PFT-Let it fly!

[Timebuilder]

Proof that PFT hurts our profession

Situation one:

A captain and an FO both working full time, both receiving pay and benefits.

Situation two:

A captain working full time, recceiving pay and benefits, and an FO who is paying for a short term of experience, receiving no benefits.

In the second situation, we have lost one avaition job, and other employers are tempted to do the same.

Proof.

 

[SierraPilot]

Timebuilder.. hate to tell you this.. but thats nothing more then speculation and circumstancial evidence.. I dont think you can prove how many pilots are displaced, interviewed, turned down, resumes rejected, furloughed, as a result of GIA anymore then I can prove the benefits of PFT to a pilot as you nor I have access to those records.

ev·i·dence

1. Plainly visible; to be seen.

prove

1. To establish the truth or validity of by presentation of argument or evidence.

Proof

The result or effect of evidence; the establishment or denial of a fact by evidence.

 

[Timebuilder]

Evidence, plain and simple:

I dont think you can prove how many pilots are displaced, interviewed, turned down, resumes rejected, furloughed, as a result of GIA anymore then I can prove the benefits of PFT to a pilot as you nor I have access to those records.

Postulate one: All GIA FO's are paying for their position (I have never heard of any other kind of FO at GIA. If there are others who are not paying, reduce this set to the number of "paying" FO's)

Postulate two: The FO position is a required crewmember position.

Postulate 3: Normally, a required crewmember is a paid position throughout the industry.

Ergo: every FO position that is paid for by the FO (all FO positions at GIA?) reduces the number of paid required crewmember position in the industry by an equal number.

 

[s3jetman]

Anyone know if there is any good games on theis week?

I think my Huskers suck but i Hope they win!!!

GO BIG RED!

 

[de727ups]

Sierra Pilot

I couldn't care less if a PFT company is 121 or 135...what difference would that make?

You think only a couple of small airlines do PFT, so how can that effect an entire industry? A forest fire starts out as small spark. Anti-PFTer's are hoping to put it out, or contain it, before it spreads. Pilots should be concerned with building up the profession...not tearing it down. It gets torn down enough by things beyond our control....no need to make it worse.

You want evidence that PFT hurts the industry? Check the W2 of a Gulfstream PFT F/O....check the W2 of an F/O from any other airline. It ain't gonna be much but it's better than nothing....and they have their honor....priceless.

 

[100LL... Again!]

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Using the logic that if one instructs therefore he must be the better pilot. My question is why? honostly, how many times does it take a person flying the cessna to figure out how to recover from a stall. Im not de-emphasizing the importance of stall recovery training, but I am saying that people are capable of learning and figuring things out with out spending half there life wasting time showing others how to do it.
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You can and hopefully will learn more than you could ever dream possible by being a CFI.

I've been at it for 9 years and still learn new things teaching private students.

This is not a smart-aleck comment, but a whole lot of pilots only begin to realize how little they know once they have instructed for a while.

This is not what you probably wanted to hear, but it is the truth.

Until someone has instructed, they are really not qualified to comment on the effectiveness as a way to build your own proficiency and knowledge.

Try it - you will be a better pilot than someone who buys theur way into a turbine aircraft that they really are not TRULY qualified to fly. (On paper, yes. In reality, not really).

Also, becoming a CFII will teach you more about instrument flight that you think.

CFII is the best, in my book.

 

[SierraPilot]

Originally posted by 100LL... Again! You can and hopefully will learn more than you could ever dream possible by being a CFI.

So are you saying military pilots arnt as good of pilots become they never taught other pilots to fly.. after all they dont teach??

Ryan

 

[Sctt@NJA]

You might be surprised. As a CFI you will probably give rental checkouts ect. to military pilots and 747 airline guys. You might be surprised at what you see.

 

[100LL... Again!]

The guy from flight safety wins the Tool-of-the-Millenium Award.

If he was right, then some of these ab initio overseas carriers would not be having so much trouble with their upgrades.

He will never sell this idea to the thousands of ex-CFI pilot interviewers out there. This is nothing more than a marketing LIE packaged as a "study".


This guy is- (hope he is listening):

A tool, a liar, and a disgrace to this entire profession.

He does not deserve to sit in any cockpit, let alone decide who should.


He should go home, get his uniform and a jar of vaseline and do what he does best.

Wanker.

 

[Nalo Boy]

WOW, that was deep

It has taken me a Ridicuolus amount of time to read this thread. Whew. Remind me never to read another thread about PFT.

If youre gonna PFT, just go ahead and do it. If youre trying to convince the gys that dont believe in it, youre not going to. Most pilots (with jobs) have paid their dues one way or another. A guy that flies helicopters in the military for 15 years and does PFT, has a heck of a lot more airmanship and SA than any GA flight instructor, and deserves an airline job. On the other side of the coin, nobody with a couple hundred hours of Light airplane time should be allowed to fly paying passengers around.

PFT is not a good thing for the industry, but it exists and is not going away anytime soon. (not that thats been said a MILLION times on this thread) If youre going to do it, just go, but hope one of these guys isnt on your interview board.

 

[100LL... Again!]

Low-time PFT'ers are professional trainees.

Perhaps they also rent their girlfriends by the half hour.

Same basic idea, hmm?

 

[SierraPilot]

If you had the company minimum flight times for a company that practiced PFT, and they had a open position would you still apply for them even so some of the people you might end up working with as FO or Captain paid for that right seat or position??

What got me thinking about this is if you had a person who had a worked his way up to a 121 op by teaching, flying for a 135 op, etc but was working for a company that practiced PFT either currently or in the past, how would one who interviews this person know if this person was hired on his own merits or paid for the position?.

 

[bobbysamd]

Dues-paying member v. P-F-T member

If you had the company minimum flight times for a company that practiced PFT, and they had a open position would you still apply for them even so some of the people you might end up working with as FO or Captain paid for that right seat or position??

What got me thinking about this is if you had a person who had a worked his way up to a 121 op by teaching, flying for a 135 op, etc but was working for a company that practiced PFT either currently or in the past, how would one who interviews this person know if this person was hired on his own merits or paid for the position?.

I'll address the second comment first. That is easy. Look at the interviewee's resume and logbook and ask. I would imagine that most regional pilot-interview board members are savvy enough to know about you-know-where in South Florida and others. Just ask a few probing questions. After identifying for certain that this person P-F-T'd, ask why, especially if he/she was otherwise qualified. Then, you can make your value judgments.

The first comment reminds me about some of my years in the broadcasting business. P-F-T is a good comparison to how so-called large-market radio stations sometimes hire extremely green talent.

I was fortunate enough to have started in a, quote, "larger market," as opposed to small market radio where most people begin. But my "larger market" station was a small and lesser-known radio station that did not broadcast at night. I worked plenty hard and worked my way up. However, management at these larger stations hired talent with much less experience than me, and for better shifts, sometimes. I didn't like that and I resented their presence. I had worked hard to hone my abilities and build experience, and I felt that these less-experienced individuals had no place in our newsroom. Compare that to P-F-T.

Perhaps my outrage should have been directed more at management, but some of these people lacked the talent, and certainly lacked the experience, to truly cut it. That's another reason why I don't like P-F-T.

Timebuilder, care to comment?

 

[Timebuilder]

Sure.

My most vivid memory as a working liberal radio guy was my first promotion, or what was supposed to be my first promotion.

I was a part timer, always available at a moments notice, taking any shift as assigned. My roomate, the overnight guy, had been let go from this AFTRA station after 12 years of service. I had been tagged as his replacement, and even had my friend's "go for it!" endorsement.

New York corporate called down to our local management, and said that legal had noticed that we had no non-white announcers on staff, and my boss was told to put the only black part timer we had in the spot. After he was promoted, someone even joked that I should have rubbed shoe polish all over my face and I might have kept my promotion!

Kind of sounds like United, doesn't it?

I've seen all kinds of people who were not qualified, or "as" qualified, get promoted or hired in radio and TV. There was one news girl who couldn't pronounce Philadelphia, and she was kept on until she got married...to the general manager!

One weekend guy kept turning up the pot to que records, instead of down in the que detent. It was comical to listen to his show, cause sure enough, in the middle of the song, you'd hear him getting the next LP ready, scratching it back and forth to find the right beat to start it!!!

Some of the smaller stations used "interns", PFT guys really, from a local broadcasting "school". They, just like the Gulfstream FO's, were displacing more qualified people.

 

[bobbysamd]

Radio P-F-T

One weekend guy kept turning up the pot to que records, instead of down in the que detent. It was comical to listen to his show, cause sure enough, in the middle of the song, you'd hear him getting the next LP ready, scratching it back and forth to find the right beat to start it!!!

Or else they wouldn't turn up the cue amp and couldn't figure out why they couldn't cue records- so they cue them up on the air. Or, they think they're on "audition" instead of "program." Or, they wouldn't turn up the pot. Or, would "wow" records. Forget to throw tape carts in the machines and would do it on the fly, wowing carts. How about the inadvertant open mike?

These are mistakes that should have been learned from and corrected on 250-watt radio, not on Philly or New York major market radio. Compare to P-F-T. Yeah, you're getting experience, or "experience." You probably would get a lot more out of it had you done some less-pressured flying beforehand.

 

[100LL... Again!]

Sierrapilot-

Nowhere did I say that one MUST instruct to be a good pilot.

I just don't think that wet-behind-the-ears 300 hr pilots belong in a regional aircraft just because they can afford to pay for it.

They really believe they are qualified, but they are not experienced enough to realize how little they know.


Any pilot who gains experience coming up through the ranks and paying a little dues shows more character, and truly deserves the seat when they get it. This includes CFIs, military pilots, etc.

What I was talking about was those who would SKIP the experience-building process and transition right into an airplane they have no business in. (Occasional exceptional pilots notwithstanding.)

 

[SierraPilot]

You know bobbysamd I find it ironic you would equate PFT with cutting in line as you do SOOO often on here.. how do you condone pilots who walk in a resume and cut in line of the hundreds of other resumes sitting on the desk of some HR person of whom probably some have been waiting months, years to hear a respones and very will may be more qualified then this so called "friend". This isnt something that just happens in aviation, but every business and industry out their. This is just a reality of business and yet I dont hear you or anyone complaining about it.. interesting.. in fact it seems to be encouraged in the aviation industry.. its all about who you know, maybe I should spend 20 grand to pay off some Chief Pilot then see how much you complain about cutting in line.

Ryan

 

[bobbysamd]

Cutting in line and contacts

You know bobbysamd I find it ironic you would equate PFT with cutting in line as you do SOOO often on here.. how do you condone pilots who walk in a resume and cut in line of the hundreds of other resumes sitting on the desk of some HR person of whom probably some have been waiting months, years to hear a respones and very will may be more qualified then this so called "friend".

It is a reality, yes. It also doesn't always work.

Case in point: Me. For years, I applied to SkyWest. For years, I updated with Skywest. For years, I never heard from them. Finally, a former student who was a pilot there offered to walk-in materials for me. I prepared a new application, and asked her to submit it with an updated resume and a check for the application fee - just in case my other tons of materials had slipped through the cracks somehow. I heard from SkyWest, all right. It returned my check, which proved that I had not slipped through the cracks. But it never called me for an interview. In all, I tried to be hired at SkyWest for nearly six years.

This was the only time I tried to use a contact to get an aviation job. All my other efforts, and interviews I had and jobs I was offered, were on my own. I tried using a contact to get an interview with a law firm. I was in on the phone conversation when a partner promised I would get an interview. I did not get the interview; in other words, it was a lie.

I had other acquaintances who got in such places as Horizon, where I also tried for a few years They had friends recommend them for jobs. I know that these acquaintances met at least the minimum quals. I had a friend who was female, and far better qualified than me, apply for years to Horizon. She was never called, either.

I do not care for situations where someone with 300 hours gets hired because his father's neighbor's friend plays golf with the Chief Pilot.

Finally, you really cannot compare using a contact with P-F-T. Once more, the operative concept here is pay. People who walk-in materials are doing someone a favor, for free, I assume. Anyone with a fat enough bank account can pay for a job. You do not need contacts for that.

 

[46Driver]

Kind of curious to know what y'all call our military reserve VTU (voluntary training units) where we come in and work in our profession for free.

 

[100LL... Again!]

46 driver-

You're serving the Good ol' USA, right?

Public service + good. Even if you also benefit. As you SHOULD.

PFT is self serving (not inherently a bad thing), but it is buying in over those who are often better qualified and have paid their dues.

If everyone had to PFT, then there would at least be a sense of fairness.