The following is distilled from my experience with the interview process. In qualification, that was a couple of years ago and the ravages of time have not been kind with the specifics, however, as I understand it the general topics and conduct remain similar.
The interview is around an hour in duration and are conducted nowadays by a three person panel consisting of a
VB HR representative and a couple of PB line drivers. I found it to be a pretty relaxed atmosphere where the aim appeared to be to get a feeling for you as an individual rather than an in depth oral examination. Questions on the following topics were asked:
- Aviation background and experience, as well as a chat about your personal circumstances; family, interests, hobbies etc.
- Motivation for employment with PB, why not other carriers? Bit of background knowledge of the company; structure, fleet, routes etc.
- Some discussion on technical subjects. I was asked questions on high speed flight/aerodynamics and runway factors (TORA, TODA, ASDA, climb segments etc.)
- Questions relating to PB's operations were also covered. I recall having a bit of a yarn about Oceanic procedures and my understanding of things like ETOPS, RVSM, and RNP. I was a little hazy on that stuff as it wasn't something I had done a lot of.
- Safety topics, incidents from flying and how I resolved them. Bit of CRM and conflict resolution, which was scenario based and explored how I would have dealt with the situation.
I hope that this has been of some help to those of you with interviews coming up. If there's anything else you'd like to know, ask and I'll do my best to answer!
Good luck...
IRD