I went to 2006 and 2005 EOCs.
Definitely a different tone this year - the now-traditional show of hands to determine the experience profile of the audience revealed markedly fewer low-timers (my estimate around 10% this year compared with 75%+ last year). Numbers were also well down - last year was oversubscribed (400+) and attendance this year was around 240 according to the organisers. There were a number of military pilots and more in the 1500+TT band this year too.
Airline presentations were similar to last year (even the Taiwan/ China jokes from China Airlines
) but more cautious – with the exception of Easyjet, no one was banding large recruitment figures about though all presenters were up-beat in general. With the odd exception (some 13000 hour American with a chip on his shoulder
), questions were few and to the point. Several airlines (e.g. EZY, MYT, TC, FC) seem now to have two distinct targets – low time integrated from Oxford or Jerez or CTC (poor old Cabair!) or 1500TT+ turbo or twin FOs
. For those of us somewhere in the middle options are more limited, though the difference between what they want and what they get means I’m not overly worried right now!
A last minute change meant that the usual (and in my view slightly patronising) ‘chin-up’ speech from some newly-trained FO didn’t happen, with Capt Nathan Burkitt from Thomsonfly giving the pep talk instead. I thought he did well given the short notice, though a lot of it was obvious advice.
The afternoon informal session had less of a bun-fight atmosphere, due to the lower numbers attending and the fact that nearly all the companies stated clearly they would not be taking CVs (on-line is the future folks!). BMI Baby was swamped, as was Jet2 for the reasons already mentioned. Cathay was deserted (not surprising given the average experience in the room) but did give away natty little 747 fridge magnets.
Overall? As a job fair, not much use really but then I don’t think that’s the intention. As a networking opportunity (with fellow Wannabes as well as airline bods) and a chance to put faces to names etc, well worth it in my view and I think £55 is fair, for the record.
Roll on the PPRuNe seminar now…