why use seniority for anything?
"Courts could find all sorts of seniority unlawful"......... Generalisations about seniority systems can be fraught with problems but there is a point which needs to be recognised about why seniority systems became particularly important in airline flight operations.
In general (and certainly in most other businesses) it is better when selecting individuals e.g. for promotion, to base it on merit rather than seniority, but seniority is a valid determinant in the specific case of pilots. When looking at a number of current employees to select for a particular purpose, the organisation needs to eliminate the unsuitable (i.e. those without the necessary qualification to do the job), then select the MOST suitable from those that are. However for routine selections such as filling flying positions where the day to day work is dominated by standard procedures (SOPs), the desired outcome of each operation is the same (e.g. the flight is carried out to a planned schedule) and one individual should be able to be routinely substituted by another without affecting the outcome of the operation (e.g. when the actual individual to do a specific job can be nominated in a rostering process), it’s hard to find a basis for deciding which is the MOST suitable based on past outcome or successful performance.
This doesn’t apply to management type positions or small business units where the tasks are not generally standardised, but is more true for pilots than any other profession that I am aware of. This is because ALL members of the candidate group are required to demonstrate their ability to perform the core function, to the satisfaction of an independent authority (specifically, a check pilot acting on behalf of the CAA) every 6 months, and are removed from the pool if they fail to meet the required standard.
That means that selecting on merit at performing the function is very difficult - every candidate has demonstrated a consistently high level of skill and it's very hard to show that one has been more successful than another. Other than by personal bias and preferences of the manager making the selection (which is highly undesirable in modern businesses) the only remaining way to judge whether pilot A is likely to be better than pilot B at performing the required function is then that a more experienced pilot is likely to better than a less experienced one. More experience, especially experience relevant to that company is generally marked by length of service with that company – i.e. seniority. Hence airlines found they generally get best results when filling pilot vacancies by stating a qualification to be met (suitability) and then appointing the most senior suitable person – everyone can see and understand the basis of selection. Doesn’t necessarily apply to other aspects of employment though!
Last edited by slast; 2nd Aug 2010 at 15:22.