Student loans could help avert U.S. airline pilot shortage: union head

[drunkenbeagle]

Former employer cut that crap out with a "You win it, You Skin it" Program. Business Development pursues sales until they reach a win, then they switch hats to Program Management until its complete.

While that can happen anywhere, it tends to be an issue of organization. Tends to work best when the sales and customer facing engineers work for the same managers. Tends to work poorly when support and delivery are a totally separate organization. From what I have seen at big corporations, this happens because the bean counters want SG&A expenses to be as small as possible, so they put anything that they possibly can into a COGS line item.

 

[Boris Badenov]

I find the notion of a school giving out free educations to people who are good at hitting things with a stick absolutely baffling.

 

[killbilly]

Put that coffee down!

And, can i haz jobz?

If you are relocatable to ATL or up around DCA/IAD/BWI area, drop me a line and we can talk.

 

[drunkenbeagle]

If you are relocatable to ATL or up around DCA/IAD/BWI area, drop me a line and we can talk.

If only there were an ocean in ATL where I could park my sailboat...

 

[killbilly]

While that can happen anywhere, it tends to be an issue of organization. Tends to work best when the sales and customer facing engineers work for the same managers.

That often backfires because many sales managers abuse their SEs. The key to this, IME, is to have separate managerial food chains, but congruent comp plans.

Tends to work poorly when support and delivery are a totally separate organization. From what I have seen at big corporations, this happens because the bean counters want SG&A expenses to be as small as possible, so they put anything that they possibly can into a COGS line item.

Mostly agree, but it depends somewhat on product and industry. We're a manufacturer with channel-based routes to market, which means that implementation/delivery can happen many different ways, and post-sale support handled through a third food chain. Not always ideal, and my team is lobbying for some changes in that realm, but by and large it works for us.

 

[killbilly]

If only there were an ocean in ATL where I could park my sailboat...

Lake Lanier, Lake Allatoona....both are quite nice. They're not salt water but....they're not saltwater.

Plenty of places to park your sailboat in MD.

 

[jskibo]

While that can happen anywhere, it tends to be an issue of organization. Tends to work best when the sales and customer facing engineers work for the same managers. Tends to work poorly when support and delivery are a totally separate organization. From what I have seen at big corporations, this happens because the bean counters want SG&A expenses to be as small as possible, so they put anything that they possibly can into a COGS line item.

Yep completely different food chains, without even dotted line accountability.

Here PM responsible for momentum business sales, Sales only handles growth or new product development outside an existing airframe (PM still responsible for Mods, upgrades, obsolescence design changes, etc)

However since PM has no direct reports here, vs the old place, its 100% matrixed so we have to beg, borrow, steal and slash the other guy to get support. Six of one, half dozen of the other, still seeking nirvana

Oh and since OE sales and Aftermarket repairs / spares are two different food chains, that becomes another battle

 

[killbilly]

Yep completely different food chains, without even dotted line accountability.

Here PM responsible for momentum business sales, Sales only handles growth or new product development outside an existing airframe (PM still responsible for Mods, upgrades, obsolescence design changes, etc)

However since PM has no direct reports here, vs the old place, its 100% matrixed so we have to beg, borrow, steal and slash the other guy to get support. Six of one, half dozen of the other, still seeking nirvana

"They eat their own" is a particularly difficult sales management/biz dev strategy....

 

[Autothrust Blue]

Yep completely different food chains, without even dotted line accountability.

Here PM responsible for momentum business sales, Sales only handles growth or new product development outside an existing airframe (PM still responsible for Mods, upgrades, obsolescence design changes, etc)

However since PM has no direct reports here, vs the old place, its 100% matrixed so we have to beg, borrow, steal and slash the other guy to get support. Six of one, half dozen of the other, still seeking nirvana

Oh and since OE sales and Aftermarket repairs / spares are two different food chains, that becomes another battle

I fly planes.

 

[jskibo]

I fly planes.

Hence why I'm willing to take an 80% paycut to fly planes

 

[drunkenbeagle]

Lake Lanier, Lake Allatoona....both are quite nice. They're not salt water but....they're not saltwater.

Plenty of places to park your sailboat in MD.

Yeah, well, I kind of like it here. And no shortage of work that I can see covering the SE from here, instead of from ATL. Hell, I have to fly through there to get to most of Florida anyway..

 

[Cessnaflyer]

I find the notion of a school giving out free educations to people who are good at hitting things with a stick absolutely baffling.

Because it is a great advertisement to bring in the students that pay big money.

 

[tcco94]

My colleagues are telling me about these opportunities in their career field that offer "loan forgiveness"... while everyday I try to figure out the time of day that I can eat a full meal and make it last my hunger all day so I don't have to pay for more than 1 meal a day.

 

[🦈💜]

I don't disagree with any of that - but to clarify my question, if college isn't the answer for science, tech, and math skills, how do a large number of people become educated in those fields? I certainly understand you're a self-taught outlier, but can we expect self taught people to exist in sufficient numbers to fill the work force?

The concept of a "work force" is problematic and complicated. It assumes work inherently needs to be done in various fields, and that for work to be done in those fields, a sizeable body of workers must exist to engage. That works a lot better when you're talking about harvesting crops, building infrastructure, and doing other predictable things than it does when you're looking at abstract, creative fields like science and tech. (And I can only assume 'math')

The funny thing about these areas is that they're inherently creative endeavors with their own whims and wiles, and as such you must inspire people to enter them for the public good if you want the best. Coercion won't bring you the best.

Now if you want to assume that private enterprise, the eventual destination of most people in these fields, is an endeavor worth powering and, thus, an endeavor worthy of the concept of a supporting "work force", you don't necessarily need the best and brightest in every seat. As such, that was addressed by my first line—pay them. If the money is there, you can get the masses needed. If you pay them, they will come. If you, like Carly, treat everyone like an interchangeable cog and work to break them down, people will gradually flee.
Now the superstars won't come for the money—they'll come because they see an interesting challenge to solve. You put those in leadership roles (but not management roles—they must be insulated from politics and schemings), and then you find them problems worthy of their stature. You pay them accordingly, of course, but they're not there for the money—they're there because they love what they do.

Inspiration, creativity, reward. Teaching isn't the process of imbuing someone with knowledge—it's a process of enabling and inspiring them to imbue themselves. She learns best who teaches herself.

Hopefully this was said in general and not to me - you know I read, liked, and reviewed your book, right?

It was general! These responses more or less become oratory.

-Fox

 

[SlumTodd_Millionaire]

If only there were an ocean in ATL where I could park my sailboat...

You could do like me. Park it in Savannah and only see it twice a year.

 

[ComplexHiAv8r]

Hence why I'm willing to take an 80% paycut to fly planes

Only 80%?

 

[mshunter]

My colleagues are telling me about these opportunities in their career field that offer "loan forgiveness"... while everyday I try to figure out the time of day that I can eat a full meal and make it last my hunger all day so I don't have to pay for more than 1 meal a day.

Small breakfast, usually from the "B" rated hotel (I can only do so much powdered eggs). Bananas and peanuts from the plane till dinner. Then a big dinner.

Peanuts curb hunger pretty good.

 

[jskibo]

Only 80%?

minus 80% is $29k.....so roughly

 

[Dexter]

It is much easier to say that, than to actually do it. The school I went to, which was hardly the best, had an average SAT score of 1350 - which was about the top 4% at the time. That leaves 96% of SAT test takers that aren't going to be competitive to even get into such a school. These are very bright students we are talking about here, if they did something other than engineering, they would likely be very successful anyway. And engineering school is a lot of work. Enough that if you aren't really interested in it, you probably won't finish.

Even with a degree in say, Electrical Engineering - there actually aren't that many jobs. Probably half have moved overseas in the last decade. Even in the US, most tend to require an H1-B. http://www.computerworld.com/articl...cal-engineering-employment-trending-down.html. I know of exactly one of my friends that were EE majors in school that actually ended up with jobs in the field.

That said, there is usually strong demand for Physics, Mathematics and EE majors that can write software.

To anecdotally counter this, my sister in law went to a state tech school, full scholarship (was actually paid a couple grand a semester to attend school because she had too many scholarships), graduated with no debt and started at $65k in her EE job. (COL in Arkansas is pretty damn low so $65k goes a long way.) The 2 other people I know who went to this same school and got basic engineering degrees all ended up the same way.

Can't say with 100% certainty what I'd do if I lost my medical, but going back to school for chemical or mechanical engineering would probably be near the top of my list.

 

[jtrain609]

To anecdotally counter this, my sister in law went to a state tech school, full scholarship (was actually paid a couple grand a semester to attend school because she had too many scholarships), graduated with no debt and started at $65k in her EE job. (COL in Arkansas is pretty damn low so $65k goes a long way.) The 2 other people I know who went to this same school and got basic engineering degrees all ended up the same way.

Can't say with 100% certainty what I'd do if I lost my medical, but going back to school for chemical or mechanical engineering would probably be near the top of my list.

If you have the ability to do math at a high level, it's a fine idea.

But I've learned something in life; if you're really smart and you can do math at a high level, you do an engineering program and enjoy it.

If you're really smart and you understand biology at a high level, you go to medical school and really enjoy it.

If you're really smart, but you can't do math nor understand biology, but you love shoving square pegs into round holes, you end up in law school.

If you're absolutely positive that you can do anything in life, but have no academic wherewithal to back up your own hype and you like to complain, then you become a pilot.

Not saying you fit into any of those camps at all, and in fact you may be in the "can do math at a high level" group. It's just that many folks say, "I wish I had done X," but when you rewind to the 19 year old version of that person, you find them shotgunning beers at the frat house and complaining about how Algebra II and political science 101 is kicking their ass. It was clear at 15 who was going to have the brains to be an engineer, a doctor, or a lawyer.