Southwest Airlines customers suffered hundreds of cancelations, delays and other disruptions this summer as the carrier struggled with snowballing problems of bad weather and a lack of staff.

Its next CEO, Bob JordanThe airline vowed that it would not do this again. This airline is close to reaching its goal of recruiting 5,000 people this year. To prevent any future service interruptions, it has already reduced its schedule for next year. The airline, and others like Spirit and American, set out to operate an ambitious schedule last summer to try to recover revenues lost during the pandemic, but a shortfall of staff exacerbated operational issues.

“The March schedule will be the next issue. Jordan stated that while we plan to meet this deadline, if it is not possible to find the right person to fill that position we will revisit and modify the schedule.” Jordan spoke in an interview Thursday. Jordan said, “What we won’t do is repeat last year’s mistakes.”

Jordan will take over from Gary Kelly and has 33 years of experience at Southwest. He told Skift Global Forum, New York, that they also plan to hire 8,000 people next year. About 56,000 people work for the Dallas-based airline.

It has been difficult to hire.

Jordan stated that they are making every effort to hire. The airline raised starting pay to $15 an hour and has been offering retention bonuses, referral bonuses as well as additional pay for certain markets with higher costs of living like Denver, he said.

Jordan expressed confidence that the airline would reach its goal of adding 5k workers by fall but acknowledged how tough competition was. Employers from retailers to airlines to restaurants have struggled to fill jobs and turned to bonuses and higher pay to attract workers.

Southwest in August cut its third-quarter revenue outlook, citing weaker bookings during a rise in delta-variant cases of Covid-19.

Jordan commented that “the holiday bookings have been holding up really well.” “It seems like we are at the backside this delta wave.”

Southwest Airlines and others have tried to make sure their staff is vaccinated against Covid-19. United Airlines The most strict policy is the one that applies to all 67,000 U.S. employees. It requires inoculation with very few exceptions or they will be terminated. In November, Delta Air Lines will impose a $200 per month surcharge on its company’s health insurance policy for employees who are not vaccinated.

Southwest offers employees two days’ pay if they upload evidence of vaccination. CNBC interviewed Jordan to learn that he preferred incentives over a mandate.

He said that although vaccines and mandates can be personal topics, they are also emotional. However, at the end, everyone needs to be vaccinated. It’s more important to me that we have data and incentives than mandates. My wish is for employees to be able to make their own decisions.

But, the government mandate could make it easier for both large employers and government contractors to get vaccines. Southwest is a charter flight operator for both the government and private sector.

He said that there is still much to be learned about the rules.

Jordan explained that while it’s not clear what percentage of employees have been vaccinated yet, the new incentives could provide further data. Jordan said that the rate at which the company has fully vaccinated its employees is similar to the average in the United States, just above 64% for those over 12. He said, “I am hopeful that with the incentives we can get to something more than that.”