British Airways DEP Selection - THE lowdown Part 1

[goaroundnow]

Hi Guys

I thought I would share with you my experience during 2008 selection.

I passed all the stages and was in the hold-pool, so it may be useful!

First of all I went to stage 1 in May 2008 and read this thread thoroughly before I went. It was extremely useful and pretty accurate (as far as I can remember).

Here's some points I remember about Day 1

- Informal, relaxed and professional
- About 6 of us (this was a low number, I believe)
- Group Exercise first - don't be too shy or pushy, fit-in, have an opinion and make sure you listen to other people! 4 assessors sat in each corner of the room watching, listening and making notes!
- Take lunch - long day and good chance to chat
- At some point you are all sat down and given salary, pension, roster details.
- Apart from group exercise, everybody is doing things at different times.
- Interview - relaxed, all the questions on this thread were there (culture, risk, team work, CRM, fuel hedging etc). Was always given time to think of the answer. Was guided if going off track or they wanted more info about something I had said. Time went quickly (about 45 mins). 2 people (1 pilot and 1 HR) interviewing.
- Computer tests - ranged from easy (suitcase man) to extremely difficult (capacity test). I used Cockpit Web to practice and it was very accurate and true to the real thing. Look at other posts for more info as they were accurate and I cannot remember every test that was there.
- Written tests - Numerical Reasoning was very easy maths (except 1 or 2 questions) but extreme time pressure. Trick here is to not get bogged down with a question - MOVE ON. All questions the same score. Verbal Reasoning was very time pressured and quite difficult. The examples you can find on the Internet are the correct format but none seemed to match BA's difficulty level.

I got the "successful" call the next morning. Sim was about 1 month later.

Sim:

Don't remember much but here goes:

- B747-400 sim
- Speeds etc sent to you before
- 1 hour briefing before with assessor, including going through layout of cockpit etc.
- 2 of you at assessment
- Each flying for about 45 mins.
- Given 10 minutes non-assessed handling practice before your PF turn.
- Landing NOT assessed - assessment ends at decision.
- It's a "line" flight. Mine was MAN - LHR with diversion to LGW.
- Autopilot above FL100
- Below FL100 all manual, raw-data.
- PFD and ND set to rose (I think)
- Mine was a pretty basic SID from MAN to a hold at LHR before diverting to LGW for R/V ILS.
- No system/engine malfunctions
- CRM definitely a BIG part
- We weren't asked any questions when PF or PM but some people have been.
- Asked at end on your thoughts re performance - BE HONEST, don't try to hide a screw-up.
- I flew with a 4000 hour Airbus guy who hadn't trimmed a plane since training - he struggled. I was current on B737NG with 500 hours (at the time) and so some of the battle (layout, trimming etc) was won!

Got successful "you're in pool" call next day, too.

Hope this helps. I know most of it's repeated but it may save some people scrolling though this long thread.