How did we miss this one?
 

Anna... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sX5_fzgwdaA :D

We will 'MAKE' you a pilot who cares if you have no aptitude or ability for the the job we need bums on seats, fast, please please accept our worthless contract and come fly our new shiny jets for us...

All with a straight face

I guess they figured makeup and a perm wouldn't help.

I hope there is a special place reserved in hell for corporate management types that regularly trot out their "passion" for something, without any other evidence except their word that it exists at all. Completely unconvincing.

Oh Come on guys! It's immensely rewarding and you get to see the world. Of course, our DFO would know all about what it's like to be a pilot???

Fun fact : Fish eye lenses were invented by meteorologists to take photos of the whole sky, they have had many different applications since.

I believe that 'keywords' such as: 'passionate', 'motivated' or 'hard-working' are now passé in CVs. Must say, I've never used any of them.

She is correct, you do get to see the world , but from 35,000 ft with the exception of China where you cannot even see the ground
Then once you land after a grueling 16 hour flight , you are transported to a hotel in the middle of nowhere that doesn't have a 24 hour coffee shop , you are hungry, Because your body is insisting that it's lunchtime . Yet it's after midnight local time so the coffee shop / restaurant is closed and all that is on offer is an exorbitantly expensive snack .

24 hours of broken sleep and you get to do it all over again

YUP That's living the dream and seeing the world . One hotel room at a time

She looks tired and haggard ... bloodshot eyes :sad:

I wonder why??

Can one of you CX people please explain to this retired UK pilot how the appointment of Ms Thompson was explained to you? What aviation background does Ms Thompson have? Does the HKG CAA (Sorry have forgotten their proper name) not have the same policy as the UK CAA of having the senior post holder named in the AOC of being a pilot? (There was an occasion a few years ago when Big Airways wanted to make the Operations Director in charge of Flight Operations. This was stopped by the CAA)

Beer drinker

Welcome to hong Kong and Cathay mate!

Where a contract means as much as bog roll.
Where the HKG CAD are on the payroll
Where the CEO is nicknamed Ivan Who, and would barely pass ICAO level 4 Engrish.

Drinker
Heard the following rumour that the person responsible for the disastrous FOUR YEAR FUEL HEDGING STRATEGY...ffs!...now in charge of HAECO, was the subject of a sexual intimidation complaint made by a certain middling AHK manager. To keep the whole thing quiet and in-house, he was pushed aside to Haeco and the middling AHK manager was promoted to DFO!!....you just couldn't make this stuff up if you tried!

I hope someone is saving all these YouTube clips for when we make headlines for the wrong reasons. Then, when everyone is asking "how could this have happened", we can just forward all these ridiculous ads to the media.

Because you know all these videos with spiky haired children and clueless managers will be taken down in record time when we have our first "AirAsia" event.

And, sadly, it's only a matter of time one of your jet stacks it in.

Well done Cathy Pathetic

:D:D:D

It's some time since I retired from Cathay, from this video it would appear we no longer have expat aircrew.

From wanabee777
It would be like polishing a turd.

It is unbelievable that CX see this as constructive advertising.

But, "Hey, the price is right!"

Or perhaps "We can do that and stay in the budget."

What? Exciting time to see the world?
Is that the requirement for the job, to want to see the world?
Had a crew member position with me to NYC recently, he had never been to NYC in any capacity previously but I had given him 48 hrs notice that he and I would be doing the first rotation out of NYC direct to HKG the next night. OK, so he turned up looking a bit tired. By top of climb he could hardly keep his eyes open. Turned out that he had 2 hours sleep in the 20 hours in NYC as there were 'required tourists things to do'...i.e. Anna Thompson's 'Exciting time to see the world' senario! Thanks Anna! He was a waste of space. Consequently it was single pilot IFR across the Pole until the 2 experienced (very competent FOs from previous experience and 20+ years of flying) took over.
I thought that 35 years ago, in an aircraft under 5700 kg, single pilot IFR had been confined to the past and now with 35 years as an Airline Pilot I find I am once again flying the same senario but with a 442,000KG aircraft and still flying single pilot IFR.
Spot the problem!

Too true, but just sometimes I get to fly with pro's. 48 hrs recently in 'Chicago' . Nice view of the Lombard car park. Survived on midnight rations from the Target supermarket next door. Mindnumbing.
BUT, and very importantly: return flight was a non event. All cockpit crew totally professional: Nobody saw daylight or any of the 'sights' during layover. See the world? xxxxxxxx. Nope, too tired for The DFO's Vogon poetry.

Sorry beerdrinker, good question. Unable to explain. Cheers.

Anna does not have any actual aviation related qualification. Yet, she was the general manager of aircrew in CX. I don't think CAD requires such qualification.

Curtain rod ,
That was a brilliant post BUT.

Sadly everything that you put in your post is so tragically spot on
It seems like the rats and crazies crawl out from the sewers when it gets dark in most US cities . I have had my entire meal stolen by a homeless bum who walked through the coffee shop where I was eating . It was so deftly done that I was too late to stop it , but considering that he appeared to be mentally challenged I probably got away lightly by not trying to stop him . Had I been shot or knifed , CX would have found some reason not to pay the insurance claim . As in this Individual voluntarily left the crew hotel
San Fran seems to be the worst for odd characters , they get very aggressive after dark.

And yes you are correct no one in CX gives a cr..p

But yet we put up with it.

Just like the assaults on our CoS, pay, housing, yada yada yada.

Look no further than the crew lounge to see the reason.

As in the Indian Mutiny of 1857 - after a certain amount of abuse, the subjects just think - "**** this for a game of soldiers"!!!

A great advert for a so called legacy airline..the crew room..(sic) is completely unfit for purpose..even for a flying club..the phones are a health hazard even if they did work and the briefing rooms are a shambolic mess..half the computers are u/s and the chairs if you can find them, are fit for the dumpster..I guess that's why we..the marginalised pilots get them..the old english word, "mimp" comes to mind as a summation...

Nice that she acknowledges the flight times are long and tiring but hay we get to see the world so that makes it all OK

Agree with beer drinker. Only in the third, (and lower), world would you find an authority, (CAD/CAA etc.), who would allow a non pilot to hold the position of DFO. Aviation is one of those professions that unless you have actually been there and done that you don't have the appropriate experience and knowledge to properly and fully fulfil the position of DFO, particularly when the chips are down and the situation isn't 'Ops Normal' any more.




The idea that you can 'back door' into a DFO position by virtue of previously held,non flying, positions in aviation is totally flawed, actual (and plenty of)flying experience as a captain is a basic essential. Under some aviation authorities a previous training management position is also required.

There was a time, up until NR became DFO that the CAD had a rule that all senior management roles were held by a pilot. The company asked the CAD kindly to amend that rule, and the proviso then was that the DFO could only be a non-pilot if all other senior post holders were pilots.... NR had to also spend some time learning the ropes as GMA before his promotion to DFO.
We now have 2 non pilot senior management post holders - at the same time!... Did the company even bother with asking CAD?

By doing it, it allows the accountants and "the board" to enforce (envisioned savings by cutting costs) "productivity gains" by being cheap. As there are less roadblocks in senior management to stop it on the basis of safety and experience.

I call this the "The Cheapness Paradox"... An almost exponential graph of cost cutting versus safety and quality...

The more accountants try and cut costs, the cheaper the product becomes, the shoddier all facets of the operation become, aeroplanes fall apart, pilots fall apart, the product falls apart - and in the long run, it costs them more money than what they saved by being cheap.

"The more accountants try and cut costs, the cheaper the product becomes, the shoddier all facets of the operation become, aeroplanes fall apart, pilots fall apart, the product falls apart - and in the long run, it costs them more money than what they saved by being cheap."

Exactly correct and the heart of the problem at CX.

Penny wise pound foolish certainly applies to this lot!

I see Swires in their infinite wisdom are applying the same tactics to Grappas restaurant in Admirality .a very popular and successful restaurant. Now Swires doesn't want to renew their lease because they want to add more restaurant diversity to the mall. You just can make this stuff up
At least all the lawyers who frequent the restaurant are leading the fight to keep it open

Anotherbusdriver, are you reading my mind??? That was a perfect response. That is exactly what is happening in all facets of this operation. It means they do not know what they are doing, don't care, as it's a front, or they are trying to sell it.

It always amazes me, when so called ' premium airlines' allow bean counters to cut costs. The first round of cost cuts results in a big bonus, those responsible leave, and new people come in looking how to cut costs more to achieve their big bonus.....and so on and so on.

The product must eventually fail. The end product, the delivery end of it must suffer, and the pax ( especially in the premium cabins), start asking, what the hell is going on?

Meanwhile, those who made the mess, have departed over the horizon with fat wallets.

Precisely SOPS.

That sums up CX in a nutshell :{

What a terrible shame for a once great airline :D

I would engage an aviation consultant who could advise me in my position of limited experience and knowledge along with a good communications officer. A Trinity of sorts. Three for one, job sharing. CX have a desperate shortage of managers and this should be seen as a sign of how progressive CX has become by implementing solution driven problems that multi manage and make mediocre individual managers marvelous. Now it's coffee time.