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[QUOTE]DHL UK might be worth a try, they seem to struggle to get rated 75 drivers so if you fancy a new type on your licence [QUOTE]
Council
LEJ based, no struggles, no turn over at present
Council
LEJ based, no struggles, no turn over at present
And sometimes there are very professional F/Os who simply do not want the hassle/responsibility of sitting in the left seat.
In my first airline after I left the RAF we had about half a dozen that I would call "Professional First Officers". One of them had been a Lancaster captain in WW II and he had been shot down and captured. He did not want to be a captain ever again and I can tell you that he was a joy to fly with.
Some of the others had worked their b*lls off and had reached the dizzy heights of having a CPL/IR and did not want to go any further. I think I can honestly say that they were also a joy to fly with.
Later in life, when our original company had gone bust and we were all flying for different companies, I got a call from one of them. His current company had gone down the pan and he was looking for a job.
I rang the Managing Director and told him that I had a great co-pilot looking for a job and that I knew him well but the big problem might be that he was 52 years old.
I shall never forget the response:
"I like my pilots to have no hair or grey hair".
Nowadays, he nor I, would have any chance of getting past the Human Remains department. More fool them.
In my first airline after I left the RAF we had about half a dozen that I would call "Professional First Officers". One of them had been a Lancaster captain in WW II and he had been shot down and captured. He did not want to be a captain ever again and I can tell you that he was a joy to fly with.
Some of the others had worked their b*lls off and had reached the dizzy heights of having a CPL/IR and did not want to go any further. I think I can honestly say that they were also a joy to fly with.
Later in life, when our original company had gone bust and we were all flying for different companies, I got a call from one of them. His current company had gone down the pan and he was looking for a job.
I rang the Managing Director and told him that I had a great co-pilot looking for a job and that I knew him well but the big problem might be that he was 52 years old.
I shall never forget the response:
"I like my pilots to have no hair or grey hair".
Nowadays, he nor I, would have any chance of getting past the Human Remains department. More fool them.
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Some fair points raised.
I did have a job to go to but it fell through after I resigned. I didn't burn my bridges but it was too late to return.
The age vs experience argument is relevant to those of a narrower mindset and I guess there will always be discrimination unless there are uncrewed aircraft.
Operating an aircraft requires little creativity in the majority of situations, the majority of everyday problems come from passengers, loading, baggage, handling etc I would have thought that life experience would have been as relevant as the number of hours in the logbook in these cases?
I did have a job to go to but it fell through after I resigned. I didn't burn my bridges but it was too late to return.
The age vs experience argument is relevant to those of a narrower mindset and I guess there will always be discrimination unless there are uncrewed aircraft.
Operating an aircraft requires little creativity in the majority of situations, the majority of everyday problems come from passengers, loading, baggage, handling etc I would have thought that life experience would have been as relevant as the number of hours in the logbook in these cases?
I am a former employee of Jet 2 (when they were Channel Express) and know the situation there quirte well. At the risk of being a party-pooper here, allow me to present an alternative perspective. The question that any recruitment team is going to ask when presented with a 55 year-old FO, is why is he/she not a captain? Many people at that stage in their careers are senior TREs and therefore to be still an FO is going to raise alarm bells in any recruiter's mind. i accept that we have unwisely ceased to look at experience when it comes to recruitment, and no one laments that more than me. However, hours alone are not a guarantee of quality. The inate personal skills of the individual are extremely important and no one wants to soak up someone else's problems. The other question to be asked in this case is why did a current FO walk out of Jet 2 with no job to go to. Once again, any recruiter will take one look at that and in most cases steer well clear. In a nutshell, if I were recruiting and decided to look at someone in the stuation described, I would want a long, hard look at the individual's training and employment record as there are, at first glance, some oddities here. It is possible that the individual involved here is a 'late entrant' into flying, but sadly again statistics do not favour such candidates in terms of future success. I am sorry to be so stark and negative here, but I am only saying what is almost certainly being said behind closed doors. Therefore, to have any chance of further employment as a pilot, aces low needs to have a very good and well-presented case that explains those issues very clearly to an employer, as I can promise him that is what they are thinking. If there are credible answers to the questions of experience not really matching up to age, walking out of a perfectly good employer with no job to go to and no command time at age 55 , then the way forward is to find someone in a target airline who will present the details of your case to the Chief Pilot personally. Without that personal intervention I unfortunately see signficant diffficulties ahead in terms of your future employability as a pilot.
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[quote=Mr Angry from Purley;9127207][QUOTE]DHL UK might be worth a try, they seem to struggle to get rated 75 drivers so if you fancy a new type on your licence
Council
Thanks Mr Angry
LEJ based, no struggles, no turn over at present
Council
Thanks Mr Angry
LEJ based, no struggles, no turn over at present
Moderator
Wirbelsturm - that may indeed be the case at BA where there are career FOs who want to be senior on the 747 rather than junior captains elsewhere. That is not the case elsewhere, and were those guys to leave BA they would find exactly the same questions asked of them as are being asked of aces low. The BA guys, however, do not have to worry due to the system in place there, which is nice work if you can get it. I am not in any way having a go at aces low, who faces a difficult situation, but am merely mentioning the elephants in the room that in my judgement are likely to be the principle sources of difficulty.
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Count, I agree entirely.
I just wanted to point out that the HR mafia often don't understand the demographics of some/many companies and the decision of highly experienced pilots who, for lifestyle or personal reasons, do not want to shift to the left hand seat. There is no 'fault' of the individual it is just that we often operate under perceptions of our industry that often are not reflective of the real world.
I flew with a great SFO a while back who had flown just about everything the RAF had to throw at him. He is in his early 50's and considers his current job to be his retirement job and is quite happy, after years of running the lead, to sit back and enjoy.
As you quite rightly point out if he were to drop back into the employment seeking world then he would have to justify that position. I feel however that in such a case it wouldn't be too difficult for him personally.
As always when it comes to airline interviews the young will get through on their micropat scores and their innate willingness to do anything to get the job, the more senior of us will have to sell ourselves better at the interview.
I just wanted to point out that the HR mafia often don't understand the demographics of some/many companies and the decision of highly experienced pilots who, for lifestyle or personal reasons, do not want to shift to the left hand seat. There is no 'fault' of the individual it is just that we often operate under perceptions of our industry that often are not reflective of the real world.
I flew with a great SFO a while back who had flown just about everything the RAF had to throw at him. He is in his early 50's and considers his current job to be his retirement job and is quite happy, after years of running the lead, to sit back and enjoy.
As you quite rightly point out if he were to drop back into the employment seeking world then he would have to justify that position. I feel however that in such a case it wouldn't be too difficult for him personally.
As always when it comes to airline interviews the young will get through on their micropat scores and their innate willingness to do anything to get the job, the more senior of us will have to sell ourselves better at the interview.
