Before pilot hiring gets hot in a few weeks: Letters of Recommendation

It’s a part of the process I hated doing. Even though I had friends that I knew would write one I still didn’t like asking for them. I went to one legacy and thought that putting it on my resume would get me an interview invite immediately at my goal airline and still didn’t hear anything for weeks. I finally got one more letter of rec, I think 3 total, and the next day was given an assessment email
 
On a more serious note. Just got back from doing a week of interviews and just got to say again, do…interview…prep. It is very obvious who does and who does not.

I’d also be very selective with some of your interview prep services. Seems as if one of the big name services is notorious for sending candidates to the interview with suspiciously similar TMAAT’s and sounding really canned. If an interview prep company is doing anything other than helping you prep your intro, 10 TMAAT stories, and your why brand X, run away.
 
derg said:
Letters of recommendation nay be helpful for an already competitive candidate.

Having one is good. Having two is fine, but not really an incremental benefit, three or more, hot damn, so you play golf with some pilots.

Remember, they’re never negative and everyone with a high-value name drop like a director or VP in a LOR usually is masking for lower qualifications:

“My cousin, YOUR CEO…”

“Cool, Sparky just soloed and things he’s coming to mainline”
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Do these help get an interview or help with the process once you're already selected? I know at some carriers, it is the latter.

Cory Trevor said:
It’s a part of the process I hated doing. Even though I had friends that I knew would write one I still didn’t like asking for them. I went to one legacy and thought that putting it on my resume would get me an interview invite immediately at my goal airline and still didn’t hear anything for weeks. I finally got one more letter of rec, I think 3 total, and the next day was given an assessment email
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I've done a lot, and do everything I can to help out others. Here's a clip from Steve Jobs about asking for help:


View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_IM1UZ9Tn4A
 
Many such pancakes are actually a form of potatoes.

Bánh rế – Vietnamese sweet potato pancake
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Boxty – Traditional Irish potato pancake
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Gamjajeon – Korean potato dish
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Latke – Jewish potato pancake dish
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Milcao – Chilean potato pancake
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Munini-imo – Pancake made with fermented potato flour
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Quarkkäulchen – German potato pancake dish
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Tattie scone – Scottish potato dish
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So like what are you meaning to educate us here? I’ve been part of many selection boards in my time in the navy, and I agree, nobody even reads the LORs. We ask our friends if so and so is solid, and we listen when a friend throws down a red card “dont hire this guy”. Meaning it is largely internal. But I dont know how the airlines operate in this setting. I dont think the world is small enough to rely on a bro network to vet all the candidates. So i assume, internally submitted active-pilot written LOR can be beneficial, CP walk in probably much more substantive? Is that about right? One of the LORs i pushed to my CP got an interview invite last week, so it cant be that far off. Granted he was very qualified, but it was also very fast for Eskimo call backs (weeks rather than months). It was also probably the best LOR I’ve ever written, and i kinda want to frame it. It mentioned the battle of the pacific, in a contextually relevant way, which i was proud of :)
 
jhugz said:
On a more serious note. Just got back from doing a week of interviews and just got to say again, do…interview…prep. It is very obvious who does and who does not.

I’d also be very selective with some of your interview prep services. Seems as if one of the big name services is notorious for sending candidates to the interview with suspiciously similar TMAAT’s and sounding really canned. If an interview prep company is doing anything other than helping you prep your intro, 10 TMAAT stories, and your why brand X, run away.
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I know it's all about playing the game, but this annoys me. Wouldn't you rather get the real candidate than a sales pitch? Guess who's gonna show up for work a year from now? It won't be the same guy you met in the "prepped" interview.
 
Well, some people go out, jumpseat and collect LOR's like Pokemon cards, it's pretty easy to tell.

So to avoid every Tom, Dick and Harry tryna bum a LOR off me that's literally been on my jumpseat for 45 seconds, maybe a little education for them would benefit everyone.

People drop dimes on other people all the time, but they often don't hold a lot of weight because (a) no one wants to put their name down when you say "Well, through company email, write the Pilot Hiring Manager with your concerns" and you just open yourself up to everything from "Who is the real ass, the candidate or the person making the accusation" or libel/slander if the accusations are false.

Ex-spouses and ex-boy/girlfriends are notorious for this too. Anyone can basically say anything and in the era of social media, it's worse. BUT that's why airlines do extensive background checks.
 
derg said:
Well, some people go out, jumpseat and collect LOR's like Pokemon cards, it's pretty easy to tell.

So to avoid every Tom, Dick and Harry tryna bum a LOR off me that's literally been on my jumpseat for 45 seconds, maybe a little education for them would benefit everyone.

People drop dimes on other people all the time, but they often don't hold a lot of weight because (a) no one wants to put their name down when you say "Well, through company email, write the Pilot Hiring Manager with your concerns" and you just open yourself up to everything from "Who is the real ass, the candidate or the person making the accusation" or libel/slander if the accusations are false.

Ex-spouses and ex-boy/girlfriends are notorious for this too. Anyone can basically say anything and in the era of social media, it's worse. BUT that's why airlines do extensive background checks.
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I’d be embarrassed to ask someone I don’t know at all for one but I’ve seen it happen. Guess I can’t hate the player 🤷‍♂️
 
jhugz said:
On a more serious note. Just got back from doing a week of interviews and just got to say again, do…interview…prep. It is very obvious who does and who does not.

I’d also be very selective with some of your interview prep services. Seems as if one of the big name services is notorious for sending candidates to the interview with suspiciously similar TMAAT’s and sounding really canned. If an interview prep company is doing anything other than helping you prep your intro, 10 TMAAT stories, and your why brand X, run away.
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Hopefully this isn’t one of the prep companies people are claiming they’re paying $1k+ for. The thing with prep is the ones who used it and got the job will swear by it. The ones who used prep and didn’t get it are at the other end of the spectrum. Somewhere in there is a happy medium.
 
tlove482 said:
I know it's all about playing the game, but this annoys me. Wouldn't you rather get the real candidate than a sales pitch? Guess who's gonna show up for work a year from now? It won't be the same guy you met in the "prepped" interview.
Click to expand...

Good interview prep isn’t a canned sales pitch. It’s a service that helps you organize your thoughts into coherent sentences. It shows dedication to getting the job and makes my job as the interviewer easier.
 
I’d be willing to bet there are a lot of pilots who are reaching competitive mins with very little professional interview experience. They went through a training program, got their CFI, passed the checkride and started working the next day. Then they signed up with a cadet program started at a regional when they sent an email saying they hit 1,500 hours. Now they’re competitive for a legacy and their last interview was wherever they worked in high school and maybe college, if they went to college.

Not to mention you have to be socially awkward to be a pilot. Having someone roleplay interview questions and help dial in answers could be a big help for a lot of people. Especially now that you may only get one shot at an interview at one legacy.
 
phill1174 said:
Hopefully this isn’t one of the prep companies people are claiming they’re paying $1k+ for. The thing with prep is the ones who used it and got the job will swear by it. The ones who used prep and didn’t get it are at the other end of the spectrum. Somewhere in there is a happy medium.
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I'm thoroughly unimpressed with at least one service everyone swears by. That same service refused to offer any guidance for how to get hired at Spirit (and yes, they turned away more than half the applicants in my class that day), calling it a gimmie. Some people in those symposiums had none of their own stories. And I noticed that they had no desire to actually answer the first question posed by the panel.

And not for nothing, but I did zero preparation for the latest and greatest legacy interview and it seemed to work fine. See! What worked for me has to be universally correct! Like and follow and subscribe.
 
derg said:
Well, some people go out, jumpseat and collect LOR's like Pokemon cards, it's pretty easy to tell.

So to avoid every Tom, Dick and Harry tryna bum a LOR off me that's literally been on my jumpseat for 45 seconds, maybe a little education for them would benefit everyone.

People drop dimes on other people all the time, but they often don't hold a lot of weight because (a) no one wants to put their name down when you say "Well, through company email, write the Pilot Hiring Manager with your concerns" and you just open yourself up to everything from "Who is the real ass, the candidate or the person making the accusation" or libel/slander if the accusations are false.

Ex-spouses and ex-boy/girlfriends are notorious for this too. Anyone can basically say anything and in the era of social media, it's worse. BUT that's why airlines do extensive background checks.
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Story time. In the dark days just after 9/11. SW, UPS, and FEdex were the only ones hiring. I was on a full month line with a nut job captain, and he would hit up every single jumpseater from those airlines. We were based in SDF so we got alot. I was just hoping none of these guys would follow through and recommend this guy. He ended up with coveted interviews at all 3, back when it was like finding a gold nugget in a stream. Got hired by UPS. 2 years or so later ended up getting caught in a "to catch a predator" style sting. Went to prison. Lost job.... I wasn't surprised.
 
jhugz said:
Good interview prep isn’t a canned sales pitch. It’s a service that helps you organize your thoughts into coherent sentences. It shows dedication to getting the job and makes my job as the interviewer easier.
Click to expand...

I wrote out three answers to every TMAAT question I could find, had people review them, and memorized them all before my last interview. 2 of the interviewers ran out of questions 15 minutes into my hour long slots, and I got the job.

The STAR format is for sure a cooperate and graduate exercise, the principal complaint I have with it is the lack of exposure lots of people have with it. If you have conducted lots of STAR format interviews yourself, you have an advantage. If you haven't, there aren't a lot of great resources out there.

Want to help me write a book?
 
drunkenbeagle said:
I wrote out three answers to every TMAAT question I could find, had people review them, and memorized them all before my last interview. 2 of the interviewers ran out of questions 15 minutes into my hour long slots, and I got the job.

The STAR format is for sure a cooperate and graduate exercise, the principal complaint I have with it is the lack of exposure lots of people have with it. If you have conducted lots of STAR format interviews yourself, you have an advantage. If you haven't, there aren't a lot of great resources out there.

Want to help me write a book?
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We should start a firm peddling 700-page applications and all in interview prep $26,500 a shot. “Bro trust me bro it’ll work bro”
 
I'm part of a committee doing zoom interviews for a new executive direction at the church camp I'm on the board for. I've never done anything like this. Back in the day when I was interviewing at majors, interview prep wasn't a thing. It's interesting to see how some people with great backgrounds don't interview well. I tell them all before hand most of the questions are loosely based on the application. You can really tell the ones that have given it some thought. There is one gal who had no background in two of our six core competencies and I was surprised we gave her a zoom interview but she knocked it out of the park. Just one of those people persons who interviews well. For a pilot job, I'm not sure you need professional help but, like someone else mentioned, come up with answers to as many questions you can think of and have pre-thought out answers.
 
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