Originally Posted by
Shadowboxer
Creditability is a tough thing to define. Is it the sum of your experience and performance over a career, or is it better defined as "what have you done for me lately", which is more like a "use it or lose it" philosophy.
Before becoming a A300 flex I spent 5 years as a junior B727 Captain and 3 years as a junior A300 Captain. Everyone knows that the toughest trips are flown by the most junior crews, so I had many opportunities to fly to the "Greats" and the "Grands" in the wintertime, to TLC and other garden spots more times than I care to remember, and into many bad weather situations because some knucklehead felt sick after looking at Intellicast.
Now Jetjok, I can only assume that your seniority places you pretty near the top on the S/O bidpack. I'm sure that this seniority allows you to pick and choose the easiest trips to the nicest parts of the country having the best probability of great weather. Is your creditability slipping away? Likewise, do I have to bump only death marches to keep my street-cred? I submit to you that your past performance over a career in aviation guarantees your creditability until your present performance dictates otherwise. If not then a lot of senior people better start looking at the last page in the bidpack because their professional reputations are slowly but surely going to hell.
So you spent time doing what the rest of us do all the time. Good for you. That certainly helps your creditability. It doesn't do anything for the creditability of those who do nothing but out and backs to STL, MIA, FLL, etc. And yes, my seniority does allow me to pick and choose what trips I fly. The operative word, of course, is "fly." Is my creditability slipping away? I don't know. You'll have to ask any of the crewmembers whom I support from the back seat.
But here's the issue: I'm not involved with the training or critiquing of others. I fly the line. My seniority allows me certain advantages over my less-senior counterparts. I don't think creditability is an issue with any of the guys that earn their living hauling freight from one place to another, on an ongoing basis, but it is for guys who rarely leave the training department. That would include you, if you fall under the above statement. Sorry, but that's how I see it, and if you read the rest of the replies in this thread, many others see it the same way too.
And by the way, just to clarify my stand. I was being supportive of the effort of the training department to get all LCA doing all the jobs, because I felt it would not only help their creditability, but give some of them an appreciation of the job that we were hired to do.