05Duramax

I'm a few months away from going to the regionals. I already have a CJO at one airline and am in the process of setting up an interview with PSA.

Honestly, Skywest would probably be my best choice because of bases; I'm a West coast guy and would prefer to stay there and not commute (long term anyway, realizing there is some commuting at some point).

My issue is the Skywest reputation. I'm asking for some honest feedback on culture. Every Skywest recruiter I have met tells me how they are the best and everyone else is a loser, if you want to be a loser go to another regional. Don't care for their attitudes or demeanor. Also I hear Skywest has a lot of lifers, mostly old guys that will never have a beer or dinner with you on a layover, slam clickers I've heard them called. Not fun to fly with at all. It also seems very conservative, I didn't join the military because I knew I wasn't a good fit for that culture, I don't know about joining the "..... Air Force".

Help clear up my misconceptions, what's it really like at Skywest?

hawk21

99.99% of the crews are awesome. You'll know who to avoid pretty quick. Been here a little over two years and disliked maybe three people.

amcnd

Don’t use these forums or recruiters as a judgment of how SkyWest guys are. Most the Lifers retire in under 10 years.. so shouldn’t effect you to much. Lifers are the top 300-400 of 4711 pilots...

Turbosina

Most folks here are pretty cool. I don't know of a single pilot who views themselves as superior to any other pilot at another airline. Except for making fun of Mesa pilots for tipping van drivers a quarter (no joke, I witnessed this with my own eyes, on two separate occasions that we shared a van from the same hotel in BFL.)

There are some slam clickers and slightly odd very senior guys, just like at any airline. But overall the people I fly with are pretty cool. That whole Mormon thing is a complete myth... I've never once, not once, heard religion discussed on a trip.

It's just an airline like any other.

TheFly

Pretty much what’s mentioned above. I’ve been here between 5-6 years and have had good experiences in the left and right seat. I’d say 90-95% of the time it’s with a good crew, good attitude and folks who are happy to be at work.

01WJ

The recruiters are like the cool kids at the local high school. Pay no attention to them, chances are you won’t ever see them again and even if you do odds are they won’t remember you and even if they do they won’t talk to you anyways.

Also, don’t let anyone tell you anything bad about the crusty old lifers. A lot of them are some of the most knowledgeable, coolest laid back people there are who are always down for a beer / dinner. (There are always exceptions)

Flogger

Skywest pilots as individuals are generally a good bunch. The problem is as a pilot group-the current group is very much saddled with the bad decisions of the past. This mostly comes down to not having a union.

The company keeps things juuuuuust good enough to keep a union off the property. The pilots benefit by not paying union dues while still enjoying descent wages, but terrible work rules. The Skywest pilots also benefit from many safety and security initiatives which are mostly fought for and maintained by the unionized carriers.

If you are interested in Skywest as a very short term stepping stone to a major, that's fine. But you should realize that you may get stuck there or any other regional for a large number of reasons. In that light-Skywest is not a good place to be stuck.

As far as the west coast bases, be prepared to spend many many years getting to them.

Good training from what I have been told by friends.

IT support for pilots is top notch. Better than most majors.

Quite a few wack job senior Captains also, which is most likely irrelevant since they're all in Salt Lake.

majorpilot

Six of about 35 in last class got Fresno, two got Colorado Springs.

Check Complete

For the most part the people here are great, and has been said there are a few out there that you can bid avoid once you get a line. Getting to the West coast bases is a bit of a crap shoot but things are moving fast here and a FO slot should open pretty quickly. About 5 years for a CA slot, or so? Don't mingle, flirt, or date a FA.

The training was at one time the absolute best. Now it been cheapened with a massive amount of self study, tons of CBT's, and ground school is taught by new FO's that want to stay home and not fly. Lots of new sim instructors, some good, some not. IOE Check Airman, many new ones, same thing are good or crummy? Only a few are bent on failures as are the sim Check Airmen. There is pretty much no limit on the amount of IOE as long as there is some progress. 100 hours is not un heard of anymore.

Probably the biggest culture shift has been with management. Some of the CP's are cool but that number goes down with time. Upper management will rape you for a nickle. All of Crew Support prides themselves to push you to the brink of human endurance unless you call out fatigued. The fatigued call numbers are increasing exponentially.From the admins up everyone acts as if your paycheck is coming out of their pocket. Not having a union was at one time a bit of a good thing, but I'd vote one in right now if given a choice. All of our rules are carefully worded to be exploited by management, we have no recourse.

I will respectfully disagree with a previous poster about IT. It's taken them I don't know how many years, and I'm told over 15,000 Surface tablets to realize they suck. The company is reluctantly going with the ipad.

I would pose this similar question on all of the regional boards and get a pulse from that. If you are planning to go to the majors in a few years then I'd recommend following the money and not so much the base location.

But under no circumstances is this the same place it was years ago, most of it being not good.

rickair7777

Yup, not what it used to be. I probably would have stayed if it was. But they don't even want people to stay, regional business model needs turnover to keep the longevity down. Lack of turnover due to good QOL was probably costing them more than the good QOL. They just need to make sure they don't get more turnover than can keep up with, although I assume they a plan for that as well, coordinated with the major partners as to which flying gets dropped first.