May (Q2) 2021

Imagine looking at an applicant's home of record and offering the closest few options with openings from the get go.

Imagine applicants being able to request the closest level 7 and below with openings available to thier HOR if they don't like the list they get.

Imagine expanding the lists beyond the number of people who finish the course.

Imagine doing literally any of these things before these poor kids last fucking day in okc.

There's about a million solutions to this problem that require nothing but an excel spreadsheet and a little bit of forethought.
 
Imagine looking at an applicant's home of record and offering the closest few options with openings from the get go.

Imagine applicants being able to request the closest level 7 and below with openings available to thier HOR if they don't like the list they get.

Imagine expanding the lists beyond the number of people who finish the course.

Imagine doing literally any of these things before these poor kids last fucking day in okc.

There's about a million solutions to this problem that require nothing but an excel spreadsheet and a little bit of forethought.
Then on top of it all they give you time off based on how far it is from the academy not where you live(they still do that right?). Like yeah sure I live in Southern California 2 days is enough to get to Michigan from there. Or do they think your shit is already in a moving truck sitting in the parking lot of twin peaks waiting for you to be done?
 
Then on top of it all they give you time off based on how far it is from the academy not where you live(they still do that right?). Like yeah sure I live in Southern California 2 days is enough to get to Michigan from there. Or do they think your shit is already in a moving truck sitting in the parking lot of twin peaks waiting for you to be done?
Ya thankfully I got hired back in the day when you knew where you were headed before you stepped foot in the academy.

When I heard about that shit I was shocked. Its absolutely ridiculous to expect someone to be able to move to some random ass location that very well may be on the complete whole ass opposite side of the country on very short notice. Absolutely unreasonable when there's a million better ways to handle it.

People really really need to stop treating aviation jobs like they are some fucking gift from God. That's half the problem, and employers taking advantage of people having airplane boners and using it to do really shitty things to new hires is pervasive industry wide.
 
IMO this is 100% why CTI and military hiring worked so well. Not talking about success rates or anything. With prior military they're already used to being assigned a duty location and moving frequently. With hiring kids just out of college (so I guess not necessarily CTI but the 21/22/23 year old recent grads) they've got less roots. They likely aren't married with kids, probably don't have a house to sell and a bunch of belongings to pack. Their biggest concern with moving is do they have to break their lease.

Now I feel like it is taking people multiple bids to get hired. And it is people that heard about the salary from social media and they hate their current job so they apply. I'd guess the average age of applicants is up (just a guess) so they've got more roots. They've got a spouse and/or kids. They've got a house. They've got a fill time job to quit. It's a lot more difficult to move wherever the FAA wants when you're more established.
 
Ya thankfully I got hired back in the day when you knew where you were headed before you stepped foot in the academy.

When I heard about that shit I was shocked. Its absolutely ridiculous to expect someone to be able to move to some random ass location that very well may be on the complete whole ass opposite side of the country on very short notice. Absolutely unreasonable when there's a million better ways to handle it.

People really really need to stop treating aviation jobs like they are some fucking gift from God. That's half the problem, and employers taking advantage of people having airplane boners and using it to do really shitty things to new hires is pervasive industry wide.
Name me some better jobs, or a better job that pays better or close with better benefits with as few entrance requirements as air traffic.
It is not the greatest job in the world and there are trade offs. We work 4 hours a day and end up millionaires with ease.
 
Name me some better jobs, or a better job that pays better or close with better benefits with as few entrance requirements as air traffic.
It is not the greatest job in the world and there are trade offs. We work 4 hours a day and end up millionaires with ease.
Bro I contribute to the safe operation of aircraft within the National Airspace System and I am justly compensated for such high stakes work.
 
Name me some better jobs, or a better job that pays better or close with better benefits with as few entrance requirements as air traffic.
It is not the greatest job in the world and there are trade offs. We work 4 hours a day and end up millionaires with ease.
I'm not saying it's a bad job, I'm saying that it's not the end all be all of jobs and the hoops the faa sometimes makes controllers jump through to get the job, or be happy beyond MuH aIrPlAnEs mUh pAyCheK is ridiculous at times. Ya the money is good when you get to a moderate to higher level, but that certainly isn't true for the fresh acad grad cats that are making AG and are expected to move across the country on 2 days notice, among other things. Tell me literally any other job that that's a requirement for entry.

Also, your entry requirements to KEEP the job are every bit as tenuous as going to college or a tough trade school, so it's not like they are just giving you money for nothing once you get in, and you have to repeat that sometimes multi year process every time you go somewhere else, which isn't a standard in any other job I can think of.

The tradeoffs are the reason the pay is good, not in spite of it. Is it at the upper end of blue collar, no education required work? Sure. Doesn't mean I have to sit here and pretend there aren't problems with how my employer does things, or that the quality of life hits associated with that nice paycheck don't exist.

And your "millionaire" point is pretty laughable. Ya, if you invest your tsp right you will be a "millionaire" in the literal sense more than likely, but you certainly aren't going to be living like it in the meantime (more like perfectly acceptable, normal middle class, and thats great, there's nothing wrong with that), and having a millionish plus in the bank at retirement is just that....a good retirement, particularly when you are retiring 10 or 15 years earlier than most people. That's 10 more years that million or so has to last, hence the good retirement program. The pension is the giant plus IMHO, not your "millionaire" retiree status.

The aviation industry is the only one I can think of that's as successful at preying on people's interest/hobby/"love of the game" in getting employees, particularly new, not jaded ones to do shitty things to get a foot in the door. It's pervasive industry wide and there's plenty of examples outside of ATC where it's the case. The FAA taking advantage of people who think like you or people who just want a job around things with wings and engines is the problem, not that I think the job sucks, because I don't.
 
I guess they’re not doing it the same as they were a few years back when you got twenty+ choices to pick from, but our list had double the amount of people that passed. I do realize that isn’t how it’s done right now though or for en route though, so I’m happy to take the L on my opinion there.
Man I miss those fat lists. Here’s 9 JANs and 7 MWHs god bless.
My academy class called their bluff: 4 of us took the available ERI slots on the list (4 ERI, 5 FAI, 4 JNU, 3 MRY, and 3 ROC comprised the bulk of our list for 14 AGs I believe). I think it was 2 classes later that they added Alaska locations to the mandatories and some poor bastards really got screwed.
sitting in the parking lot of twin peaks
Ah, yes, I also am a man of culture.
 
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IMO this is 100% why CTI and military hiring worked so well. Not talking about success rates or anything. With prior military they're already used to being assigned a duty location and moving frequently. With hiring kids just out of college (so I guess not necessarily CTI but the 21/22/23 year old recent grads) they've got less roots. They likely aren't married with kids, probably don't have a house to sell and a bunch of belongings to pack. Their biggest concern with moving is do they have to break their lease.

Now I feel like it is taking people multiple bids to get hired. And it is people that heard about the salary from social media and they hate their current job so they apply. I'd guess the average age of applicants is up (just a guess) so they've got more roots. They've got a spouse and/or kids. They've got a house. They've got a fill time job to quit. It's a lot more difficult to move wherever the FAA wants when you're more established.
Honestly....as a guy that had to apply multiple times and was using his military experience as a fallback plan, and didn't really have anything tying him down when he hired- I still don't know if I'd have been totally okay with getting two days notice to move to some unforseen, unknown location.

I was thirsty to get started in a real career in a field I know and liked, and make real big people adult money (I wasted away a good portion of my 20s being a fuckhead lmao), but I don't think taking advantage of those things is a good employment practice, regardless of if you can get away with it as an employer.
 
I'm not saying it's a bad job, I'm saying that it's not the end all be all of jobs and the hoops the faa sometimes makes controllers jump through to get the job, or be happy beyond MuH aIrPlAnEs mUh pAyCheK is ridiculous at times. Ya the money is good when you get to a moderate to higher level, but that certainly isn't true for the fresh acad grad cats that are making AG and are expected to move across the country on 2 days notice, among other things. Tell me literally any other job that that's a requirement for entry.

Also, your entry requirements to KEEP the job are every bit as tenuous as going to college or a tough trade school, so it's not like they are just giving you money for nothing once you get in, and you have to repeat that sometimes multi year process every time you go somewhere else, which isn't a standard in any other job I can think of.

The tradeoffs are the reason the pay is good, not in spite of it. Is it at the upper end of blue collar, no education required work? Sure. Doesn't mean I have to sit here and pretend there aren't problems with how my employer does things, or that the quality of life hits associated with that nice paycheck don't exist.

And your "millionaire" point is pretty laughable. Ya, if you invest your tsp right you will be a "millionaire" in the literal sense more than likely, but you certainly aren't going to be living like it in the meantime (more like perfectly acceptable, normal middle class, and thats great, there's nothing wrong with that), and having a millionish plus in the bank at retirement is just that....a good retirement, particularly when you are retiring 10 or 15 years earlier than most people. That's 10 more years that million or so has to last, hence the good retirement program. The pension is the giant plus IMHO, not your "millionaire" retiree status.

The aviation industry is the only one I can think of that's as successful at preying on people's interest/hobby/"love of the game" in getting employees, particularly new, not jaded ones to do shitty things to get a foot in the door. It's pervasive industry wide and there's plenty of examples outside of ATC where it's the case. The FAA taking advantage of people who think like you or people who just want a job around things with wings and engines is the problem, not that I think the job sucks, because I don't.
It’s forced retirement when working planes, we have other options in the agency. But god forbid people do something else. And we get social security early until 62, On top of our pension. Many are making over 100k in retirement even at a low Level, work somewhere else and you are easily over that. That doesn’t happen anywhere else!!!!!! You shouldn’t have to touch your tsp if you are making over 100k in retirement, that’s another 10-15 years of growth in your tsp money which means it’ll at least double if invested right, early investment or not you’ll probably have 2 million even if just doing the 5 percent.

And while I agree that you have a right to complain and want to change things and you might actually be someone who tries, but in my experience the biggest complainers never like what is proposed, regardless of what it is” combined with never rolling up their sleeves to help out on their free time.

you mentioned the retraining at new facilities, yes that sucks but you won’t lose your job if you don’t make it at the next place. You will still keep a job. So I don’t agree that this is a problem.
Also entry pay pretty much anywhere else is about what we make at AG pay. And many other jobs don’t double inside of 2 years like ours does.
 
It’s forced retirement when working planes, we have other options in the agency. But god forbid people do something else. And we get social security early until 62, On top of our pension. Many are making over 100k in retirement even at a low Level, work somewhere else and you are easily over that. That doesn’t happen anywhere else!!!!!! You shouldn’t have to touch your tsp if you are making over 100k in retirement, that’s another 10-15 years of growth in your tsp money which means it’ll at least double if invested right, early investment or not you’ll probably have 2 million even if just doing the 5 percent.

And while I agree that you have a right to complain and want to change things and you might actually be someone who tries, but in my experience the biggest complainers never like what is proposed, regardless of what it is” combined with never rolling up their sleeves to help out on their free time.

you mentioned the retraining at new facilities, yes that sucks but you won’t lose your job if you don’t make it at the next place. You will still keep a job. So I don’t agree that this is a problem.
Also entry pay pretty much anywhere else is about what we make at AG pay. And many other jobs don’t double inside of 2 years like ours does.
None of that applies to the issue at hand.... which is the shit treatment of the new hires who don't have the same level of job security you and I do. So please, name me another civilian carreer field in which you get hired and have no idea at anytime in a multi month hiring cycle where you are going to end up, nationwide until 2 days before you are supposed to be there.

My point is the faa doing this because they can is biting them in the ass down the road when it comes to staffing not that the job doesn't come with perks. "Shut up and take it, daddy faa is gonna let you talk to airplanes and make sure you don't starve to death in 50 years" isn't a good excuse.
 
daddy faa is gonna let you talk to airplanes
Chill Relax GIF
 
None of that applies to the issue at hand.... which is the shit treatment of the new hires who don't have the same level of job security you and I do. So please, name me another civilian carreer field in which you get hired and have no idea at anytime in a multi month hiring cycle where you are going to end up, nationwide until 2 days before you are supposed to be there.

My point is the faa doing this because they can is biting them in the ass down the road when it comes to staffing not that the job doesn't come with perks. "Shut up and take it, daddy faa is gonna let you talk to airplanes and make sure you don't starve to death in 50 years" isn't a good excuse.
The hiring of the previous 20 wasn’t successful either. It lead us here. And that was when people could put specific states, areas, multiple states etc.in my opinion the cpcs are the ones leading the charge on why our hiring is the way it is and at some facilities why training sucks so bad leading to lengthy backlogs and not helping the training program fits the needs of the job. Obviously people in the back don’t know what might work best. I’ll lead the charge with you on that. They try it and we fuck with it just like you think the way the faa is hiring just because they can.
I do not apologize for saying that if you cant deal with a few years of pain for benefits you won’t receive anywhere else, I don’t feel bad.
 
None of that applies to the issue at hand.... which is the shit treatment of the new hires who don't have the same level of job security you and I do. So please, name me another civilian carreer field in which you get hired and have no idea at anytime in a multi month hiring cycle where you are going to end up, nationwide until 2 days before you are supposed to be there.

My point is the faa doing this because they can is biting them in the ass down the road when it comes to staffing not that the job doesn't come with perks. "Shut up and take it, daddy faa is gonna let you talk to airplanes and make sure you don't starve to death in 50 years" isn't a good excuse.
I'm sorry but I just don't think this is as big of an issue as some make it to be. It's not like this is a bait and switch. You know when you apply how the hiring process goes. You know it will be a long drawn out process in which you have multiple opportunities to be fired. You know when you apply that you could potentially move anywhere. You agreed to all of this when you applied. If you want a 9-5 job with weekends and holidays off in your hometown then don't apply. Go work at your local airport as a baggage handler if you just have to be in aviation.

This is how the aviation industry, especially air traffic is. Brand new hires suffer the most because we don't even know if you will certify. Core 30 airports and centers get the focus because they run the most traffic and the most publicly visible traffic. But life isn't perfect and sunny all the time just because you got to your home facility or a high level facility. Plenty of things still suck there too. Every facility has issues. Most controllers have something to complain about. Much of this will never change.
 
I'm sorry but I just don't think this is as big of an issue as some make it to be. It's not like this is a bait and switch. You know when you apply how the hiring process goes. You know it will be a long drawn out process in which you have multiple opportunities to be fired. You know when you apply that you could potentially move anywhere. You agreed to all of this when you applied. If you want a 9-5 job with weekends and holidays off in your hometown then don't apply. Go work at your local airport as a baggage handler if you just have to be in aviation.

This is how the aviation industry, especially air traffic is. Brand new hires suffer the most because we don't even know if you will certify. Core 30 airports and centers get the focus because they run the most traffic and the most publicly visible traffic. But life isn't perfect and sunny all the time just because you got to your home facility or a high level facility. Plenty of things still suck there too. Every facility has issues. Most controllers have something to complain about. Much of this will never change.
I knew going to the academy we were going to get two slots for each person that passed. Then they told us after a month at the academy, yeah about that, it’s just one person. So instead of getting 12 options we got six. So I didn’t agree to the placement process I got. The hiring process is dogshit, we shouldn’t settle for what it is currently.
 
The hiring of the previous 20 wasn’t successful either. It lead us here. And that was when people could put specific states, areas, multiple states etc.in my opinion the cpcs are the ones leading the charge on why our hiring is the way it is and at some facilities why training sucks so bad leading to lengthy backlogs and not helping the training program fits the needs of the job. Obviously people in the back don’t know what might work best. I’ll lead the charge with you on that. They try it and we fuck with it just like you think the way the faa is hiring just because they can.
I do not apologize for saying that if you cant deal with a few years of pain for benefits you won’t receive anywhere else, I don’t feel bad.
Bruh this isn't my first day at the office. I'm at my third facility. I got hired in the pick two states days. Obviously that's a bad plan, didn't work. Reference my post above where I spitballed like 3 or 4 things they can do to instantly make the process better for new hires and still staff facilities that need it most though. Doesn't take a lot of effort on the faas part to seriously have an impact on the number of people wanting to immediately leave the places they get sent.

I'd agree training standards and training program length is a problem. It's something I'm dealing with going on almost 4 years at my current facility, but again that has little to do with the scattershot way the faa is doing it now which has zero attention paid to the implications it has on all of us when it comes to career advancement and mobility.

Having a little regard for the wishes of your employees goes a long way for morale, and happy people put in for fewer transfers and hardships, period.
 
I'm sorry but I just don't think this is as big of an issue as some make it to be. It's not like this is a bait and switch. You know when you apply how the hiring process goes. You know it will be a long drawn out process in which you have multiple opportunities to be fired. You know when you apply that you could potentially move anywhere. You agreed to all of this when you applied. If you want a 9-5 job with weekends and holidays off in your hometown then don't apply. Go work at your local airport as a baggage handler if you just have to be in aviation.

This is how the aviation industry, especially air traffic is. Brand new hires suffer the most because we don't even know if you will certify. Core 30 airports and centers get the focus because they run the most traffic and the most publicly visible traffic. But life isn't perfect and sunny all the time just because you got to your home facility or a high level facility. Plenty of things still suck there too. Every facility has issues. Most controllers have something to complain about. Much of this will never change.
How many of us really knew taking the position that it could be 8+ years to get back home though? Personally I took the position stoked to leave home for a few years and see the country. Now I’m years in and just stuck in BFE praying to go home. I think that’s often overlooked. Also, drives me absolutely bonkers that union reps, management, and senior controllers that have no interest in the NCEPT process because they don’t want to go anywhere look down on controllers trying to go back home. I’ve been told on multiple occasions by these people that have no clue how the process works that “Everything happens for a reason”. Like you’re shitting me ?
 
Bruh this isn't my first day at the office. I'm at my third facility. I got hired in the pick two states days. Obviously that's a bad plan, didn't work. Reference my post above where I spitballed like 3 or 4 things they can do to instantly make the process better for new hires and still staff facilities that need it most though. Doesn't take a lot of effort on the faas part to seriously have an impact on the number of people wanting to immediately leave the places they get sent.

I'd agree training standards and training program length is a problem. It's something I'm dealing with going on almost 4 years at my current facility, but again that has little to do with the scattershot way the faa is doing it now which has zero attention paid to the implications it has on all of us when it comes to career advancement and mobility.

Having a little regard for the wishes of your employees goes a long way for morale, and happy people put in for fewer transfers and hardships, period.
It’s hard to have regard for employee morale when the employees themselves are extremely impulsive and do what they want when they want without regard for overall implications of the shift, staff, facility. Yea more attention could be paid, by throwing money at the problem, but n90/zny proved that to be wrong.

ultimately the people of moline, don’t care about staying there and don’t care about what they leave behind. Certainly Managers don’t give a fuck about what they leave behind also. That’s a stepping stone for them. They want to leave also. Leaving behind a staff that wants out once they realize they can make more money doing about the same amount of work elsewhere.
 
I'm sorry but I just don't think this is as big of an issue as some make it to be. It's not like this is a bait and switch. You know when you apply how the hiring process goes. You know it will be a long drawn out process in which you have multiple opportunities to be fired. You know when you apply that you could potentially move anywhere. You agreed to all of this when you applied. If you want a 9-5 job with weekends and holidays off in your hometown then don't apply. Go work at your local airport as a baggage handler if you just have to be in aviation.

This is how the aviation industry, especially air traffic is. Brand new hires suffer the most because we don't even know if you will certify. Core 30 airports and centers get the focus because they run the most traffic and the most publicly visible traffic. But life isn't perfect and sunny all the time just because you got to your home facility or a high level facility. Plenty of things still suck there too. Every facility has issues. Most controllers have something to complain about. Much of this will never change.
Yah you can get based at airline at a different hub. But they can and do commute for free from their homes. And they get a lot more time off than we do.
 
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