Originally Posted by
elcrusoe
Like what kind of possibilities do we have other then controlling a/c and well entering the dark side of management? What kind of oppurtunities do we have?
I dunno how big the company you work for is but in larger ones (or Eurocontrol) there should be opportunities to use your ATC experience. Engineers are not ATC and when they design new systems they need expert knowledge from the users. Obviously active controllers are the best source, however they're not always available. So there are people who are the interface between the ATC and the engineering world. People with a very good knowledge of ATC and how it works, who can talk ATC talk and convey requirements to the engineers. People who are much more easily available than controllers, who can schedule meetings, who have time to become familiar with engineering speak, management speak and project speak.
This job does not mean that controllers get left out of the loop, far from it because without user buy in you might as well not bother with the project. It does mean that new and future systems (not to mention existing systems which need to be sustained) have an ATC focal point with sufficient expertise to keep things on track.
I'm one of those people and there are quite a few of us in the division. What you never see in the operational world is just how much behind the scenes effort goes into things like resectorisations or new tools or even just keeping what you've got going.
BD