Should seniority be scrapped in airlines?

[parabellum]

Well said Hands Solo.

900 said: "That's why I'm confident of a challenge"

Don't doubt it for one minute. Nor do I doubt it will be unsuccessful. A seniority system does not set out to differentiate on the basis of age and age is not a factor, it is all about date of joining and time served, regardless of age, used as a final arbiter when all other considerations like qualifications, experience and suitability are equal.

"Seniority - a thing of the past (soon)" says 900, I wouldn't be placing any bets if I were you!

Still waiting for someone to outline a case that will support the theory that a seniority system in an airline is either unfair or unlawful discrimination. There is a huge difference between perceived discrimination and proven discrimination.

[swordsman]

From legal point of view a company in the UK is within its rights to reward loyalty.
Hence senority.

[Fareastdriver]

I do not think the government or the judicary would outlaw seniority in the airline industry as they would have to outlaw it in the military and also, good heavens, the Civil Service.

[7Q Off]

There is not a legal chance to scrap seniority. Seniority does not discriminate by Age, by sex nor race. Seniroty reward loyaly. Beside that you have 2 kind of pilots in an airline. Competent and not competent. To be competent you need to have your medicals and pass all the check rides or sim test. If you have 1000 pilots competent the only way to be fair is having a seniority. You said that seniority discriminates. What you propose discriminates more.
If you have 1000 competent pilots with 20 years of service and you promote a competent pilot with 1 months of service you are DISCRIMINATING 1000 pilots. Is worst what you propose.
900, you can have an opinion. But if you are not a pilot is very dificult to have a serious opinion.
I am not a doctor so I will not have a serios opinion of Brain surgery.

Beside that I dont see that the military will scrap seniority in the UK. I dont think you will see a 22 year old general in the near future.

[900]

Odd

Folks, the anger is palpable.
Why can't you see that performance at work (in any job) and thus opportunities for promotion, transfer etc. or indeed, in reverse, redundancy can be measured by performance rather than length of sevice coupled with statutory checks?
What are you worried about?
Coach drivers, lorry drivers, train drivers, all roles that have a "standard" level of competence, beyond which some will argue there can be no differentiation. "I hold the licence therefore I can do as well as anyone else who holds the licence"
Smells like good old industrial restrictive practice to me. But what do I know, only pilots apparently (7Q?) can opine here with any worth?

[qwertyuiop]

Problem is 900 (been said many times), how do you assess a pilot? What makes a good pilot, what makes a poor pilot? What makes a good captain?
Every method of selection is very easy to abuse.
By far the best method is to set a standard and experience level and then let those that reach this level wait their turn.

[Re-Heat]

The problems with seniority are many and varied, including:

To claim that the sim check is an objective appraisal is somewhat false - it is a tough, periodic assessment of minimum required standards to be demonstrated; an appraisal in other industries considers ongoing performance at ANY time as assessed by (a) peers, (b) seniors, and (c) juniors, covering not only technical skills, but people management (let's say those beyond the flight deck in this case), leadership, attitude, and general personal qualities.

What sim and line checks do not assess are: ongoing assessments of those that people fly with, both those junior, cabin crew, ground crew and management, instead assessing the technical skills demonstrated as observed by an objective assessor at a single point in time.

I can see the concern that a more "normal" assessment, including sim checks AND further appraisal processes would be open to abuse by "brown-nosers" etc, but I think that is a misplaced fear if you have not experienced the professionalism and objectivity with which HR runs these process in non-airline industries.

Furthermore, the only acceptable version of the seniority list in my opinion is an industry-wide, global list based upon experience - but that still does not address some of the further concerns bulleted above.

Dispassionate thoughts?

[bugg smasher]

the only acceptable version of the seniority list in my opinion is an industry-wide, global list based upon experience

Interesting thought, wouldn’t work though. Loyalty to any one company is based largely upon one’s position and remuneration that advances and increases as one moves up the seniority list. A system that allowed outsiders to be ‘inserted’ relatively high up the ladder would create intense frustration and disloyalty within the pilot ranks of a particular company, as it now does, for example, when a British Airways captain retires at 55 and takes up a senior position within some of the Asian carriers.

[7Q Off]

900:
I can not talk about brain surgery, I am not a doctor.

[Bellerophon]

Re-Heat

...Remember Concorde and how people were selected for that?...

Yes, I remember it well, and also how people were selected for it. What exactly was your point?

Regards

Bellerophon

[Re-Heat]

It was not strictly in line with seniority, undermining the argument above that seniority being the basis for BA fleet selection that has been so resolutely defended above by those at BA. (or conversely the argument for it, if you believe that system for that fleet to have been appropriate). You seem to think I insinuate something else - I do not.

I can not talk about brain surgery, I am not a doctor.

Yes, you can if you have some idea what you are talking about. If people did not have comment about others' systems, how do you expect anything ever to develop, progress or change?

[Hand Solo]

Originally Posted by Re-Heat

The problems with seniority are many and varied, including:
Selection on fleets - while not problematic in some airlines, seniority does not cater for fleet moves in others. Remember Concorde and how people were selected for that?

I believe there was another interview to discuss whether people really were interested in a 7 year type freeze, a 6 month conversion and a limited route structure, which doesn't seem unreasonable given the fleets unusual operation within BA. Anyway, Concordes gone now.

Selection in training roles - route checker, line trainer, base trainer, training standards & examiner revalidation: subject to interviews that may not be subjective.

I'm sure you mean objective, but nonetheless you are making our point for us. You are saying that interviews may not be an objective means for assessing means yet arguing that they are better than an objective seniority system.

Promotion based upon flat standards - promotion up Pay Points does not have to demonstrate increased standards, just sufficient standards to pass line and sim checks.

Why should it? Ones flying licence doesn't demonstrate increased standards. In my experience many of the old codgers can't fly that accurately anymore but they have a wealth of experience that more than compensates. How would you assess that?

Lack of fast-track for those with excellent standards and command potential - have to wait turn, which can vary if company is not growing at steady rate.

You've yet to explain just why there should be a fast track. You haven't even explained what 'excellent command potential' means. Let me tell you a bit about the real world of flying. In an airline like BA there are only three things that 'excellent command potential' might influence:

1) Your colleagues on the flight deck.
2) The cabin crew.
3) The passengers.

You can charm the passengers without being a good commander. That is no basis for promotion. You can charm the cabin crew, which might mean they'll come out for a drink downroute, but in a dysfunctional airline like BA they'll still ring the union to determine what they should do and in a functional airline they'll do as the company requires. Charming the cabin crew is no basis for promotion, as certain captains who have great skills with the crew but are sorely lacking elsewhere demonstrate. Perhaps you can even charm your colleagues on the flight deck, but in my experience most of them are free thinking individuals and will make their own minds up based on rational thought. In fact, there is little that your 'exceptional command potential' poster boys (and girls) can do that the average Joe cannot, and the difference really isn't worth a promotion.

Healthy companies required - those unfortunate enough to work for companies that go bust or have no future prospects return to the bottom of seniority lists in new companies.

Thus it ever was. I doubt the leading lights of Arthur Andersen walked into comparable positions elsewhere after the Enron fiasco. Once again you have confused salary and prospects with seniority. If an airline goes bust there are plenty of direct entry captains positions out there. You may be at the bottom of a seniority list but you can be well up the salary tree. FOs can take FOs postions elsewhere, earning more than SOs or cruise co-pilots but still lower in seniority. I hardly think a DEC or DEFO position could be described as having 'no future prospects'. Furthermore, should airline X go bust tomorrow, why should, and indeed how could, an unknown quantity pilot get a job at airline Y in a more advantageous position than a known pilot who has been with airline Y for years?

Stagnant companies - those not expanding stagnate progression up the list, particularly if there are few retirees.

No different to any other company. Show me a stagnating firm that keeps promoting from within or hiring from outside to a high level rather than ticking over with the status quo. If you don't like stagnation you go to a growing firm. If ten years for a command at BA doesn't suit you go to Etihad where it takes four years. Whats that you say? The pay at Etihad isn't as good? Well stay where you are then. Life is full of tough choices.

Excess retirees - the opposite applies, and those with average standards can achieve commands too early.

You demonstrate a gross lack of understanding of the job. Firstly, how high is the average? I guess there are 'average' pilots of the space shuttle. 'Average' graduates of test pilot school. Heaven forbid someone should be 'average', even if that average standard is very high. And what is 'too early'. Do you think standards are deliberately lowered in order to meet a quota? Do you think FO Jones will have the standards required of him on his command course lowered because bless his cotton socks his only been flying four years? When Easyjet couldn't get enough experienced FOs for their command requirements they hired DECs.

Pay based upon loyalty is arbitrary - it depends where you have the luck to get a job.

What a nonsensical statement. All pay in any profession is based on where you have the luck to get a job. Some firms are willing to pay more. Why do you think so many new graduates want to be accountants? Because they just luuuuurrrv counting beans?

To claim that the sim check is an objective appraisal is somewhat false - it is a tough, periodic assessment of minimum required standards to be demonstrated;

You tick the boxes, you pass the check. Thats pretty objective. Did you know you can know play back simulator flights with hard copies of flight profiles to prove you meet the standard?

an appraisal in other industries considers ongoing performance at ANY time as assessed by (a) peers, (b) seniors, and (c) juniors, covering not only technical skills, but people management (let's say those beyond the flight deck in this case), leadership, attitude, and general personal qualities.

Already worked in such a firm and have many colleagues still there. Peer appraisal has a huge amount of subjectivity involved, starting with who you choose to conduct the appraisal. Strangely enough the people who do best under this system are not necessarily the technically capable, which should be the case in a technical role, but those who network and play the office politics. Nobody is going to give their mate a bad review, but the technical expert can be damned with faint praise.

What sim and line checks do not assess are: ongoing assessments of those that people fly with, both those junior, cabin crew, ground crew and management, instead assessing the technical skills demonstrated as observed by an objective assessor at a single point in time.

I thought objectivity was what you were all about (but I think you mean subjectivity this time). Again, you demonstrate a distinct lack of understanding of what this job is actually about. Perhaps you'd reward jovial banter with the pushback operator at LHR? I wonder how that would go down at Beijing where the guy is utterly confused by your non-standard communications? Management? Haven't had direct contact with one of those for over a year! No need! How will you assess that? Interaction with those on the flight deck, junior and senior? Already assessed in the simulator and on the line.

I can see the concern that a more "normal" assessment, including sim checks AND further appraisal processes would be open to abuse by "brown-nosers" etc, but I think that is a misplaced fear if you have not experienced the professionalism and objectivity with which HR runs these process in non-airline industries.

Give me a break. Do you really think all those books on how to get ahead in the corporate world are there because HR is objective? It's such a truism that brown-nosing, dirt-dishing and office politicking gain career capital that I barely need state it, yet you have the audacity to hold that up as a shining example of an alternative to seniority?????

Furthermore, the only acceptable version of the seniority list in my opinion is an industry-wide, global list based upon experience - but that still does not address some of the further concerns bulleted above.

Well I hope I've addressed some of your bullet points with a dose of realism.

[Re-Heat]

Yes, somewhat patronisingly as well. Perhaps you assume that where I work means I have no idea of what I am talking about in the airline: on the contrary.

The focus of my post was that the current seniority system bears no relation to a full annual appraisal of abilities that one would find in any other industry - and many other industries have as many safety concerns and technical requirements that have to be met on a continuing basis. Do you really think that ever other industry in the land has huge problems ensuring an objective process due to brown-nosing etc? Come off it: I can't believe that you can really have had any realistic experience of other businesses if you say that - it is certainly not my experience anywhere.

This translates to one's year-round behaviour around colleagues in the operation. You know it is completely trite to suggest that someone's banter would have any reflection on this appraisal: an objective appraisal process takes account of the quality many pieces of individual possibly subjective feedback to produce a single objective outcome.

An appraisal is not a singular interview with a subjective outcome - it is the culmination of feedback from various sources. The very fact that old codgers have different, additional skills from the pure flying angle surely is a cause to argue for such a different system?

My argument for abolition - it was meritocracy, pure and simple. I cannot conceive of anything fairer and less discriminatory.

My argument against seniority? It is the same as any structure that ossifies a business to protect the position of insiders against a meritocracy.

I doubt the leading lights of Arthur Andersen walked into comparable positions elsewhere after the Enron fiasco.

Many in fact did. Most of them in Deloitte.

I have no envy, or issue with people inside a seniority system, however, consider why most people arguing for its continuation are its beneficiaries in terms of pay and promotion: it ossifies a structure that is not as meritocratic as I believe it should be. I do not believe that is right.

[Re-Heat]

I find it hard to square your reasoning that seniority should continue to penalise those who have the misfortune not to choose the most successful company, just because that is the way it has always been.

Such reasoning is hardly conducive to any sort of progress.

Management? Haven't had direct contact with one of those for over a year! No need!

Which is a somewhat telling reflection of the continuing dire quality of many of BA's pilot management community, and a relationship with the flight crew community that is entirely unhealthy.

[Bellerophon]

Re-Heat

...It was not strictly in line with seniority...

In fact it was, just like all other BA fleets, as a check of the results of the annual Posting and Promotions bid (called the Cassandra run) would quickly reveal.

Do you think that pilots who have missed a course they wanted, on any BA aircraft type, didn't check to see who got the course they wanted, and if that pilot was entitled to it?

Given that the relatively small number of BA pilots who actually bid for Concorde were (mostly) extremely keen to get on her, do you seriously think that even a single selection for a Concorde course, out of seniority order, would have gone unnoticed or uncontested?

As has been said, a few pilots, whose names appeared on the initial result lists over the years, subsequently withdrew after becoming fully aware of just what the course entailed, but no line pilot, in either seat, was put on a course out of seniority order.

The plain facts are, that the year I got my Concorde course, hundreds of captains senior to me had passed up the chance to bid for her, and scores of captains junior to me, many of whom would no doubt have made a better Concorde captain than I, were, fortunately for me, denied a course, solely on juniority.

I suspect a few Concorde F/Os might regard me as living proof that course selection for Concorde couldn't possibly have been done on any basis other than seniority!


...undermining the argument above that seniority being the basis for BA fleet selection...

Or not!


As for the other points you raise, Hand Solo has replied, far more eloquently than I ever could, with views I would totally support.

Whilst it's always presumptuous to attempt to speak for others, in this case I do believe that the vast majority of BA pilots would share our viewpoint.

Best regards

Bellerophon

[Ropey Pilot]

Only managed to read the first half of this thread so far - so apologies if I am repeating but...

Everyone against seniority seems to think that it keeps T&Cs lower than they should be. Is that the case?

Most airline beancounters would love to have every seat filled by a year 1 FO and a year 1 Capt (assuming the airline has yearly pay increases).

A regional airline I know is practically rubbing its hands with glee as the more senior guys (particularly skippers) are getting pi$$ed off with their lot and jumping ship. They can then hire DECs (or promote the more senior FOs who haven't done the same thing) at Pay Point 1 prices!

The chances of an incident are still low (as everyone is qualified/capable for the job they are doing - something which apparently doesn't happen in seniority driven jobs; failed your Captains check, no worries you are next on the list so here you go anyway)

The promoted FOs even have worse T&Cs than the equivalently experienced (and in some cases significantly less experienced on type) new join Capts since they are historic from their original contract. In fact if HR would let them they would be better off resigning and reapplying (if it wasn't for their Type rating bond).

And personally (as a junior in my new airline) I am looking forward to choosing my roster in my 50s. In the non-seniority based one the guys were still doing the same old cr@p that I was up until the week they retired (the ones that stayed) That is something I don't want to do!

[Re-Heat]

Bellerophon - apologies, I stand corrected.

I know that most BA pilots agree with you - in fact I have not yet met one that does not: it would be far less interesting to have discussion with those who agree with me though...!

Surely however you can agree with the final point I made though - that it is protection for insiders, therefore, if you believe in meritocracy, it is not meritocractic?

[Skylion]

The seniority system benefits a) the airlines and b) the unions. For 90% plus of pilots it is a career limiting liabilty, restricting their ability to change employer and location depending on changing personal and family circumstances.It also means that if they are unhappy with their employer, particularly as they get older/more senior they don't have the real option of walking away and slotting in at much the same level in another company. This is a serious restriction on their freedom to sell their labour wherever they wish, as well as to build their own career as they would in most other walks of life.
This unholy alliance between employers and unions to the detriment of employees is both unusual and undesirable and to find people outside the promotion escalator of the legacy carriers with enthusiasm for this headlock is amazing. Even inside the legacy carriers there must be some who would like to make a bid to control their own lives without risking a massive income loss.

[Raj Merlion]

Skylion, exactly right! An unholy alliance does indeed exist between the airlines and unions; sad that so many pilots are really blind to this fact.

[parabellum]

Skylion You make a good point in favour of the pilot who may, for whatever reason, wish to move from one company to another but why should the profession jig itself in such a way as to accommodate the 'movers' at the expense of people who choose not to move and have demonstrated a greater degree of loyalty?