Well for a start Thank God to see some reasoned debate!
Many of the posts have offered varying views on the thread and many have merit and raise different issues. This is the great thing about a somewhat anarchistic communication forum, you will always get some dross but on the whole this thread makes interesting reading.
The main thrust of the replies in the affirmative is that the multiple changes of pilots and cabin staff in some way imposes a time pressure on the crew thereby compromising safety. The reply from 'no sig', apparently a member of eJ NMC, refutes this and I am sure all line crews at eJ would have to agree with him.. albeit I am not a Captain at eJ but I know of NO instance where a crew has been time pressured to meet a schedule by anyone other than themselves. Sure we get encouraged to try and meet OTP targets and the company sets us some demanding tasks but never have I heard of eJ actually pushing anyone at all to cut corners in any way. This is first and foremost a safety oriented company.
Those in the negative seem to generally follow the reasoning of: Our job as Pilots is just that.. Pilotage = the action or business of piloting and the guidance of ships or airplanes from place to place (a funny word few will recognise
) but I am unable to find in any definition of that word a reference to schedule management or time pressure. This may seem like semantic pedantry but I do really believe that we are NOT managers, we are operators... OK we get the sharp end view of the operation and have much to offer the ‘office managers’ in addition to our hard earned skills, licences and experience, if they choose to heed it.. but the fundamental remains.. our function is to operate safely.. Pilotage refers soley to the operation of a vehicle from one place to another. The safety of that operation finally rests solely with the Pilot/s, ultimately the Captain.
Just a note on the idea of briefing before a flight:
If instead of doing one ‘first flight of the day’ briefing you have to do four then so be it. The crew room is just a meeting place with information readily to hand, all that same information is available in the aircraft. You can brief just as well sitting in your 'office chair with a view' as you can standing around a table, in some way you are not distracted when in the aircraft
The onus is on the individuals to ensure we do our jobs well and I can honestly say that at the sharp end in eJ we do! So we come again to the issue of time pressure..and I think that it is the change away from the traditional flight preparation process that some find disconcerting rather than a concern that we don’t get enough time to prepare for a sector or series thereof. We are an innovative company and some of the innovations need a bit of tuning.. but like any orchestra with a new melody we all need to concentrate on and play our respective parts, if we do that to the best of our ability then we give the ‘conductor’ the best chance of tuning things to make a harmonious operation. We will always take all the time that is needed to play our part well, and there will be no questioning that. Let the ‘conductor’ rearrange the score. Again I stress, DON'T RUSH!
Just so ppl don’t think I am here as a company sycophant, I am as unhappy as everybody else with the levels of disruption to our personal lives currently being experienced. It has made an otherwise highly motivated and procompany group of employees quite unhappy and it needs VERY urgent attention. In ways this thread is emotionally hijacked by this quite different issue and I will risk airing my thoughts on it.
A roster is published not for conformance with FTLs or any other piece of legislation, that could be done without ever publishing a roster. A roster is published well in advance of the scheduled duties so that we, the operating crews, can have certainty and predictability in our personal lives in a very varied shift working environment.
Our job as Pilots and Cabin Crew is unique in many ways, only one of which is the strange hours we are required to work so that our companies remain successful in a highly competitive environment, it is completely different from just about any other job you can name. We have no public holidays, regular weekends, are away from our families and friends at important times, required to sleep away from our homes on a regular baisis etc etc.. but it is all part of the turf. We get some extra leave for it..but in reality that does little to compensate.. I would gladly give up the additonal leave to fly a 40 duty hour week Monday to Friday, have Christmas, Easter, Public Holidays and special family days off etc etc. Nor does any other job that comes to mind have you trying to change your circadian rythym nearly 36 hours in a week of duties. Starting with very early getups and then finishing work at almost the same time you were getting up (sounds like Monty Python
) by the end of the week is ridiculous and places very heavy and pretty much unnecessary strains on us as humans operating in a high stakes, complex and challenging environment let alone as people with families, friends and lives of our own. This is the error, IMVHO, that is causing the current problem at eJ. A lack of consideration and forethought of the human aspects of what is otherwise probably a profit maximising system. We have been assured that this major problem is to be addressed so lets wait and see a bit. Just remember: Our jobs are not our life, our jobs are what we do to support our lives and our lives should be prioritised above any profit/financial goals. Not very orange perhaps but I hope relasistic.