First job

[Jugs08]

Just wondering if people have had success in getting a flight deck job by any of the following means? Cabin crew, ops, office job within airline or small operator. If anyone has any experience in any of the previous potential ways in it would be appreciated. Or would it be better to work and save for future training?

[Tsym]

I strongly advocate heading down the career paths you have mentioned within your post. You are sitting on an expensive license; your knowledge and experience is already valuable to many companies within the industry - so put it to good use and do some invaluable networking at the same time.

I qualified at the tail end of 2009. I spent a season working as Cabin Crew for a well known (and friendly) airline, and then secured a job working within the control centre for a large international airport. This latter job was ops based; everything from aircraft stand planning to emergency response - this was secured off of the back of my working knowledge of aviation from both sides of the flight deck door.

This ops based job gave me a solid understanding into how multi-faceted in the industry is, and put me in a position to network with some very influential people.

I secured a job in the right-hand seat of a medium sized jet at the tail end of last year.

Airlines will ask you what you have been doing since you qualified - they want to see willingness, eagerness and drive to achieve your goal. No one will just offer you a job - so put your licenses/experience to good use and apply yourself to the industry in other ways.

From my own experience, I learnt so much from being cabin crew - it's also the closest thing you will get to working in the environment you so eagerly want. Plus of course you get to sit in on take offs and landings - what a perk!

And if I haven't convinced you enough; I know a good 10-15 friends who worked as cabin crew when they completed their flight training.... Every single one of them is now flying in the right hand seat.

Make your own luck!

[RTN11]

Although I didn't take this route myself, I know many who did and it worked well for most of them.

Being ground ops, whether it's something like dispatcher or baggage handler really gets you used to the type of turn around time, and the tasks that actually need to be completed, something which frankly was alien to me when I first started on the line. Same would go for cabin crew.

If you were working in an ops or rostering role, you would gain some great knowledge of the commercial pressure airlines are under, and I'm sure would be able to network very effectively.

I also know a few cabin crew who have CPL/IR and are waiting for their break with an interview.

I worked up from an instructor, so I had better manual flying skills and currency, but when I first started at an airline I completely lacked a lot of practical day to day knowledge regarding ground tasks.

[First.officer]

I have to agree wholeheartedly with the previous posts.....I started working as Cabin Crew, Did Dispatch, moved to Ops Controlling and eventually got flying on a light jet.....networking and gaining experience does pay dividends IMHO, and is invaluable in making yourself stand out from the rest of the crowd.