Reading through many of the posts, I am amazed at how much more difficult finding a flying job is nowadays.
In my time, I was never asked for a resume, no one ever asked to look at my licence that I recall, people sort of knew about each other. My only flying 'interview' was for a corporate job where the boss also interviewed my husband to explain that I could be days away from my home.
Flying theory subjects back then, people learned by correspondence, with the Sydney TAFE then starting up the School of Navigation for flying subjects at night. There were no schools linked to any of the airline carriers. Most folks did their flying training at weekends in your local aerro club or a local flying school, later some of the wealthier students started doing their training full-time in a relatively short space of time.
I got my 1st job as a flying instructor back with Camden Aero Club in 1974, of which I had been a club member & did my PPL & CPL training through the club. I didn't need to apply for the job, the club, which had become a weekend training organisation for a while, 'coz the previous full-timer had moved on, & it needed a full-time instructor, & I was there wanting to get into flying.
So the club arranged for me to pay off my instructor rating through them. Once qualified, I worked full-time on my own from day 1, with the part-time CFI coming in at the end of his working day as a school teacher, checking how the day's proceedings had gone. I stayed with the club for about 5 years. The work was great, I loved instructing, but decided on upscaling to twin & IFR qualifications.
I then quit & did freelance charter for a few months before applying for a corporate pilot job that the previous pilot was about to quit. In my corporate flying time, the company sent me off to the USA to get endorsed on a new Mitsubishi version, the MU2B-60 (not yet in Australia), as the boss wanted to trade in our current Aerostar to lease an MU2.
It was a wonderful learning experience! The MU2 was a great aircraft to fly, as was the Aerostar. The boss had a mercurial temper & could be difficult. Unfortunately, the corporate job didn't last as the company was slack with the lease payments & the aircraft was repossessed after about a year & half.
Went back to freelance charter & night freight for several years to give me time for studying my ATPL subjects, before getting a full-time job in night freight with Norfolk Airlines in 1987. I quit the company when it lost its night freight contract to the opposition freighter about 3 years later. Although flying was offered to me in another division of NA, but by this time in my flying career, I was tired of living out of a travel bag. In hindsight, my decision turned out to be wise, as NA went out of existence, going bust some 9 months after my quitting, owing money to pilots & others.
The flying game has changed, & also many airlines have gone bust, such as Ansett, TAA, East-West Airlines, Impulse Airlines in times gone by, & newer airlines such as Tigerair, Australian Airlines, Bonza, to name a few from more recent times & that's just here in Australia & not counting other country's airlines !!
But then many types of jobs outside of aviation have disappeared or changed too, prior to flying, I was doing technical drawings/drafting by hand, which is done on computer now, I believe.
In my humble opinion airline tickets are too cheap, & the airlines obviously haven't got sufficient $$ reserves to get past difficult times. Operating an airline with its myriad of ongoing daily expenses, it doesn't seem to adequately allow for things like unexpected major repairs, or even when needing to divert to alternates with extra fuel, maybe accommodation, or even a crew change when they run out of flying hours, & consequently they go bankrupt.
Just my rambling thoughts, I think it's best to have some other skills or qualifications to fall back on when jobs change or disappear, so one can pay the bills & eat.
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