Should be an amazing place for a pilot/instructor to work...but it simply is not!
Pros
Outstanding professionals throughout the training center and in every department. Best people I have worked with in many years in this industry. Must have been a wonderful place to work at one time, because there are many long-time employees who share stories of how it "use to be". Hope this center gets it together soon so that those who love teaching aviation can share those same stories in 25 years.
Cons
Mid-level managers rise to their level of incompetence--promote the best of the best and let the incompetent ones fall to the wayside. Just because someone is good at "scheduling" WILL NOT make them a leader who inspire others to do great things. Also, in a customer-service business where the customer is A#1 (as they should be!), do you really have to have so many former military guys in management positions?? Having served in the military, I promise you that these personality types do not lend themselves to either "customer service" or high employee morale. A setup for failure, in my opinion. To come here for "quality of life" is one of the biggest myths in aviation! An instructor will not know their schedule for the week until the Friday before...and then it can still change at a moment's notice. There is no way to plan anything without taking valuable scarce vacation time. Schedules can swing from 4 a.m. for several days to suddenly showing at 5 p.m. or even 9 p.m. or later. The place can operate 24 hours a day and without management who have the capacity to actually plan and not just "put out fires", it can make life miserable for the instructor. Pay and benefits are average at best. "Merit increases" are paltry and there is virtually NO PAY DIFFERENCE between a self-motivated professional who consistently does an outstanding job and the guy who just barely gets by. Very surprised at the fact that there is no real difference in compensation based on an individual's contributions...everyone is paid roughly the same, with the only real difference being hire date. No tangible motivation for a go-getter to consistently go above and beyond--in fact, these talented and motivated people will actually be run into the ground.
