Skilled migration strengthens Australian aviation

[Erin Brockovich]

Nice immigration promo

These people recognise that Australia is the greatest place on earth to live and work…………..and day's work long but honest.

Give them a few years living in reality and they’ll soon form their own opinions, which you’ll find to be the same as everyone else living here. A day’s work long but honest, but not for a fair day’s pay anymore. As much as they ‘love the place’, they will still need to live on the buying power of the local dollar. If they get remunerated the same as the locals then they will have the same problems with housing affordability and the like. The Aussie dream will disappear!

The sponsorship is easy, especially when you balance that by the commitment and dedication these people show when you give them the opporunity of a lifetime

Imagine the commitment and dedication your local staff would show if you gave them a little something back? Strange concept I know. Loyalty and respect is usually demanded and not questioned.

It’s a shame you see your greatest asset, your local staff, as ungrateful and uncommitted. Maybe it is a culture that ‘The Company’ has created within.

[numbskull]

I think the key quote from " The company" is that "they each dropped a significant sum for choosing to come and work in Australia"

How long do you think it will take to realise that their managers are a bunch of #ickheads and that they get substandard payrises year after year no matter how hard they work.

Their wives will complain that they left all their family and friends to come here and they can't afford to buy a house within 50 km of the city or have any of the luxuries that they would like.

How long do you think it will take for the rose coloured glasses to to come off??

I'm not knocking them. Good Luck to them. They can have my job because I got sick of putting up with it.

[poacher2gamekeeper]

THE COMPANY has its own "illusions of grandure"

Bad Company, you are prompting some instant and emotional responses which I suspect is your very intention in signing up.

Quote "Frankly anyone who comes out here to work, is genuine, and under no illusion of grandure."

What you meant to say was:

"Delusions of Grandeur" - A gross and false overestimation of personal worth, importance, powerfulness, or attractiveness.

Sounds more like your mob given what you have revealed of yourself so far in your first post!

Look forward to more insights into your company's modus operandi.

Also,

Quote "I must say that they are the most grateful dedicated employees we have."

Try speaking of your local staff in a proper way to start with and you might get some loyalty from them in return.

P2G

[Long Bay Mauler]

So Company please tell me why you cannot get your new employees from the pool of labour right here in Australia?

Don't you train your staff?Don't you promote within the ranks?What is wrong at your company that you cannot do either of these 2 things?What about encouraging school/university leavers to join your company?Are the people you are recruiting from o'seas really dropping alot of cash to join you?Are you not offering "real" wages that keep up with the cost of CPI,inflation,housing,etc in Australia?

And before you think I am being anti-foreign,I would say to you some of my best work colleauges are from o'seas and yes they generally do have a fantastic work ethic.But my earlier post was more about training Aussies already here,those who want a start or more career progression in avaition.

I think its a joke of Mark Vaile to say there is a shortage of engineers in Australia.I mean,Qantas has laid off over 1000 LAMEs in the previous 2 years with the closure of Heavy Maintenance in Sydney and the loss of the Singapore Airlines contract in Line Maintenance,plus how many ex-Ansett engineers are still out there.Call me cynical,but how can there be a massive shortage in Australia when the big companies keep making engineers redundant.There are still 20+ engineers in Melbourne Line Maintenance who have been told they are redundant who will leave Qantas in the next 6-12 months.Plus what about the 20 who have just left?

I am sure that the definition of redundant means that the position and skill set is no longer required.So why is there a massive shortage?

C'mon,either Mark is gunning for a board seat at Qantas or he is helping them to get a sc@b labour force together to bust the ALAEA and its members during their stalled wage negotiations.

P.S. By the way,Pauline didnt coin the phrase "Asian Invasion".It has been a long spoken expression in Oz,especially in the early 1980's.

[QF 744]

I HEAR SINGAPORE HAVE SOME QUALITY MAINTENANCE FACILITIES,PERHAPS QANTAS CAN GO OVER THERE AND BRING BACK SOME HIGH CALIBER ENGINEERS WITH STAPLE GUNS IN TOW....

[Romulus]

What about John Holland?Are they going to be recruiting apprentices?I bet not?

Nice call.

Now the choice is yours, you can be a mouth or you can back up your statement and put something up. I'll call your bet.

What are you prepared to bet that we won't have a significant apprenticeship scheme?

How about everything you own? I'll match that with equal value.

So, are you going to be a mouth or are you going to actually commit? Make it a lesser commitment if you like, there's very little more satisfying than watching a big mouth try to act all tough then run away from his words when challenged.

Let me know what you're prepared to bet on your statement and we'll dance.

This is where the government via the office of Mark Vaile has dropped the ball by not encouraging the bigger maintenance operators of the country to recruit enough young people into the industry.

Can't speak for QF but we are certainly getting a lot of their time. Same goes for the Vic State Govt as well.

This current Federal Govt has not supported Australias engineers.They have allowed thousands of engineers to disappear from the market by allowing Qantas to close down faciltities and supposedly making engineers redundant,not making it a condition of Virgin starting prior to the collapse of Ansett to train their own engineers from the start,and not making sure that the people who maintain Australia's aircraft are paid good money for the service their labour provides.

Ah, yes, good old governemnt bailouts.

Simple fact is the money has to come from somewhere, so you either pay it as taxes or you pay it as fares or whatever. If you want efficient air travel then we need to get on the ball of beating SIAEC etc by being smart enough to do it in house. We think we have an option that works and various parties are talking to us about it.

Simple as that.

I blame Mark Vaile all the previous DOTARS ministers in order Hon Warren Truss MP,Hon John Anderson MP,Hon John Cobb MP,Senator The Hon Ian Campbell,Hon Wilson Tuckey MP,Senator the Hon Ron Boswell,Senator the Hon Ian Macdonald,Hon Mark Vaile MP,Hon Alex Somlyay MP,Hon Michael Ronaldson MP,Hon John Sharp MP & Senator the Hon Grant Tambling for allowing this rot to happen to what is an essential industry for the economy.SHAME!!

Blame is such an easy way out.

[The Company]

So Company please tell me why you cannot get your new employees from the pool of labour right here in Australia?

We recruit from the local market too. I did not say that our total employee growth was being supported by overseas people.

However, there are a number of barriers we face with the local market.

The most significant is skill shortage, complimented by the opportunity to engage people with a very broad range of skill and experience from other operators, regulators, states and countries. There is a skill shortage in Australia, and when growing a business one must have access to skills to be quick to market, fast to respond.

Another significant barrier we face is competition for quality people here in Australia. Competition from other operators, regulators, vendors and clients as the aviation market grows and grows. People are going offshore, always have, always will, and we have a strategy to meet this leakage with imports. Simple Keynsian response to the curves.

We don't lose people because of money. We pay the same rates as our LCC cousins, and in most cases more. Some of our captains earn as much as 40% over award. Some of our FO's earn the same over award return. Thank John for AWA's, we are a company that proves the lefty mantra is as hollow as KR's genuine nature.

We lose pilots because of red, orange, white, teal and other vivid coloured jets.

We don't lose engineers.

We like management people from backgrounds that have been there seen that.

We are keen to train Aussies with more skills, and will continue to do so. You paint a picture that we are just plain stupid. Of course we train locals and give them skills. We are just trying justify pouring hundreds of thousands of dollars into the development of the skill set for Brett Godfrey, Geoff Dixon, Michael O'Leary and Alan Joyce. Because it is FACT that the last five captains we have lost have all left us to take less money and more overnights within 12 months of being trained. Why did they leave? According to the independent exit interviews, because of the red, orange, white etc jet.

The fact there was already fans bolted to the airframe does not count.

As for the silly comment that "oh we'll see, couple of years and they will run away" is said like someone well practiced at staying in something for 12-18 months. You should not need to do much research to find that for every 100 foreign workers coming to Australia, 99 stay. And the other was Haneef!

[bushy]

12-18 months.

The major airlines have for many years poached pilots from GA and recently developed the "transient" mentality which is killing GA and is now common in the major airlines.
It is difficult to refine operations when you are working with a continual steam of beginners who leave before they really get to be good at what they do, and have no interest in what will happen next year. The regionals are feeling this now, and the majors are becoming aware of it.
They are asking for, and will probably get govt assistance, so they do not have to spend money on training people who have no intention of staying.

[The Company]

Very true Bushy. It is a barrier that I really feel we as operators are not putting up.

I however will not hold my breath for Govt assistance. Unless you are DJ or JQ or QF, no Government, State or Federal, will offer much help. The best help in these situations is our own tenacity.

And it is not just aviation. Speak to any of the professions, and the lawyers are putting in a year or two at XYZ and graduate accountants putting in same at ABC. Then moving on in the eternal quest for partnership or similar. Very few stay in jobs more than three years now. We are just tuning into that channel.

We hear so many bang on about "oh pay us more, work us less and we will stay longer". "Give us the training, and we promise you that we will show you value for money", is generally untrue, when 80% will jump ship for a wink and nudge from someone with a bag of boiled lollies. But these kids have to pay for the ride and nothing will stop them.

And it is no longer the cross of the GA operator to bear. We are copping it, as are DJ by EK, QF by CX, CX by QF, and so on. This is the new age of staff cannibalisation, and we believe if we sit out here on our little island and not look further than 7 miles out to see, we will just eventually run out of experience.

Anyone who has spend time in the likes of the European market will know the next thing around the corner for aviation is contract crew/engineers companies. Maybe we have already started.

[freddyKrueger]

And it is not just aviation. Speak to any of the professions, and the lawyers are putting in a year or two at XYZ and graduate accountants putting in same at ABC. Then moving on in the eternal quest for partnership or similar. Very few stay in jobs more than three years now. We are just tuning into that channel.

Please remind us who let that Gennie out of the bottle. Employers have used insecurity as a fear tool for the last 20 years.
Times, they are a changing.

[Toolman101]

We don't lose engineers

Where is this shangri-la

It must be heaven to work for such a great company that people don't leave

[Gen. Anaesthetic]

Leadership

Hi All,

While I do not want to stoop to the level of negative comment that seems to be so prevalent around here, I find it quite astounding that there is little or no mention of the need for an effective, positive culture and leadership within this industry. At the end of the day, I, and I expect many others would be just like me, go to work not just because of the money and conditions, but in fact primarily because of the quality people that exist in my work place. This unfortunately has all but disappeared in the Australian aviation scene, and it seems to really stand out when you compare other aviation environments around the world, for example the US. Depending on where you go, pilots are often paid a pittance over there, but many of them stay in the industry because they are given a dignified existence even if it doesn't mean a lot of money. Ok that is obviously a gross generalisation but I have experienced it first hand myself and can claim some knowledge of the situation.

With all the talk of what needs to be done to fix this industry up, surely one of the first steps must be that people at least interact with each other with more respect and dignity than seems to be common right now. When we get to the level of frustration that exists now, there is only one way for the industry to go, and that is down. I note with frustration the management rebuttal that appears to inflame and retaliate rather than promote any common sense of purpose. And on the pilot's side there is clearly a lot that can improve as well. In the days when I was a professional pilot I suffered a very strong sense of "the grass must be greener" and felt very hard done by my employers, but the fact is that my life in the corporate world has been only slightly less brutal in many ways. Life is tough, what makes it tougher is when people get stuck in the loop of making others feel like c--p just because they are having a tough time of things themselves. While I hate to see people misuse the term, the karmic effect of cause and effect in the big picture cannot be forgotten. It's much better to dig yourself out of a hole rather than pull others down with you.

We're all in this together. We're all part of the solution or we are all part of the problem. It's up to us how we resolve it. Emotionally charged responses beget further emotion but little in the way of progress.

FYI I flew for a regional for a few years, and have since worked in my own company, one of the big 4 accounting firms, and in the finance industry. I've seen a lot, but what I am seeing now in corporate Australia and society more broadly is a worrying trend towards depersonalisation of doing business and maintaining the primary interest of shareholders. I have seen a lot of presentations and arguments for why the shareholder must come first, but I can tell you as a shareholder that I would rather see my investee companies creating an effective social outcome just as much as a financial one. In this sense I think that our airlines would be well served to be more transparent in their approach to managing and communicating the triple bottom line (finance, environment, society).

Some will find this post full of nice ideas and suggest that the real world doesn't allow such behaviour to go on, but I contend that the resilience of organisations is going to decrease markedly (i.e. companies will go down) unless they consider this in greater detail. Indeed there is a considerable amount of management research that suggests this is real, and indeed there are many organisations out there that are succeeding extremely well because of a focus on this stuff.

I hope this inspires some useful discussion and I look forward to hearing from you all.

[Erin Brockovich]

True leadership is an extremely rare thing these days. Non existent in our industry in Aus at the moment.

Great post Gen. I agree with you whole heartedly but, I also believe that ‘companies will go down’ before they start investing in their staff again.

Firstly respect and dignity needs to be shown through remuneration. We primarily work for these companies to earn money. That is what makes the world go round, puts a roof over our heads and food in our stomaches. A pat on the back will only go so far and we don’t even get that.

Unfortunately because of the conditions on offer currently the quality of people keeps changing. Everone is searching for bigger and better because they can’t afford to stay, regardless of how much they enjoy working with their colleagues. I love my job but I hate the associated bullsh$t. I hate paying the mortgage and having nothing left over. I suppose it doesn’t matter because I’m too tired after working max duty and shifts to go out anyway.

There are only two solutions. Make the companies pay, or ideally have the companies realise that their staff are the key. Healthy staff, healthy business that looks after itself.

[blackhander]

The problem as I see it is that the 'leadership' seem to be fixated on the bottom line because that's what affects their bonuses.
No thought or care about what happens in the longer term because by then the bank account is healthy and they've moved on leaving someone else to pick up the pieces.
Having happy, engaged and well remunerated staff doesn't necessarily acheive these goals.

[chimbu warrior]

Who is this "Company"?

Perhaps The Company should offer a few details about his operation, so that Aussies can decide for themselves if it is a good opportunity.

Despite the movement in the Australian industry there are still people who do not want to join an LCC or go overseas.

[virgindriver]

Here is a story from an Auckland newspaper a couple weeks ago.

Sound familiar?

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/topic/stor...ectid=10450719

[bellsux]

From my side of the fence (GA) we do need skilled migrants. The money is good and the conditions are as well, yes there are some places I wouldn't want to work but I do have a choice and I can pick and choose where I go. Most GA companies are growing and there is not enough skilled workers in the hangar, we do have apprentices but it does take time to train them. Sure we can look back and say we should have trained more but the fact is that there are not enough LAME's in the hangar to get the job done. I will work overtime or weekends if I choose to to but I don't want to be forced to do it because there is no one else around to get the job done. For the LAME's coming over here for a lifestyle change they would find it easier to get a 457 sponsorship from a GA company and probably enjoy living in a regional community rather than a city. It is a shame that we don't see even a small percentage of all these LAME's made redundant coming over and giving it a try...

[LME-400]

It is a shame that we don't see even a small percentage of all these LAME's made redundant coming over and giving it a try...

Airlines put a lot of "infrastructure" around their LAME's.

I would assume there would be a big learning curve moving to GA.

[Charlie Foxtrot India]

I have a couple of students who want to train to become LAMEs - but have had no luck getting an apprenticeship.

[Grassmere Avenue]

what the....!

Mr James Russell....
Contact 02 9554 9399 for assistance.
State who you are, where you are from, your situation and see what can be done to assist you.