Ok, so I seem to have struck a chord with a couple of you, which believe it or not is a good thing!
I spent a bit of time prior to replying here, as it’s easy to have an emotional and defensive response, which let’s face it is fairly natural, but often it will skew the message trying to be sent. So instead I have thought hard about how to make my points in a constructive way for all who read, and hopefully I will hit the mark....
Firstly a little background as to what I am about to say.
I obviously know a lot of RAAF pilots, I have been around the traps for a while, and I can tell you there are good ones, not so good ones, nice ones and not so nice ones, a mixed bag really. But whilst we all have our differences, fundamentally we are all very similar people, with very similar values. You could put this down to recruiting and the psych assessment if you like, and I would attribute part of this to that, but I would attribute the majority to our shared experience of a combination of basic training and pilots course. Usually even the most cocky amongst us are humbled very quickly on course, as it is easily the hardest thing you will have ever done and everybody struggles at some point. It is a very humbling experience, and excellent character building!
Like I said we all think in a very similar way, we all have the same pride (think slight superiority complex) due to what we have undertaken and achieved. Now because we all think the same, one of the things I can tell you is that none of us outside of PSA, and probably within, have much faith in the fact that a test designed by psychs can be more effective than
putting somebody on pilots course for 2 weeks (FSP) and seeing what actual flying/ learning aptitude they have. At FSP if you were an absolute weapon, and got a good wrap from your QFI, the OSB was almost a formality. Now I am not trying to start a discussion on the merits of FSP vs ASP, nor diminish anybody’s Achievements of passing ASP here, as from what I understand it is very hard with a high failure rate, I am merely building towards a point.
Now this is all just my opinion, but I know it is shared by many of my peers and I see no real reason why it would differ in the eyes of the people on your board, shy of towing the party line.
The point I have been building to, is that the OSB has always been a big part of the process, but I believe now more than ever it will be a much bigger discriminator than in the past, as every FSP candidate automatically sat a board, whereas it doesn’t sound that way for ASP. They also had a report and recommendation from an actual QFI vs just a test score. What this means for you guys out there, is you need to be well prepared and check your egos at the door as your job just got a little harder as they don’t know as much about you and your personality before you walk into that very scary door.
Now this brings me to the ultimate goal of this post, you are going to be assessed by people like me, with the same experience base, and the same expectations. We would be looking for the same things. I would like you all to think about the following 3 things:
Perception is reality. We only get to see you for a short amount of time, especially now with the introduction of ASP.
Respect is hard earned and easily lost.
Good bloke factor. Apologies to any ladies reading this, it applies to you too I just don’t really know how to word that. This will go a long long way in your favour.
Ultimately what the OSB are asking themselves throughout your interview, is would I want to be on Squadron with this person? If the answer is yes, you will get recommended.
Now back to having struck a chord....
On course we will often do a thing called buddy debriefing, where you will bring a buddy into your debrief and he listens to all your debrief points, warts and all, then you theirs. The aim of this not to embarrass, but to hopefully learn from others mistakes and triumphs, which may prevent you making the same mistake.
Now make no mistake about it, 80% of a debrief will focus on where you went wrong, the route cause and how to fix it. So students need to learn to accept constructive criticism very early on, and take what’s said in the debrief for the learning opportunity it is or they won’t last long. The biggest barrier to success is a student who believes they know more than the instructor, doesn’t accept their mistakes, and instead makes excuses. They won’t see through their own defensiveness and take the lessons on board, and in turn they won’t learn and improve. I have seen many a student like this suspended from course. Their own ego is their undoing.
The reality is as a student you don’t know what you don’t know. You need to trust in your QFI, they want to see you pass, if for nothing else than failing you is way to much hard work 😉
Now to Tayra and Hans, please consider this post your buddy debrief. You have both done some great work on here in helping others, and it sounds like more behind the scenes, I congratulate you on that and encourage you to keep it up, goes towards that good bloke factor(again sorry ladies)!
However from what I have seen you both also have had tendency’s to at times be the student with the barrier mentioned above, in that I have read some interactions with a combination of knowing better and with me excuse making and blaming others.
Now it is difficult to sometimes ascertain tone through writing, which can potentially skew what you are trying to say, I understand that, and I am only going off what I have read. In person you guys may be 180 out, but it would be remiss of me not to address this. Some of what you have written has bugged some fellow Aircrew and if I am being honest myself. Now remember as I said earlier we all think the same way. My concern is that if I have seen it here, it could come out in group activities at the OSB, which is basically being assessed by us.
As I said earlier respect is hard earned and easily lost, please remember that on here next time before biting back at somebody else. If they make an overly negative comment, take the high road and ignore it. Please don’t diminish all the good work you guys have done on this thread!
Not just to you two guys, but to everybody, read through the above again and take a critical look at yourselves and make an honest assessment. Does he make a valid point? Could I have handled that better? How could I react next time etc... The key to improvement is accepting that you can make mistakes, assess them and try to find a way from letting them re-occur.
So in finishing, please don’t take the debrief as a dig, but as a debrief is supposed to be taken. You can rest assured that you have both helped a lot of people out there, both intentionally and unintentionally.
I am on here as I am trying to help, and I would honestly like be nothing more than to see a post from you guys telling us all you will be starting some time soon.
Cheers
SHT