Managing a plane...what goes into it?

[killbilly]

Someone mentioned in a another thread how much work went into managing an airplane - a turboprop or jet - as being a full-time job.

I really don't know anything about airplane management. I mean, I understand that you have to provide consumables, and maintenance, cleaning, inspections, maintenance and insurance, but much of that is stuff you have done rather than do yourself, correct?

What is it about managing a corporate aircraft that makes the management a 40-hour a week job? It kind of sounds interesting to me, honestly.

 

[TFaudree_ERAU]

Don't forget:

- Crews; arranging contract pilots if the company you fly for is too cheap to hire additional pilots. If you have enough, figuring out who is going to be paired up on what trips.

- Trip logistics; catering, transportation, hotels, flight plans, customs, etc etc. An international trip adds about 2-4 hours of work beyond what is normally required for domestic. We've been known to send 2 airplanes out of the country at once.

- Training; shopping around for the best prices, scheduling around trips (gotta have a contract pilot to fill in if you don't have any more than the bare minimum to staff what you got)

 

[killbilly]

Don't forget:

- Crews; arranging contract pilots if the company you fly for is too cheap to hire additional pilots. If you have enough, figuring out who is going to be paired up on what trips.

- Trip logistics; catering, transportation, hotels, flight plans, customs, etc etc. An international trip adds about 2-4 hours of work beyond what is normally required for domestic. We've been known to send 2 airplanes out of the country at once.

- Training; shopping around for the best prices, scheduling around trips (gotta have a contract pilot to fill in if you don't have any more than the bare minimum to staff what you got)

So...it sounds to me like an aircraft manager spends a lot of time on the phone doing research and scheduling/coordinating things. Almost like a project manager....having things done to/for the airplane. And I imagine the larger the plane, the greater the workload.

What else?

 

[OldTownPilot]

Don't forget:

- Crews; arranging contract pilots if the company you fly for is too cheap to hire additional pilots. If you have enough, figuring out who is going to be paired up on what trips.

- Trip logistics; catering, transportation, hotels, flight plans, customs, etc etc. An international trip adds about 2-4 hours of work beyond what is normally required for domestic. We've been known to send 2 airplanes out of the country at once.

- Training; shopping around for the best prices, scheduling around trips (gotta have a contract pilot to fill in if you don't have any more than the bare minimum to staff what you got)

It sounds like someone doesn't have enough pilots

 

[TFaudree_ERAU]

So...it sounds to me like an aircraft manager spends a lot of time on the phone doing research and scheduling/coordinating things. Almost like a project manager....having things done to/for the airplane. And I imagine the larger the plane, the greater the workload.

What else?

Pretty much. The Director of Operations in a true corporate flight department doesn't do much flying. They're an office manager. They report to upper level management, be it an HR person, a VP or the CEO his/herself.

The complexity of the corporate flight department greatly depends on the amount of flying. There is a Hawker operator here that flies maybe 100-150 hours a year...if that. The only person that uses the airplane is the owner himself. No sales people, no clients, just him. His schedule is set months in advance, and he understands that if crew training or maintenance is due, he won't be using the airplane.

On the other hand, our operation doesn't work like that. We use any one of our 4 airplanes to fly all sorts of trips. Day trips with sales people to another regional office, VPs to submit proposals at the major east coast business centers, the bosses on their weekend get-aways. They "need" to go, regardless of whether one of us are sick, needs some time off, or is due for recurrent. We have to really watch the schedule to figure out how much time we have until the next inspection and how that will play in with the trips that are on the schedule. There are grace periods for maintenance intervals, and sometimes we have to use them. We have to shop around for contract pilots, sometimes at the VERY last minute. It's tough, and will sometimes make you want to pull your hair out. It doesn't help that we're trying to operate 2 jets with only 3 pilots on staff. Sometimes we're using just as many contract pilots as we are full time pilots to make the concurrent trips happen.

You'll run into owners that are micro-managers. They hire a professional (us) to manage their investment, but they don't want to relinquish "control" of the operation. They can get in their own way sometimes, and they don't even realize it. You tell them that, based on years of experience, it's better to operate in a way that varies from what they propose, but they don't want to hear it. That's a battle in and of itself, and one that is not easily won.

 

[Baronpilot244]

I didn't manage a jet, but did manage a piston twin for corporate and personal operations. We also had a partner in the aircraft so basically I had two bosses.

In the heyday we were flying approximately 40 - 60 hours a month. THe airplane had 50 hour oil changes, 100 hour and Annual inspections so there was a great deal of scheduling that had to be taken into account.

So the time spent in the FBO waiting on pax usually meant planning the next day's trip or maintenance or chasing down the best prices on parts etc.

I used to set aside two days per week for cleaning if possible - 1 day thoroughly washing the outside and cleaning the inside, next day applying wax to the airframe plus doing a detailed inspection of the airframe to check for discrepancies.

Addressing Service Bulleteins and ADs which cropped up every now and then - more scheduling to get these things taken care of.

Then there was making arrangements for recurrent training, renewing subscriptions and keeping paperwork up to date. Coordinating with our insurance co.
Planning trips meant talking to FBOs and sending in our rental car and catering requirements. Reserving hotels if we were staying over, getting the airplane hangared if weather was a concern.

I carried out the oil changes as far as possible and this gave me a chance to get a good look under the cowls to see for myself what was going on under there. Couple this with the flying (which was all done by me) and it was busy. I also assisted the A&P on some of the more difficult jobs. I saw this as OJT and I became very familiar with the inner workings of the plane I was managing. I think this is important from a management point of view as well as a pilot's perspective.

I can only imagine what it would be like to manage more than one aircraft in a very busy department - I was busy enough with just a Baron to play with.

There was a job posted a little while back for a Baron pilot. The job entailed flying the airplane but also required the pilot to be solely responsible for the management of the aircraft. The salary would have been ok if you were just required to fly the plane, but it didn't make the cut as a manager's pay.

Don't get me wrong - I thoroughly enjoyed every minute of the 4 years I spent managing and flying a nice piece of equipment, but it certainly opened my eyes as to why some of the CP salaries in these big departments are 6 figures. Lot of liability involved and you have to know what you're doing.

Just my 0.0002c worth

Bp244

 

[AirmetTango]

So the time spent in the FBO waiting on pax usually meant planning the next day's trip or maintenance or chasing down the best prices on parts etc.

Planning trips meant talking to FBOs and sending in our rental car and catering requirements. Reserving hotels if we were staying over, getting the airplane hangared if weather was a concern.

...and don't forget the time spent revising all those plans when (not if) the owners change their plans. At least twice.

To the OP, remember that if you are talking about a small corporate department, you just don't have a "staff" to take care of anything. In my case, I'm a one man flight department, so if I don't do it, it doesn't get done. If you do the math, you can see how easily a pilot/aircraft management position can be a full time job. We fly almost 500 hrs a year. A full time job is about 2080 hours a year (52 weeks x 40 hours). Basically you only have to spend about 4 hours on the ground for every hour in the air to make it full time. Heck, I can spend a couple hours each trip with basic tasks such as pre and post flight, fueling and hangaring the airplane (I do that myself at homebase), checking weather, and so on. Coordinating maintenance, scheduling, trip planning (not just flight planning), communicating those maintenance and trip requirements to the owner(s), paper work (some one has to keep track of all those fuel and lunch receipts, right?), cleaning, etc can easily chew up the rest of the time.

 

[fsiflyer]

Someone mentioned in a another thread how much work went into managing an airplane - a turboprop or jet - as being a full-time job.

I really don't know anything about airplane management. I mean, I understand that you have to provide consumables, and maintenance, cleaning, inspections, maintenance and insurance, but much of that is stuff you have done rather than do yourself, correct?

What is it about managing a corporate aircraft that makes the management a 40-hour a week job? It kind of sounds interesting to me, honestly.

It is a 24/7/365 job. Managing a plane is like having a child. Scheduling, maintenance, training, cleaning, updates, flight planning, over flight permits requests, other adhoc stuff that seems to pop up, yada, yada, yada. Most of all this happens when the plane is still in base. Once it goes out on a trip then it gets even better. Crap comes up all of the time. Broken at a distant airport, pilot gets sick, pilot gets sick of the FA, FA gets sick of the FO, FO sleeps with the FA...and so on and so on.

Managing a flight department is not an easy job but I do find it very rewarding. Stay up to date on things. Don't let things fall behind not even for a day. Most importantly keep looking forward. Solve the problems and try not to become one of them.

 

[mattyt98]

Like Baron pilot I have managed piston twins (414 and barons) as well as assisted with Jet management and it truly is a full time job when you put in the flying as well. Just scheduling maint in and of itself for something like the 414 is tough because your local guy wont do anything with it so you have to find a service center that has a good rep then hold their hands so they dont lay you out with a bill that is out of control because they went crazy fixing all sorts of stuff that maybe didn't need to be fixed right now.(ie time change items) Keeping up with the training and currency is another hurdle but is usually a pretty standard thing and down about the same time every year. Of course negotiating with insurance companies is always fun as well.