"Airline types need not apply"

[BoilerUP]

ETA: I will say that while airline guys who bail get a bad rap there are a bazillion examples of corporate guys coming and going but "they just didn't fit in". If you're a corporate guy and you leave a job after a few months, you get a pass. If you're airline, you get slammed. That's just the way it works.

Corporate guys who only work a job a couple months then leave typically DON'T get a free pass - unless their leaving was involuntary, if ya know what I mean.

There are entire other threads dedicated to folks who "grab a rating and run", leaving departments operationally & financially in the lurch, along with the pilot(s) who recommended that person (and sometimes, the manager who hired them) in the crosshairs of whoever the flight department reports to.

...which is why its so important to hire the right PERSON for each specific operation, regardless of whatever the hell that person's aviation background might be.

 

[nerdpilot]

Well maybe if you do leave after a couple of months because you are highly underpaid and you have been fortunate to have found something better, it might wake up your frugal mulitmillionaire to pay a decent salary instead of having their jet sit idle while it takes at least a month to get a guy 135 ready again. They have the right to let you go anytime and you have the right to leave anytime. Give me a contract and I will stick to it.

 

[semperfido]

Wasn't it AA73 that was on here a couple months ago throwing out flame bait on this same subject matter?

 

[Gulfstream 200]

Well maybe if you do leave after a couple of months because you are highly underpaid and you have been fortunate to have found something better, it might wake up your frugal mulitmillionaire to pay a decent salary instead of having their jet sit idle while it takes at least a month to get a guy 135 ready again. They have the right to let you go anytime and you have the right to leave anytime. Give me a contract and I will stick to it.

Will you really teach those richy rich folks a hard lesson?

or will they simply hire YET ANOTHER sub-standard guy who is more than eager to work for "highly underpaid" wages just to fly an airplane. Crap jobs are crap jobs...aviation, not aviation, etc.

Don't kid yourself, nothing sits idle in the real world and pilots are as disposable as a goddam Kleenex.

Know your own worth and stick to it.

 

[aa73]

Wasn't it AA73 that was on here a couple months ago throwing out flame bait on this same subject matter?

If, by "flame bait" you mean asking serious questions on subjects I'm not an expert on, then yes, that was me.

Call it what you like - I'm constantly evaluating the pros and cons of airline vs corporate, since this "fabulous" airline job may very well evaporate at a moment's notice... as such, I feel it's good to be informed.

TC... thanks a bunch for the scoop. I appreciate the honest answers.

 

[Redtailer]

I can safely say that it just doesn't matter if a person is airline or not. If he is going to leave due to the working conditions then he is going to leave. I have been on all of the different sides of this having been an airline pilot first, went corporate then back to the airlines again. Anyone that puts an ad out that doesn't want airline pilots is just ignorant.

Some folks may not like what I am going to say next, but this is my opinion after seeing both worlds for a while. The corporate folks have good pilots and some good flight departments, but those are more of the exceptions than the rule. Here is what I have noticed. In a lot of cases the flight department is REALLY small. Maybe 2-6 pilots. Many have the attitude of not wanting airline pilots in their ranks so in a lot of cases the pilots on staff have worked their way up through the 135 charter/flight instructing ranks. These folks eventually become CPs at a young age and only because corporate pilots in general fly much less than airline guys, tend to have overall less experience. Once again I know there are a lot of really great pilots in the corporate world, but what I am talking about are a lot of places that don't have some of those folks in charge. Also, many places do not have a corporate memory like an airline does.

What you end up with is the blind leading the blind. Contrast that to the airlines. The pool of experience is much larger. In most cases you will have someone in the right seat of a major airline flying with someone that has been at that airline for 20+ years. The wealth of experience and the safety structure of an airline is passed on from one generation to the next. This is something that mostly just doesn't happen in the coprorate world. Once a new DO, CP, or both moves in it's almost like starting over again.

So in my opinion one of the best things a flight department could do is to hire major airline pilots that have been around the block. They bring a different perspective to the table. The problem is that sometimes that perspective is not wanted.

Now having said all of that the whole carrying the boss's bag thing is a bit of an adjustment. I don't think that has anything to do with being an airline pilot though. I believe that the airline pilots get a bad rap because it's easy to tag that person as such when the job doesn't work out. Fact is that jerks come from all walks of life. How many times have you heard of a coprorate pilot being let go from a department? If it was an airline pilot rumors would fly like mad because he was too good for the job. If not it all goes quietly as just some guy that couldn't fly.

See no one really has any statistics how well airline pilots make the transition to corporate flying versus non-airline pilots. It's all just hearsay and anecdotes. Kind of like some old sayings. "Bull in a china shop." "Taking candy from a baby." These are statements that "everyone knows" are just true. Take another look around the internet about those.

 

[ackattacker]

A lot of good info and well thought out posts on this thread.

Having worked both corporate and airline (in that order), I will say that Redtailer's post above is pretty much spot on. It's true that airline pilots are frequently seen as prima donnas. But it's also true that airline pilots are brought up in a safety/union culture where you can always choose the conservative path and nobody questions you. Captain is King. In corporate that just doesn't always fly, and you basically have to tread a much finer line. You can easily lose your job for making a call that in the airline world nobody would say boo, except maybe behind your back. Depending upon the flight department it probably takes more real backbone, and certainly more tact to be a successful and *safe* corporate pilot than it takes to be an airline pilot. In the airline world you can be a truly miserable, hateful, and contrary human being and still keep your job. However given the wide spectrum of folks who constitute the pilot group, as a whole I'd have to say I sleep sounder in the back of an airliner than I do in the back of a corporate jet. Not that the airline pilot is less likely to be a moron, just that he's more likely to be an experienced moron who errs on the safe side than a too-eager moron who errs on the side of git'r'done. The accident statistics back me up on this. But CP's and corporate types doing the hiring at a small flight department don't want to know about that. They just see airline "types" as people who write up broken airplanes and bitch and moan about perceived unsafe practices which have been SOP for years. Point is, any ad which specifies "no airline" I see as a huge red flag. It means they want you to be *compliant* and go along with the program even if that program is unsafe, unprofessional, and has a high turnover.

 

[Gulfstream 200]

A lot of good info and well thought out posts on this thread.

Having worked both corporate and airline (in that order), I will say that Redtailer's post above is pretty much spot on. It's true that airline pilots are frequently seen as prima donnas. But it's also true that airline pilots are brought up in a safety/union culture where you can always choose the conservative path and nobody questions you. Captain is King. In corporate that just doesn't always fly, and you basically have to tread a much finer line. You can easily lose your job for making a call that in the airline world nobody would say boo, except maybe behind your back. Depending upon the flight department it probably takes more real backbone, and certainly more tact to be a successful and *safe* corporate pilot than it takes to be an airline pilot. In the airline world you can be a truly miserable, hateful, and contrary human being and still keep your job. However given the wide spectrum of folks who constitute the pilot group, as a whole I'd have to say I sleep sounder in the back of an airliner than I do in the back of a corporate jet. Not that the airline pilot is less likely to be a moron, just that he's more likely to be an experienced moron who errs on the safe side than a too-eager moron who errs on the side of git'r'done. The accident statistics back me up on this. But CP's and corporate types doing the hiring at a small flight department don't want to know about that. They just see airline "types" as people who write up broken airplanes and bitch and moan about perceived unsafe practices which have been SOP for years. Point is, any ad which specifies "no airline" I see as a huge red flag. It means they want you to be *compliant* and go along with the program even if that program is unsafe, unprofessional, and has a high turnover.

Anyone still wonder why some in corporate wont consider airline guys?

 

[LJ45]

I wish I could hire some of those experienced Dash 8 airline pilots that are very good at stalls, or a 737 captain that can handle a good x-wind

I think we can all agree stereotypes are bad, unless the majority makes it true....hahaha

 

[Apache06]

I agree Gulfstream 200.My chief pilot and two of my line pilots are former airline. To a man, they do a great job.

It's more about the individual.