blackberry. I don’t go anywhere without either of them.

Massimo, our Italian sales executive, then sets me up for the day with one of his brilliant cappuccinos, followed by a lecture on how to make a proper cappuccino, which he also gives every day.

Yesterday, I was out for the morning at a photo shoot at Dublin airport to mark the launch of our new Dublin/Washington service, but by 11am I was making a corporate presentation to the chief executive of a top multinational.

Basically, if a business commits to a certain spend on our flights, we give them a discount – so that’s what I was pitching.

I spent the afternoon sitting on the office floor with the rest of the guys stuffing goody bags for a marketing promotion at a shopping centre.

We’ve a small team, just six of us here and they’re a great bunch. If I’m in the office, most of my day will be spent dealing with travel partners, talking about various campaigns or promotions they may be running.

Just now I was on the phone to the American Chamber of Commerce about their Thanksgiving luncheon, of which we were a sponsor.

I travel to London once a month to meet my boss for a strategy meeting. Generally I’m out on the 6.50am flight and back by mid-afternoon. I used to travel over the night before, but now I’m studying public relations by night, so I can’t. I think it’s really important to keep learning.

I’ll travel to the US a few times a year, either on press trips or for meetings in our Chicago headquarters. I’m just back from a holiday to the west coast, which was a trip of a lifetime, driving from San Francisco to Las Vegas.

I’ve been with United, previously Continental – we’re in the process of merging – for seven years. I started out in Aer Lingus, working on the reservations desk and ending up in revenue management, which I adore. Finishing up time varies enormously. In summer, I like to get out for a run after work, but it’s harder in the winter. I’m just about to start training for next year’s New York marathon, so I think what I might do is start training at lunchtime, but we’ll see.

In conversation with SANDARA O'CONNELL