foo fighting
I understand what you say, unfortunately you have to define ‘successful’, and in who’s view. It is usually successful in the eyes of your superior / government / shareholders. I admit as the airlines are shareholders, this could open up an interesting discussion.
Thus someone has been successful is someone who has achieved what has been asked of them, despite how badly the company may have performed.
In most companies senior managers are on personal contracts. I.E. there are terms that they have had some input into negotiating salary, bonus etc. They are not fixed by grade. Thus the usual level of benchmarking that has been applied could be described as ‘supply and demand’ .
How good at negotiating your conditions are you. Management will always say that there is no money, Look at all the industrial disputes form the past. How many times have you heard the words ‘Final offer’ only to find later a few more ££’s have been found. They are hardly going to say that they have £x available for pay increases but are only going to give you £x/2.
How good is the union at negotiating salary increases. I would have thought that you should have a fairly strong position.
1) Is there a shortage of staff
2) How long does it take to train new staff
3) How visible / what is the impact of a strike / industrial action.
However you have to be able to back up your claim. I remember that the Firemen at EGCC were very good at negotiating their pay rise. Why? They all stuck kept together, they had a union, management could not do their job, it takes a long time to train them, strike action was very effective.
On the other had if not much happens management will offer very little. Why should they ? When you do the shopping, you don’t pay more than you need, do you.
If you think that you are poorly paid, why have you not left for another job else where ? What selling points could you put on your CV for another job ? Everyone would like more !
Don’t get me wrong, you do a very difficult job in extremely difficult circumstances. I am only trying to suggest what may be being seen from the other side of the fence. If you can appreciate how management may be thinking, then you can use it to your advantage. Throwing insults at management won’t get you very far, you have to be smarter than that.