Originally Posted by
DonConsult67
Management of this pathetic operation masquerading as an "airline", especially in the training environment, could care less about what anyone thinks who is not beholden to their sociopathic, fiefdom style of governance. Hence the continual news releases about management changes ~ disagree with anybody in (or make a logical suggestion to) the 44th Street Glass Tower and you're out, valid reason or, more likely, not ~ a fabricated, personal-vendetta-based one.
The "training" department is a complete joke as we heard first-hand from almost all our referrals. Their protocol is to supply cheap, low-end, haphazard, non-standardized education, not provide the proper materials, texts, and resources, then send new hires off to "do it themselves", expecting them to meet moving-target standards (which are still unpublished and vary among instructors).
After numerous "training" department personnel changes, each one touted as the nirvana of cleaning up the mess, it's no better.
We keep hearing complaints about the "state of the art" facility but it's overcrowded and not enough space is devoted to what's important. Perhaps if Mesa stopped dragging pilots off the line and put their "training" department in the hands of professional educators, things would change. But if Mesa does that, they would have to pay real wages to real professionals, instead of relying on the "pilot shortage", "bonus", "upgrade" farce.
We are the only regional I am aware of that doesn’t use line pilots as their instructors, and instead uses several contract instructor on the Ejet. My buddy at SkyWest makes $200k per year as a SIM instructor. So, we underpay and we get what we pay for. Instead of the best line pilots, that are formerly instructors, becoming instructors that like to instruct and are good at it; many times, we get the line pilots that can’t do, so they teach. Even worse, these guys even become line check airman.
I have spoken to enough new FO’s and observers, I think some changes would make major improvements on the Ejet side. Pay the sim instructors so you get the best. Use only Captains for instructors that have instructing experience in their background. Hire pilots that have flown an airplane to check ride standards in the last 5 years, instead of guys that have flown a 172 on Saturdays in VFR conditions for the past 20 years. Send new hires home after Indoc and wait on systems and FPT and their oral until the new hires have been scheduled for the SIM. Use the idle CAE IPT trainer in DFW for the check out of FPT training. Fix sim scheduling.
Unfortunately, management does not understand and really doesn’t care to understand.