Retention

[JTIDS]

Is it my imagination or is the RAF heading to a point where in 2015-18 pretty much every pilot with over six years experience will quit at the same time. Anyone who was on AFPS05 will have done their six years return of service and so be eligible to PVR and with no immediate pension to stay in for will head off to the airlines. Anyone who has reached their 38/16 point before April 1st 2015 will have no reason to stay in beyond that date and there will be a slow trickle of people leaving as they reach their 16 year points beyond 2015 who are just going to hang on to pick up what they can of their AFPS 75. In a very short space of time there will be no experience left, especially as PA Spine now seems to be a waste of time. (No additional real pension until you reach 68!)

Or am I missing something obvious.

[Fox3WheresMyBanana]

1st rule of personnel beancounting - inexperienced people are cheap.

2nd rule of personnel beancounting - never hire clever or moral people: they threaten your job or create work for you.

There are no other rules. Performance in war or aircraft losses are someone else's budget.

Those considering leaving will discover the same applies in the jobs they are thinking of moving to.

[raytofclimb]

Yes

I'm pretty certain I'm leaving at my 38/16 in Jan 2016. I'm also pretty certain a decent FRI wouldn't keep me in.

I've had a great time but I'm not prepared to gamble on the intervening years to my 44 point and will take a pension hit if I leave inbetween.

The ship is sinking.

Ray

[zedder]

Or am I missing something obvious

Don't think so. I think it is Manning that are missing something obvious, and I don't think the problem of retention will only be restricted to Pilots. I say that as someone who is seeing a lot of the youngsters (particularly GD/WSO and WSOps) I used to fly with PVR'ing at what I assume for 'the system' is an alarming rate; if I was very cynical of course, perhaps you could argue that this was always part of the Master Plan to get the RAF numbers down below whatever the latest 'target' is ASAP.

I believe what started as a trickle is now turning into a serious flood. No doubt there is lots of hand-wringing going on among various members of the Air Force Board who are seeing the situation slip beyond their control at an alarming rate. All I can say to that is "You reap what you sow you completely clueless dickheads".

Standing by for the RAF to disappear up it's own arsehole!

[Lima Juliet]

The other problem is that they have made such a complete horlicks of the flying training pipeline in the past few years there is now also a dissenchanted bunch of late 20-somethings in the system (about 3 years worth). They won't need much p!ssing off to start looking elsewhere either!

Still, I reckon we will cope with more 'capability holidays'!!!

LJ

[NutLoose]

I must admit the thought had crossed my mind with all of those choosing to depart, what would happen if that also included the core people shuffled off around the world to maintain currency experience on the likes of Maritime airborne operations. Carrier operations.. VTOL operations etc for the future hardware coming online..

[Bob Viking]

I fear you're all correct (I said the same thing in a letter to manning when I refused PAS) but I think the reality is that no one will miss us once we've gone. The wheel will keep turning (no matter how wobbly) and those at the top will carry on blissfully unaware of the problem.
I'd love to see empirical figures to back up the feeling of a so called exodus though. I get the same impression but I wonder if its just that, as you get towards the twilight of your commission, so many of your 'generation' are leaving that it feels like an exodus. I must admit that the number of guys I know who intend to stay beyond 38 could be counted on one hand. By a teenage mutant ninja turtle (slightly obscure I know but I like to keep things light hearted whenever possible).
BV

[5 Forward 6 Back]

Bob, you can get some statistics through DASA's website. A quick look at their outflow table here shows the following numbers for voluntary outflow of trained RAF officers:

FY09/10: 420
FY10/11: 440

12 month periods ending:

31 Mar 12: 680
30 Jun 12: 680
30 Sep 12: 730
31 Dec 12: 890
31 Mar 13: 780

That's an upward trend in my book. From 420 PVRs in FY09/10 to 780 in FY12/13. Measure from 2009 to 2012 and it's almost an exact doubling in the PVR rate.

Interestingly, it shows the VW numbers as well (voluntary outflow of untrained officers, it says here)

FY09/10: 40
FY10/11: 50

12 month periods ending:

31 Mar 12: 60
30 Jun 12: 60
30 Sep 12: 230
31 Dec 12: 230
31 Mar 13: 210

So only 40 untrained officers PVR'd or VW'd in FY09/10, rising to 210 in FY12/13! That's Leon's hacked off guys in the training system, I reckon.

Of course, these aren't aircrew specific, but with so many blunties on short service commissions and happily seeing them out, I imagine the vast majority of these stats are from aircrew.

[5 Forward 6 Back]

P.S. Bob, did you receive any reply to or acknowledgement of your letter to manning when you rejected PAS, btw?

[Bob Viking]

5F6B.
Of course not. I don't even know if anyone read it.
BV

[Stanley Eevil]

And of course there will be the effects of the wonderful deal that is `NEM` to come.........

[dallas]

@zedder

All I can say to that is "You reap what you sow you completely clueless dickheads".

@Bob

The wheel will keep turning (no matter how wobbly) and those at the top will carry on blissfully unaware of the problem.

I think the military 'top' are all too aware of the problem, but can't do much about it anymore; it's the politicians who are disconnected, and compare ambulance drivers to civil servants to soldiers to binmen. The difference I've always asserted is that the military has 'made do' and got on with it and not enjoyed union representation/negotiation of other govt cut targets, and the 'can do' may now bite the services in the ass when the spare has been spent earlier on. There was still some fat when I was in - the military loves projects and strategic spending - but it won't be until something very serious happens that a route and branch restructure is politically led, that sees, God forbid, the RAF generating aircraft with its resources properly aligned to do so, and starts to clear out all the detritus that has been caught up in its engines since the 90s. I hope nobody gets hurt in the process, but it might take just that sort of shock to embarrass the politicos into action - it normally does.

[ALM In Waiting]

The Gp Capt giving our NEM brief acknowledged that it was actually cheaper to retain experienced and trained personnel than recruit new ones. However, whether that is actually put into practice is another thing entirely...

[Uncle Ginsters]

The trouble is that it's an ever-decreasing circle - initially, a few walk leaving those remaining to pick up the slack. Eventually they get miffed and walk leaving even fewer working much harder, who, of course get miffed or burnt out fairly quickly and leave or get signed off.

To break the chain, someone very senior needs to publicly recognise the problem, ease off the pedal and actually fight off the bean counters enough to improve things.

The thing that worries me is not the number of my generation leaving...we're all approaching our 38/16pts. The concerning thing is the number of 1st and 2nd tourists setting up to leaving in the very near future.

Of course, until they actually 'press the button' we don't have a problem though, right?

[BEagle]

The concerning thing is the number of 1st and 2nd tourists setting up to leaving in the very near future.

Which is a natural corollary of 22Gp having dumbed-down the previously excellent 2000TT/1500PIC military pilot accreditation scheme to a mere shadow of its former self. Some people were prepared to suck it up and put up with the rough and the smooth until they hit those magic figures; now that there's no such scheme, many see absolutely no point in staying in longer than the minimum engagement term - they'll simply waste potential airline seniority by staying in a moment longer.

Quelle effing surprise!

[TorqueOfTheDevil]

Those considering leaving will discover the same applies in the jobs they are thinking of moving to

And therein lies Manning's best hope - that people still in will hear stories of leavers getting hacked off on the outside, and deciding that maybe the Flying Circus isn't so bad after all.

Reminds me of an entry in the diary of a senior Luftwaffe staff officer when the going was getting really tough for the Germans, who wrote "Our only hope is that the General Staff of the enemy air force is as scatter-brained as ours!".

Scatter-brained may have been a euphemism, perhaps equally applicable to Manning in the modern situation...

[Bob Viking]

BEagle.
There's a nail somewhere in your vicinity with a sore head!
BV

[Aynayda Pizaqvick]

Couldn't be more correct BEagle, that is exactly what I'm seeing. The so called "accreditation" system is now so poor it is directly effecting retention, let's face it, if you have to spend £20k+ to get your licence it makes sense to get out early to make the investment worthwhile.

Add that to an erosion in the quality of service life, the (comparatively) rubbish new pension and the constant deployments to desert locations and you'll find a sizeable chunk of pilots approaching the end of their 6 year return of service have already made up their minds to hit the PVR button. And our leadership can't claim to be unaware, I've told them myself!

[BEagle]

CAP 804 October 2013

CAP 804, the CAA's pilot licensing document, has now been re-released.

Predictably, there is no improvement in the abysmal levels of accreditation now available to military pilots. The only changes concern clarification of aircraft which may be used for skill tests.

But, all in all, it's still a complete crock of $hit and won't help retention one iota.

[newt]

Sounds like they might need us to sign up again Beags!! Mind you I hope they can offer part time and a golf course on every station!!