Obviously, the big picture is that the Mainlanders are pulling the strings at CX. Not a threat, just a statement of fact.
Big China with over one billion citizens has lots of available manpower to fill every vacant position at CX 100 times over at a fraction of current salaries paid. Anybody can be trained, re trained, tested and retested for a job. It takes time, but it can be done and it will be done. Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but soon, and forever.
So if you're planning a career for the future at CX, my unsolicited advice would be to lower your expectations, because this is as good as it gets!
CX is a Chinese carrier. Check up on the working conditions and pay of the Mainlanders who are flying the same equipment at: Shanghai Airlines, China Southern, China Southwest, China Northern, China Eastern, Air China.... As Westerners are we really in a position to dictate how a sovereign Chinese airline is to be managed and operated? As "guests" at a foreign comany in a foreign land, can we superimpose our Western philosophy of work standards and compensation? Hellooooooo.
PS. I'm not an airline manager, just an ordinary USA driver who has travelled a great deal, "been there done all that," and one who has an affinity for practical reality.
Cheers 