Cubdriver

Everyone wants ripe fruit to fall from the sky and save them from the endless uphill climb to a good job in corporate aviation. They dream of a job that not only pays the bills on a condo, it allows buying cars, college, and salts away for retirement. Maybe even pays for a boat and a motor home. The problem is, what do you do for the 10+ years you are around waiting for that wonderful job to arrive? Almost every civilian pilot follows a standard path composed of a mixture of things like flight instruction, aerial mapping, pipeline patrol, Part 135, banner tow, ferrying, traffic reporting, skydiver flying, pumping jet A, waxing airplanes, sightseeing tours, FBO front desk, and similar unglamorous jobs.

Of those I have done aerial mapping, flight instruction, banner tow, ferries, pumping Jet A, skydiver flying, Part 135 and 91 corporate flying, and a few things related to aircraft engineering since I have the appropriate degree. Serious fruit has never fallen after ten years of doing all this and seems about as far away as it ever has been. On the other hand, I do not have much else to do and I love airplanes. Newbies always think in terms of getting just one month past their next flight certificate and the gravy corporate jobs are just somehow going to happen at that point. That almost never happens, it is the exception and not the rule. You would be much smarter to plan for the long-haul. Asking questions like you are is the best way to understand the process. but it would be foolish to think you are going to doing anything very spectacular like flying a Gulfstream for a large corporation in less than about 10 years of doing a lot of rather less exciting things.