As it flew toward the new millennium, United continued to lead commercial aviation. With the establishment of its ESOP (Employee Stock Ownership Plan) in July 1994, United becme the largest employee majority-owned corporation in the world.  Shuttle by United, launched later that year, competed successfully against a new wave of low-cost carriers. The Star Alliance global partnership United formed in 1997 with four international carriers continued to grow and expand United's reach. United focused on improving its service by developing a new Customer Satisfaction Philosophy for employees. For the first time since 1965, the company departed from its familiar "friendly skies" advertising slogan, replacing it with the word "'Rising."

Uncharted waters...
When employee groups took ownership of a majority of the company's stock, they entered uncharted waters.  The only thing that was immediately clear was that the old culture would be out of place in the new environment.

On July 12, 1994, Stephen Wolf and two key officers of UAL Corporation, along with United Airlines President John Pope, stepped down from their positions. Also on that date, Gerald Greenwald was elected chairman and CEO of UAL Corporation and United; and John Edwardson was named airline president

One of Greenwald's first steps was to begin to transform the corporate culture from a "command-and-control" philosophy to one based on high employee involvement, with emphasis on communication. Workplace innovations were quickly adopted, including telecommuting, elimination of the furlough policy and introduction of casual dress codes in non-public areas of the company.

On July 25, 1994, a historic move was made by United's stockholders. For the first time in the airline's history, representatives from the International Association of Machinists and the Air Line Pilots Association were added to the board of directors. Salaried and management employees also selected an outside director to sit on the board. Over the next two years, the original 54,000 U.S. employees who launched the ESOP in mid-1994 were joined in ownership by many of their co-workers in Europe, South America and Asia.

Meanwhile, United continued to grow. In October 1994, "Shuttle by United" was established as an "airline within the airline, to operate low-cost, no-frills flights on the U.S. West Coast. In 1995, United inaugurated mainline service to New Delhi, India. The route was the final link needed to establish the company's "'Round the World" service and make United a truly global airline.

In May 1997, United positioned itself as an airline for the 21st century by partnering with Air Canada, Lufthansa, SAS and Thai Airways to create Star Alliance: the airline network for Earth. Varig joined the alliance in October. The company also embraced a new service ethic, the Customer Satisfaction Philosophy, to attract more of the world's frequent fliers to United. CSP was to be the basis for all of United's actions in the future, including a new global image and advertising tag line: Rising.

Poised at the threshold of the New Millennium, United Airlines continued its flight.