Qantas’ search for female pilots has led to more workplace harassment - Quartz
 

QF hiring more female pilots leads to more victims of sexual harassment in the #MeToo era:



https://finance.yahoo.com/news/qanta...194051247.html

Any announcement of gender parity in the cabin crew ranks? In the hangar? Check in staff? Bag loaders? ...

Who says 50% of women want to be a pilot? Do 50% of men want to be nurses, hairdressers, beauticians etc?

How interesting.

There is no place for harassment or intimidation of any sort in any workplace.


Consider this..
Sunrise looks doomed.

Short and Long Haul EBA's are front and centre.

To facilitate the above, a requirement for pilots to be the bad guys in the eyes of the public.

QF pilots are now portrayed as misogynistic workplace bullies.

I can see where this is going.........

There needs to be acceptance in the general population that Aviation is hard for everybody, it's not because you are a girl that it is hard and somehow you need special treatment.

The problem with this whole quota issue is that it drives resentment from men and woman who made alot of sacrifices and put up with alot just to get into an airline.

What's your point? I've known plenty of male pilots (myself included) who've also come out of an assessment believing that we've stuffed it up and don't have a chance of getting the job, but then were successful. Maybe we're just humble and too hard on how we performed for such an important event?

And plenty of pilots (male and female) who've come out of a recruiting assessment loudly proclaiming they totally aced it, and are guaranteed of a job. And when the rejection letter arrives it wasn't their fault, the recruiters were too biased/stupid/blind to see their obvious brilliance...

With well placed stories in the daily rags lamenting the "lack of agreement" on the "amazing Project Sunrise" pilots ought realise that this is now open season.

Obstructionist, kamikaze and now misogynist.

That airlines have a "gender inbalance" is ironically due to the reality that there actually are less women in aviation. Also less in some trades and under representation in the armed forces in some areas.
Is it that women choose other vocations? Yes, quite often it is. The US BLS conducted a long term longitudinal study in "the gender pay gap" finding a small one existed. The cause of it likely to be choice: Women were traditionally attracted to roles with less remuneration.

When the CEO openly states that it is now policy to hire more women pilots is it a surprise that there are more women pilots?

Didn't Qantas have a whole course of female pilots for International Women's day?
What an "amazing" coincidence that despite under representation in the industry, "the best pilots Qantas had on hold all happen to be women, all on International Women's day"

Once it was merit, now gender apparently matters.
Discrimination fixes apparent discrimination.
The mind boggles as to the crewing arrangement should these pilots decide that they would also like children.

This in spades

I would hope for no harassment of any kind but it's rather astounding to have it reported just now. Who would thunkd it

It is contract season after all.

I guess that there is a pay gap between the CEO and the CP.

It does make a good conspiracy theory, and it does look like there is more to Sunrise than the official company line, but rest assured if management want to can it commissioning a year long independent study into work practices for the sole purpose to put the blame onto a group of your employees it isn't necessary. There are solid reasons to deal with potential harassment and bullying issues amongst all employee groups.

No. The course that started in the month of IWD this year (March) was 50% female. The course that started previously was 100% male, the course that started after was 95% male. Overall I'm told unofficially the % of new hire females is roughly similar to the percentage of female applicants.

Also been unofficially told that over the course of a pilots career male pilots are more likely to take extended periods off work due injury and illness than female pilots due pregnancy. The thought being men, especially older men, have higher rates of chronic illness and and younger men are more likely to undertake extreme and adventure sports that make them more prone to long term injury.

I read both the black widow and hailstones emails.

They are going to need a scalp, and need one soon

Just for men will be decidedly nervous right now.

How can you be sexually harassed in these days of gender fluidity?

On a serious note I have a close friend who job is to recruit more women for the ADF. She has complained about the level of entitlement of young women these days who, fully aware of their desirability in the virtue signalling game, act as if their recruitment and preferential advancement into the ADF is but assured.

Other tensions arise from the assumption that women on promotional lists are there for quota purposes; which infuriates those who got there on merit.

The same applies in QF; those most loudly decrying these quotas are the old school female pilots. It's No Win from all perspectives.

Thats probably true but in my experience a large percentage of women drop by the wayside over the span of the average career. Few seem to want to be 60 year old pilots.

Ah, no one? Literally no one is saying that.

That is an interesting perspective Captain.
There are those females who are just good. They get there on merit.
Isn't that the idea?
Merit based recruitment.

Specifying discrimination to assure an outcome is just discrimination, no matter the alleged premise.

Our first Australian female airline pilot is still going strong. There probably haven't been enough female pilots to undergo a full career to make an accurate assessment yet.

If there were quotas that would be an issue. There aren't.

This thread has drifted, there are already enough threads here about female/male pilots, gender quotas in employment etc.

This is about pilots and cabin crew being subjected to harassment and bullying, both males and females.

I've been (straight white male, before people make assumptions I'm speaking on behalf of some fantasy fictitious sisterhood) QF tech crew for 20 years. There is nothing surprising to me in this report.

I have flown with many of the senior female pilots too. All of them have been totally pleasant to fly with. The only pilot in Qantas I absolutely refuse to fly with is a male, and the only ones I see on the roster and roll my eyes thinking "hang in there - you don't have to socialise with them" are also male.

I have spoken personally to junior female pilots who have been concerned that they are "assumed" to be there only due to recruitment quotas. I have also spoken to more than one male pilot who has decided that they will assume the same thing, which is pretty disappointing. I would've thought they'd give them the benefit of doubt before passing judgement. I've had one pilot say to me with a straight face that female pilots shouldn't be rostered together because all they'll do is argue (obviously hasn't been paying attention to many eye watering stories of male-male cockpit interactions over the years!).

Anyway I can relay many comments which have stuck in my head over these years, including quite recently, which have really raised my eyebrows. Unfortunately they're often preceded by "it's probably not politically correct to say this, but....... (insert asinine derogatory comment here)". I often wish I could respond with "But you had to ****ing say it anyway, didn't you?" but there are CRM issues to contend with when you're at 39,000ft so it can be quite difficult to address it.

Yes this is a "minority" of pilots........ but in my opinion it's not a tiny insignificant one.

I'm actually a bit over it.

I think that comes under the "bullying" part of the report. 1 out of 10 pilots reported having been subjected to bullying. In reality it seems the number is higher. All over aviation we may label them as "idiots", "wankers", "difficult to fly with", but in reality they are workplace bullies.

I hope they have the capacity to understand THEY are the ones who are the target of this report. Either they change their behaviour, or under a new mentality they will have to seek alternative employment.

A deliberate corporate policy to recruit based on gender will likely produce non-merit based appointment.

What a wonderful way for Little Napoleon to manufacture another crisis.
Sure beats running an airline.

Perhaps the more obvious problem is the 2000 pilots who did not reply, presumably majority male.
Are they too scared to speak up too?

Australian political correctness at it's finest. Maybe male Pilot's need to identify as females to have a fair chance of acceptance - PC gender choice could be a positive! Then women who are concerned that they are paid less than their male counterparts can identify as men to get a nice little pay rise. If they ever get called in the office for pranging an aircraft, due to their lack of experience, they can convert back to women, for a minor slap on the wrists. :ugh:

“I know girls that have came out of sims crying (some laughing) as they believe they‘ve just butchered every component of their sim...had their letter of offer a few weeks later.”

Indeed, and I know boys that have done exactly the same thing.

“The US BLS conducted a long term longitudinal study in the gender pay gap finding a small one existed.”

The BLS study found that on average women are paid about 20% less than men in the US. Small difference?

“The mind boggles as to the crewing arrangement should these pilots decide that they would also like children.”

Australia is a typical developed country, an aging population with a declining birth rate. It is an economic imperative for Australians to have more children.
Progressive countries have figured out that accommodating child birth within the labor market is not only morally prudent but economically mandatory.

“By definition, the alleged Qantas target for gender representation means that qualified male candidates will be passed over in favor of female candidates that meet threshold minimum requirements until such time as the target is deemed to be achieved.”

It doesn't mean this at all.

“She has complained about the level of entitlement of young women these days”

As apposed to the level of entitlement of men displayed here on this thread in a discussion about an industry staffed almost entirely by…..men?

The younger generation are all entitled, boys and girls alike.

“Thats probably true but in my experience a large percentage of women drop by the wayside over the span of the average career. Few seem to want to be 60 year old pilots.”

Several things about this comment. Firstly, perhaps you could provide some data to support this claim instead of just using your “experience”. And secondly……so what if women want to retire earlier than men. Hats off to them.

“those most loudly decrying these quotas are the old school female pilots.”

Just to be clear, QF do not use quotas in the employment process and have not indicated an intention to do so.

“I've had one pilot say to me with a straight face that female pilots shouldn't be rostered together because all they'll do is argue”

A rather laughable sentiment particularly in reference to Qantas.

That is probably very close to the mark.
People ought just get things on merit and there are plenty of people who do.

Crisis, drama, superlatives and manufactured diversion has long been a staple of the reign of Little Napoleon.

A 20% recruitment "target" when the percentage of female CPL holders in Australia is low single digit, is a quota by any other name.

60% of the female pilots, from a smallish number, who joined ahead of me had voluntarily departed QF before the age of 50. Many below me ( and I cannot quote exact numbers) have done the same. I wasn't criticising their decision to leave, just noting it. I believe it's primarily a life balance thing. Good on them.

As a male who's lost count of the number of sucker punches taken during the 'GA Journey' i think it's fair to say harassment is not just Gender based.

I'm sure harassments is real and unacceptable. Pilots are not exactly the most "woke" on average.

The bit that annoys me, however, is the remarks about pay inequity. Increasing the number of females employed means a higher percentage of the more junior- and thus lower pad- pilots are female. In other words, addressing past inequity leads to the APPERANCE, without decent analysis, of pay inequilty.

A senior female pilot gets paid the same as a senior male one. There are just fewer of them.

The first intake at the academy in Toowoomba is 50% women, despite Qantas stating that around 15% of those who expressed interest were women. Does anyone really believe that 50% of those who went on to apply were women? Are the people at Qantas really that stupid that they think this won't cause tension between those who didn't receive this sort of special treatment and those who did?

But the senior female pilots are all in management. So they get paid more. Or is it lesbians that get paid more than females and males. Or lesbians getting paid more than gays getting paid more than straight females and straight males. Or lesbians getting paid more than gays getting more than cross dressers getting more than straight males and females??

It's very, very confusing for me. All I know is I'm not a lesbian so any Management position under the current regime is by default ruled out for me. In the past, such positions were based on the ability to do them, not which personal parts of myself I wished to place inside particular parts of someone else, but I have come to accept I am a dinosaur and almost extinct. Though not, I hasten to add, by failing to put the correct breeding part in the right sexual organ to procreate. I spent years of fruitful research giving that art a very red hot go.

The Chief Pilot with his penchant for car park and vehicular procreation platforms has, it must be admitted, publicly given the problem more of a red hot go than I have. I wonder if QF solved any potential harassment issue of that person by surrounding them with non gender specific personages lest they feel lustful urges in carparks again??

If the CEO claims that the "target" is 40% women pilots by 2028, an industry with in total less than 7% women pilots, then to achieve such a level of intake there must be active discrimination.
Call it whatever you like, it is, however, no longer merit based.

And just in case some facts might help.