Senior ATCO you have no idea, do you?
I'm not sure whether ferris has worked in SA (or is working here currently), but I have to agree with his "insult". He also has a good grasp of management, especially ATNS management.
While you and many so called helpful ANSP's are there to support ATNS in their hour of need, the management team are only there to help themselves!!
ATNS has known about SWC 2010 since 2006, and what have they done? they've embarked on a pointless retention strategy, which has, or will blow up in a very spectacular fashion.
Regarding ATC's, they've done fairly little. About 8 months ago, they approached Swiss ATC's, without the knowledge of the Union or Proffessional Association. That didn't go down that well. There most recent endeavour was to recruit Swedes. The salary they stated in the ad was "wrong".
Why should I train you, if you will be earning twice my cost-to-company while you will be here (that's without relocation)? After your "African adventure", do you know what we ATNS'ers will be left with? I'll tell you, a company full of promises about a big fat bonus, which will never happen.
Let me give you a rundown of 2 of our senior managers; Firstly there is the Executive Manager: Service Delivery (quite important, don't you think?). This is a person that has no idea of ATC, or even aviation. She used to work at a local airline which operates Dash 8-C's. Her contribution to saving money was that there should only be one pilot in the cockpit, because why do they need two crew in the cockpit anyway. She does even write her own e-mails pertaining to Service Delivery, because she has no clue as to what to write!!!
Secondly, there is the Senior Manager: Operations. He was never a good ATC to start with, so management was his next step.WHAT A BULLSH!TTER. He has no idea of ATC. He can never give a striaght answer. There is never a simple "yes" "no" with him. His latest brain-fart is that we should not have stadby duties at all, because get this, if the standby is not activated, that means there is a ATC sitting at home doing nothing!!
Acooring to him we should then just combine sectors and the TFC should stay on the ground.
Fact is ATNS manages like an Ostrich. When the sh!t hits the fan, the hide there heads in a hole (often there own assholes) and hope for the best.
About youor comment that we have a choice to leave if we're not happy; yes the ooption is there, and is being persued by many at this time, and a whole lot more in about a year or so. The downside to this is that you leave everything you know behind, which is not entirely a bad thing. If things don't work out for you though, and you return to the employ of ATNS, your new THREE YEAR contract will state that you have no pension benefit, and also that ATNS can give you a month notice to terminate your employment, without having to give a reason for said termination.
All I can say is: "nice ATNS. Best company to work for, my lilly white
!!!"