Compensation and professinalism

[CMI]

You can polish a turd all you want; in the end you still have a turd.

 

[Draginass]

Poor appearance by employees is symptomatic of management FAILURE. Failure to lead, failure to manage, failure to set the example, and most of all failure to run the company in a way that employees are proud to be a part of. Instead employees take on the same attitude as managers, i.e. "I'm just here to rake in as much loot as possible, and to heck with everything else."

Management always gets the kind of labor union and employees they deserve.

 

[acaTerry]

I now dryclean them due to a nice six figure salary and I don't spend the time to wash them.

And he got that 6 figure slary by BEING A PROFESSIONAL no matter what job he was doing, and he advanced...take a hint guys.

 

[suupah]

I agree personal pride should drive us all to press our shirts, shine our shoes and keep our hair neatly combed. I also remember being an FO making 580 dollar checks every two weeks trying to figure out how to get by while working another job as a waiter on my days off and allowing myself only three days off a month.

I did manage to shine the shoes and press my shirts but to be honest I never went anywhere near a dry cleaner and I did not replace my uniforms, or get my hair cut nearly as often as I should of. The end result was a pretty shabby set of shirt/pants/shoes. They were pressed and shined but still looked shabby. In this case I do believe compensation (at the time there was no uniform allowance) did have a strong correlation to professional appearance. I lived in one of the cheapest areas of the country and had very cheap rent of 350 dollars a month. even with that, it was tough to get by with other bills. I have since upgraded and now always have a new white shirt and nicely drycleaned and pressed pants, a sharp haircut and shoes less than a year old that are shined. I also keep have a nice rollerboard. I upgraded my appearance when my salary was upgraded.

That being said, I believe that it is clearly not sustainable to live under those conditions for extended periods of time while keeping high morale and a crisp, upbeat, rested and professional appearance for the public.

The other issue at CJC is how unprofessional the corporate culture has always been. You do not need to look very hard to see the complete lack of professionalism in management. Look at the very loose training program, manuals, aircraft appearance, policies, threatening memos and complete disregard for travel and accomodations from day one of training or anytime you tdy.

If management wants professional pilots they need to create that professional culture from the top down. In addition they need to give us a means to provide professional uniforms for ourselves, a salary that allows us to pursue restful activities on our days off to fully recuperate and enforce these policies only after giving us a reasonable way to abide by them. They should put shoe shine materials in crew rooms, care instructions for clothing articles (for those laundry deficient folks) including how to press, iron, and care for uniforms and have random spot checks of uniforms. They also need to clean our planes so that we don't take our nicely laundered and pressed uniforms to a filthy plane with seats that have never been cleaned and will leave you smelling like a dirty gym towel at the end of your shift.

professionalism is a two way street and an attitude that is developed by mentoring. And for many their first airline job is their first professional job, the mentoring must come from their first airline culture.

 

[Tarzan]

Poor appearance by employees is symptomatic of management FAILURE. Failure to lead, failure to manage, failure to set the example, and most of all failure to run the company in a way that employees are proud to be a part of. Instead employees take on the same attitude as managers, i.e. "I'm just here to rake in as much loot as possible, and to heck with everything else."

Management always gets the kind of labor union and employees they deserve.

No, it is not symptomatic of management failure to run a company that an employee can proud of. It is the result of a company not wanting to upset the turds with a requirement to live by the rules. Once they start to do that, the turds run to the union to stop the company from enforcing the policy.

 

[ex j-41]

When i was a kid we had to memorize this quote "Leadership is the art of influencing human behavior in a manner desired by the leader."

Managements job is to motivate their employees to achieve a result. We are a product of their management skills. Don't blame the dog, blame the owner.

 

[acaTerry]

Guys, it has always been this way, and it has been this way at BIG U, DAL, NWA, all of them right down to the tiniest commuter. The difference is that you, the pilots, are in control of your public perception. If you guys struck today, even in wake of the BUF crash, you'd get no support. Why? Because you are seen by the public as backpackin', hair gellin', earbud wearin', cool guys who find performing any type of customer service beyond the dignity of your position as a pilot. Remember the thread about how annoying and stupid the pax are? How cool it was that one guy said "no habla" to the person who asked where their gate was? See guys, you are your own worst enemy. If you made the passengers love you, like the CMR guys did in 2000, you'd get their support like the CMR guys did. And it was the letters to CMR management from passengers, newspaper cartoons, and editiorial letters in papers that led to the strongarm that caused them to get a good contract. But when you act like a bunch of high school kids, what do you expect?
Post after post, you guys make a$$es of yourselves....how much you get laid on the road, how dumb your FO is, how dumb your CA is, why can't I listen to my iPod in the cockpit, I don't like my uniform....geez.
Like it or not, cheap fare or not, if you consider yourselves to be what the pax expect you to be, that is professionals who care about the safety, comfort, and happiness of your pax (even the ones who are pains), it is only then that you will gain any ground. You act like kids, you get treated like kids, and paid like kids. Stop worrying about the cool factor...that doesn't pay the bills.
Yeah, mgt as a rule is lousy, but you can only blame mgt so much. If a commander of troops is an idiot, does that excuse his troops to lose a battle by not even fighting?

 

[CopilotDoug]

Because you are seen by the public as backpackin', hair gellin', earbud wearin', cool guys who find performing any type of customer service beyond the dignity of your position as a pilot.

I have to disagree, Terry. I think the public's perception by and large is that we're still a bunch of overpaid and underworked prima donnas...even down to the lowliest commuter pilot.

 

[suupah]

I kind of take some offense to what has been said here. I never see backpacks, spike bleach tips, and i pods amongst cjc pilots in the terminal. I actually see some of the most friendly and helpful pilots in the terminal at cjc. I can't tell you how many pilots i have seen retrieve bags, push wheel chairs, help old ladies etc etc on a daily basis by none other than cjc pilots.

To be totally honest I have found that the airlines with the best contracts that are the highest paid amongst the regionals seem to have a greater share of cocky and arrogant pilots. I have never encountered a cjc pilot who wasn't friendly as can be.

I only half-kid when i say that Colgan pilots don't act like we're too cool because we are well aware of the fact we are not cool.

What you do see at cjc is crappy shoes, mis match rollerbags, un cut hair. these are all symptomatic of low pay.

 

[acaTerry]

I have to disagree, Terry. I think the public's perception by and large is that we're still a bunch of overpaid and underworked prima donnas...even down to the lowliest commuter pilot.

You half-got what I said Doug...add what you said to the quote from me and you'll have bingo.

 

[taildragerpilot]

With that kind of pay, what kind of "professionals" were CJC Managers hoping to attract ? This is like buying a Yugo and bitching that it's nothing like a BMW.

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[JumpersAway]

The philosophy isn't a hard one to grasp. Since pilots chase money, the highest paying airlines attract the "cream of the crop", while the lowest paying attract the "cream of the crap". Based on this argument, I'd have to say that there is, indeed, a strong corrolation between pay and professionalism/tallent.