Nagging little voice

[Flying Illini]

It seems that there has always been a very little, faint voice in the back of my head that says I should take a chance and see what flying for an airline is all about. The much stronger voice in my head tries to overpower/cover up that voice saying that corporate is what I want to do. I do enjoy the type of flying I'm doing right now, and eventually, I hope to make it to a large corporate department. But whatever the reason, the airline voice has gained some momentum saying I should give it a try. The thread about "what do you enjoy about this job" has given it strength. I want to do more flying at night, I want to experience taxiing into the gate. My little taste with customs in CLE just whet my appetite.
My question is. Should I listen to that little voice and give it a shot? Especially with the current state of the industry? I read many of the posts on the Majors and Regionals forums and most are negative...do I want to get myself into that?! Do I really want to fly to the same destinations day in and day out? What if you don't like the captain you're paired with...you have to put up with him for 3 or more days...so many questions. What's it like to haul people around. What's it like to turn left when you walk in instead of turning right and chatting with your passengers? I really like the personal side of corporate flying. For those of you who have done both...what were the biggest challenges in the changeover? Did you go back to your original line of work after giving the switch a chance? Something tells me that the only way to answer these questions of mine is to give the airlines a shot... Confusion appears to be reigning supreme at the moment.

I'm really looking for some perspective from anyone and I would appreciate a few responses from those who have done both and what the transition was like.

BTW~should I be concerned about all the voices inside my head?!

Thanks,
JD

 

[N1atEcon]

No comparison. Major airline flying beats corporate flying any day. That is why no one quits an airline to go fly a Lear (until they reach 60 of course).

 

[English]

No one quits an airline to go fly corporate? Really?

 

[AA717driver]

There are good corporate jobs and bad ones. With 1000 hours, you will start at a crappy regional job. Sure, it gets better, but right now, you can go to a regional and build a bunch of flight time(corporate insurance companies love that right now) and you can still move back to corporate later. You have a background in corp. so you can tell them that you are just trying to build time by going regional. IMO.TC

 

[Lear70]

Do I really want to fly to the same destinations day in and day out? What if you don't like the captain you're paired with...you have to put up with him for 3 or more days...so many questions. What's it like to haul people around. What's it like to turn left when you walk in instead of turning right and chatting with your passengers? I really like the personal side of corporate flying.

We don't fly to the same destinations day in and day out. I haven't had an overnight at the same place in nearly three months and have only seen two of the airports on turns twice - I have all three-day trips, 14 days off, one of the overnights each trip is at least 14-18 hours - I do a 31 hour BOS layover Thursday night to Sat morning. (I've been here three years).

Put up with a CA (or F/O) you don't like for 3 days? Try 30. Most of the airlines I know (especially the regionals) build pairings the same for CA's as F/O's so you end up paired together for the month. If you really don't like it, you can drop the trip and swap out the entire month's worth of trips if there are enough in open time (I've only done that once in three years here).

Turn left instead of right? I actually still enjoy talking to people as they get on the airplane, assuming we've had enough time to preflight before we board. Some days it's nice though to just be able to close the door and let Inflight deal with them - kind of like having the best of both worlds.

That last part is the one I miss the most. Flying the same people regularly was a blast. I flew at Flexjet, but we had several customers that would ask for me by name and I ended up flying the same people more often than not. Knowing exactly what they wanted, not having them pitch a b*tch when the weather wasn't good enough to leave for an hour or so or diverting an hour out of the way to avoid getting the sh*t kicked out of you, having them know YOU by name and the rapport that goes with someone who knows more than the average shmo who just paid all of $140 round-trip and expects to be seated and treated as a first class pax are just some of the things you won't see in the airline world.

There's pros and cons, but unless it was to go to a 6 figure plus Fortune 100 or Fortune 50 gig (not likely), I wouldn't leave the airline world. It's much too nice having guaranteed days off, pass privileges, jumpseat privileges, and more job security that most corporate gigs that haven't been established for 10+ years. Of course, nothing is certain until we lose our medicals and have to stop flying at age 85 (of course, I plan to be the George Burns of aviation too).

 

[Raskal]

Tough calls, I know. I'm at a decent sized corporate/shared ownership/management company. The flying is more like corporate than a true frax, lots of overnights accompanied by very long day trips and fbo sitting. We're treated extremely well on the road with generous budgets, nice hotels and the freedom to make any changes. It's a good company with decent money (right in the middle of the NBAA survey) and excellent mx on the fleet. Downside-corporate life. Upside-corporate life.

We've had pilots move on to wet dream flight depts with Fortune 50 corps, recently we've had a reasonable number of FO's leaving for the regionals. We have furloughed NWA and Delta guys, one may return soon and the other has decided to stay.

Sorry for rambling but the point being everyone seems to struggle with this. It's a very American, very natural thing; the grass is always greener. Personally, I've recently decided to stay and make it in the coporate world. I love the variation in destinations, the personal involvement with the pax, the freedom of not being on such a tight leash. I'm willing to put up with the bad (not much worse than fbo sitting for hours in some rural hole thinking the whole time that airline guys don't have to do this) I spent a lot of time weighng and speaking with friends on both sides...it's a helluva spot.

One thing though, don't let people with negative experiences on both sides make too much of the choice(s) for you. People who constantly put down one type of flying or another are either bitter, inexperienced or have some serious confidence issues. My only piece of advice, don't wait too long to decide, corporate typically has better short-term pay and it's easy to become locked in. If you want out, do it before you can't afford to take the initial pay cut to go do the regional or national thing as a first year FO.

 

[Flying Illini]

My only piece of advice, don't wait too long to decide, corporate typically has better short-term pay and it's easy to become locked in. If you want out, do it before you can't afford to take the initial pay cut to go do the regional or national thing as a first year FO.

That's good advice and I've definitely thought about that. It will only get harder to leave corporate...

Thanks for the advice, it's all good stuff.

 

[P3 Tweek]

Corp vs. Airline

Flying Illini,

I've been flying corporate with the same company for nearly 20 years. I'm facing the same decision. Here's my perspective on this dilemma:

ADVANTAGES (airlines):
1. Eventually, better pay at airlines.
2. Almost for sure knowing when and which days you'll be home. Perhaps not in the beginning year or so.
3. When you leave your airliner, all its problems can be differed to maintenance and forgotten or MEL'd.

ADVANTAGES (corporate):
1. Pays good enough.
2. No bitchy passengers unless you are flying premadonnas at your company. (I have none)
3. With FAR91 the FAA is out a sight and mind as long as you do your job professionally.
4. I'm almost home every night and weekends- even though for only a few hours at times. PS. Some flight departments are gone all the time.
5. Almost NO exposure with TSA (BOS and a few others excluded).
6. I've been to a lot of GREAT destinations (PASI, PANC, PAKN, CYVR, CYYC, Canadian NWT, KGCN, KSAN (I like SAN), and a bunch more.)
7. You become intimately familiar with each airplane you fly and its unique glitches and even sounds.

DISADVANTAGES (airlines):
1. Low seniority and risk of furlough - SWA may be the exception. I'm concerned a little about another 911, worsening economy, and continued high oil prices. The company I fly for is positioned nearly inversely proportional to these otherwise bad situations. If the airlines are suffering for the above similar reasons, we fly much more (up about 30% more flying since 911) - my business thrives.

DISADVANTAGES (corporate):
1. You must be a `jack-of-all-trades'. Many of the routine duties are done by the corporate crews themselves such as washing and cleaning the aircraft (actually this can be a nice break at times), helping mechanics, organizing maintenance schedules hopefully around the flight schedules, and keeping things legal, developing operating budgets, and playing the personality and corporate mentality `game' correctly.
2. Up and back at `O' Dark Thirty for many flights.


I have a VERY good and secure job now, a new Encore CE-560, and a young family. Southwest Airlines is the only airline I would and have considered. I'll be 50 years old soon. It has taken many years to build the time and qualification requirements for SWA. So far, I've been passed by for an interview opportunity with SWA even though I've had an application in since 2002 and update the online version often. Very soon, I believe this decision and dilemma will be made for me by time and circumstances. I'm hoping and praying, for all of you younger airline drivers out there, that political and economic circumstances remain positive so that all of you may have the opportunity to have prosperous careers.

ex-USN P-3C IFT/WST Tweeker and Citation windwagon driver

 

[Bandit60]

No comparison. Major airline flying beats corporate flying any day. That is why no one quits an airline to go fly a Lear (until they reach 60 of course).

I have major airline friends calling me up all the time to see if there is an opening in my company. I have seen plenty of airline guys switch and can't believe how fun flying can be again. My pay keeps increasing while airlines are decreasing. The stability of my company is great. Not much of a chance of a losing my job.

 

[xdays]

P3Tweek covered it pretty good, at least from my perspective. My background includes 8 years corporate and 135 followed by 27 years with a major airline. Granted, I was fortunate to be working in the industry at a good time, but I wouldn't have changed my career path for anything. My biggest gripe with corporate flying was the long sits in FBO's. On the plus side, the flying was great and you fly some pretty awesome machines. Read and digest what P3Tweek has written, as it will give you a real good picture of the different careers. On a side note, in 27 years with the airline I never met one pilot who even talked about leaving to go to the corporate side, unless they were facing furlough. That's not to say it never happens, it was just my personal observation. Of course, the industry is certainly changing as we speak.
Best of luck in whatever direction you choose. Corporate or airline, you really can't go wrong.

 

[P3 Tweek]

Corp duty days.

"My biggest gripe with corporate flying was the long sits in FBO's. On the plus side, the flying was great and you fly some pretty awesome machines."

You're dead on xdays!

My loooooong wait each day hanging at FBO's is punctuated in between with a little 9 hole golf occasionally and always a nice meal somewhere like Red Lobster, Olive Garden, or someplace equivalent. Always a 1-2 hour nap in a lounge chair - hopefully a good one. So all-in-all not too bad but always a bit tiring.

My SWA friends are through with their duty day almost always in 8 hours and rack up around 5 hours flying time in that duty day. A typical day of mine will be off the ground at 0600-0700 for a 1 to 2 hour flight somewhere and back off the ground at 1600-2000 to return home.

Humm! This is why it has taken me so long to build PIC time.

Tweek

PS. Congratulations on having a GREAT airline career. You are VERY fortunate and blessed to have done so. Corporate again when you retire? Also, this little Cessna Citation Encore is an awesome performer, Primus 1000, and a beautifully stable aircraft to fly! SL to FL370 @ ISA in 20 minutes redlined @VMO/MMO into the high 20's.

 

[enigma]

Illini, You don't get to find out if you made the correct aviation career decision until you retire.

Don't tell the Feds about those little voices

Here's the deal, your career will be partly dependant upon your drive/intelligence/ethic/etc, and partly on luck/timing. Tossing a coin is most likely as good a way to make decisions as is running computations on a Cray computer. However, I will still take the computer and hope that I can give it enough information to enable it to come to a reasonable conclusion. I'm not kiddin here, there are soooooooooo many variables.

I've done both, and don't have a preference. A good job is where you find it. For me, I've found better jobs at scheduled pax carriers than I have found at pure corporate operations. But that is just me, the next guy might have had different experiences.

In general I have found this to be true, the average scheduled passenger carrier will offer a better lifestyle than the average part 91 corporate operator. Your milage may vary.

regards,
enigma

BTW, if your profile is truthful, I'd suggest that you take the job that gives you the most quality flight time in the near future. And one more thing, make sure you keep your expenses low, even after you land the big job. That makes it easier to pay the bills when they furlough, downsize, eliminate, etc.

 

[FN FAL]

No one quits an airline to go fly corporate? Really?

Everybody talks smart till they are running around faxing resumes to any place advertising for help, just to get a job.

You should have seen all the heavy duty 121 resumes we got from applicants for the last few caravan positions we advertised.

 

[G4 Driver]

Airline vs. Corporate

I heard the same voice. I was Director of Operations for some folks with a GII and a pair of Westwinds pulling down 150K. When the call came, I went, six months later got furloughed and am now back in corporate since '01.

With that said and knowing what I know now, I would do it all over again. You could say that I have "been there, done that" in corporate from the top to bottom. There is no comparison between a corporate job and a career as an airline pilot. Corporate jobs, even the best ones, come and go with the blink of an eye. This furlough thing is more like a phase...once you get through it you're (in most cases) done with it and can enjoy a wonderful career. You pay your dues and take your chances!

To be quite honest, I didn't want to look back on my flying career and wonder what airline flying would have been like. Now that I know what it's like, I can't wait to go back.

I recommend reading "Fate is the Hunter" by Enrst K. Gann. It's a start on what to expect and a great read.

 

[Flying Illini]

Thanks for the replies, these have all been very helpful!

I didn't want to look back on my flying career and wonder what airline flying would have been like.

Me either...I guess that's why I'm listening to those "little voices."

 

[USNFDX]

Nagging little voice.......Isn't that your wife?........No wait, that's the Nagging BIG voice!