FlightSafety Reviews

Pros

Lot's of opportunity for advancement. If you have the desire and the ability, even the sky is not the limit at FlightSafety. Always working with the latest airplanes and technology. Working with great people, usually the top in the industry for what they do. Reasonable and respectful working conditions. Plenty of paid time off. Most (not all) managers and supervisors are people and career oriented, both for themselves and their subordinates. Extremely good job stability, especially compared to all other aviation companies.

Cons

Potential for travel, anywhere, any time, for unknown lenghts of time. Ofen at very short notice. Pay is average at best, considering the skill sets required. Merit raises are slim in the good times and non-existant in the slow times. Some managers tend to not consider their employees interests at all and seem incapable of creating a work environment that encourages pride or offers the chance for the employee to demonstate any individual talent or exceptionalism. This isn't common, but it exists, and top management has not done anything about it for decades, even though they have been advised of the problem.

Advice to Senior Management

Demonstrate more than lip service to the problems described above and at least indicate that you recognize the problem exists. If you can't fix it, for whatever reason (which is very unlikely) then at least acknowledge the problem exists. Review invididual pay more often than once a decade, if that. And when you do, tell the employees what you discovered, then explain what you've decide to do about it. That has happened once (at Broken Arrow), it should happen regularly.

It is to your advantage, along with all the other "Teammates".

Pros

You get a lot of time to learn the systems on the airplanes you teach.
You occasionally get to fly the full motion simulators for hours on end.
You are perceived as an expert and if you are a good instructor, you will get many job offers.
Free donuts.
Free candy.

Cons

The place is run by military retirees who like to lord over their employees with ambiguous, non-existent rules.

Don't expect support from any of the managers if you are having problems with the material, just expect deadlines and threats of being reprimanded when you ask for help.

Since you get paid salary expect to work a lot of overtime on the weekends without any compensation.

You'll spend most of your time doing busy work such as internal audits, editing power point shows, editing training manuals, or sorting and resorting bins of junk in the back room.

If you start doing well and start teaching a lot of hours, be ready for someone to anonymously report you for doing something "unethical" such as leaving work 5 minutes early on Friday our using a bad word while chumming it up during a break. Jealousy is everywhere.

You can get 1000 positive client reviews and then 1 bad one and you get put on probation.

They have mandatory work furloughs that they use to get you to use up your vacation time. No bailout for this Warren Buffet owned company!

Pay: What you start with is pretty much what you stay with + 3% increase annually.

Advancement: Not unless someone quits or dies or if you can make up a new position and sell it to management.

Advice to Senior Management

Start treating your employees like salary employees and send them home early instead of making them sit around and look busy. Start giving some pay raises or bonuses and maybe you will retain your best instructors.

Pros

Almost all instructors (and other Center employees) are a great mix of highly competent and personable people. The same goes for almost all clients. Working facilities (including simulators and classroom equipment) are top-notch.

Cons

A continual undercurrent of tension pervades the New Castle, Delaware FlightSafety International Learning Center. Management activities (such as monitoring employee activities with a security camera system, unfairly and unequally treating employees to give advantage to management politically-favored employees, and arranging for underqualified management members to attain a quickie aircraft type-rating (such as a GV) to bolster their "value" for promotion within FSI) have resulted in employees regarding management with suspicion and a complete lack of trust. When a "town hall" meeting for employees was arranged at the Center, only 3 of the over 400 employees showed up. Management personnel accomplish their functions through email, not by personal interface. They maintain a, "don't worry, be happy" attitude, as demonstrated by the daily "Care" briefings. These "feel good" sessions, conducted in the client lounge, are regarded by employees and clients alike as a bad joke.

Career progression for instructors? There is none. At one time, FlightSafety had a clear career path for instructors, and promotions for center management positions were from the ranks of (usually) long-time instructor personnel. That has changed - key management personnel have little or no real instructional or aircraft experience, and appear to be selected by company headquarters personnel to mirror their own background. Since they lack any background in what makes the company function, they regard instructors as an irritant, unhappily necessary for the company to function as a money-making machine.

Pay and benefits are marginal at best. FSI formerly had a defined-benefit pension plan. Woops! Gone - and, place taken by a 401k (have you looked at yours lately?). Pay is static. Going "above and beyond" (in terms of accepting additional responsibilities) doesn't even merit a simple "thank you" from management. In a way, this is understandable since they have no idea (again, no background) of what an instructor (or customer service rep) does.

For those looking at FlightSafety International as a potential employer, regard working at FSI as a "bridge" position to better and much more rewarding work elsewhere in aviation.

Advice to Senior Management

Some time ago, the top official in a very large aviation operation said, "If you take care of the employees, they'll take care of business." You must be aware of the overall level of dissatisfaction among your line employees (in training centers, specifically, the instructors). Regarding those who bring up problems (such as clear violations of published company policy) as trouble-makers is not a solution. Running the company through fear (loss of job, adverse personnel action, etc) is demoralizing to the employees. I am pessimistic, though - the company is run the way it is because senior management wants it that way.

Pros

instructing was satisfying because of the students not the employer

Cons

never got a raise in 10 years. they would lie about wages and would not help employees work with government agentcies to correct wage issues. that is why they whent Union

Pros

I'm having trouble filling out this section. Most of the "great" reasons to work here are either on the way out the door (good managers are retiring, morale is sinking) , or unavailable to new employees (pension plan has been unavailable for new hires since 2006).

Historically we have been a low-risk company, doing everything possible to keep things simple and keep people happy, and happily employed. Past performance does not guarantee future results...

I think our production at FlightSafety Simulation (based in Broken Arrow, OK) strikes a great balance between engineering (which constantly sees the need to make it better) and accounting (which constantly requests that we get another one shipped, sooner, cheaper). We build usable, reliable training devices and in general, we respond quickly to customer's requests. Of course your perspective greatly influences your perception of our performance.... if you're a military customer, you'll think we give you the world because we answer your phone calls without a charge number.

Corporate management is doing a great job of expanding our services to survive and compete in a global market.

Cons

We didn't used to have to say "teammates are our most valuable resource." When a company feels the need to make this statement, that means it's not obvious enough for employees to figure that part out on their own.

The new upper management personnel (I'm speaking locally, not corporately) are egocentric, career-focused, and some of them have anger management issues. Their goals are to make things look good on paper, in the news, etc. but the concern for making things work well within the company is not as high as it should be.

Advice to Senior Management

Corporate: bypass your middlemen and get in touch with the people who make the products and provide the services. Find out why people are worried, dissatisfied and leaving.

Local management: Reevaluate your motivations.

Pros

Great people, but that goes for most companies in Tulsa area. Job stability is good, I hear its tough to get fired (I haven't tried though).

Cons

The pay is unfair. The top management keeps classifying this company as "manufacturing", especially during our only salary review few years ago. This is most definitely not a manufacturing company, we do put things together but we don't have assembly lines with steady-volume product input and output. This is an engineering company but the pay is that of experienced assemblers. Management is very difficult to communicate with, lots of old people stuck in the 60's running the whole place. They keep preaching for staying flexible and adapting to change but i guarantee you that's not what their crusty brain really wants.

Advice to Senior Management

Please send your managers to some sort of modern school to teach them how to manage. Good workers don't always need to be next in line for progression because they're not always good managers. Please don't p&* in our hand and tell us its raining. The air quality is so bad people have bronchial attacks, allergies, and asthma issues. Change the filters instead of telling us how great the filtration system is, we're not blind or stupid. STOP micromanaging and promoting micromanagement. No, i don't need an email reminding me to work every time I want to exchange a non work-related conversation with a coworker, I am NOT a robot! Stop giving us "benefits" we can't use. Stop taking "benefits" away. Stop adding hidden cameras. And finally, get rid of some of your top managers! They dont' belong in a company you're trying to build - there's no team spirit here.

Pros

Very diverse and fun working groups. All of the employees are great to work with and are either very knowledgable in what they do, or willing to take the effort to learn more. Even if a group isn't assigned to a project, they will do what they can to help to get the job done right and to satisfy the customers need.

Cons

There seems to be a failing desire by those in charge to look at quality vs. getting the job done quickly. Many times an idea has come up to make the job work better, but there was too much fear of the "schedule"... most customers will be ok with a slight schedule slip since we do produce the best sims out there. The other is lack of true promotion options. After a couple of attempt at moving to a position that my qualifications ecceeded, I found that most all the applications weren't even looked at because the hiring Manager already had made up a pre-decision. Now this isn't in all positions, but seems to be a growing trend.

Advice to Senior Management

Really look at your base and the how new "corporate" ideas are actually causing many people to start looking else where. With the new move, the 6S BS, and sterile work environment ideas that are being forced down employees throats has many already agreeing to not be around for the move to the new location. We build multi million dollar custom flight simulation devices... not compact cars on an assembly line.

Pros

FlightSafety is a stable company with a caring management group. The working conditions are great, clean and safe. Hard work is recognized and career advancement opportunities exist for those that want them. Salary and benefits are reasonable. I work with a wide variety of interesting people which includes both my co-workers and customers.

Cons

Career advancement is possible but due to the scope of the operations it can be a long time in coming. Merit increases are a bit low and will be shut down in tight economic conditions.

Advice to Senior Management

Consider a better merit increase plan and refrain from cutting salary and layoffs unless faced with no other options.

Pros

Working with the professionals whoes PERSONAL experience, knowledge, and care are the product this company lives off of. If you ever hear of someone learning something, or having a great experience at FSI. It was due to the INDIVIDUAL that they got as an instructor. Facilities are clean, equipment well maintained.

Cons

No work rules. No amount of extra work will earn you a dime more than your fellow instructor is qualified to do nothing. 2% annual pay raises are the most that you can expect. Just knowing that there is a 2% spread between the "best of the best" and a turd that can't even pass a 135 checkride in his own airplane does wonders to kill your spirit and desire to give 150% each month. By the way, 150% pays the same an 60% and there are no rules, so no way to draw a line, or say no to any demand, no matter how insane. Schedule?? 5 swing shifts from 0300 start to 0300 end. No limit on weekends, no maximum days in a row. You know, anything goes when there are NO RULES!!

Advice to Senior Management

Tell me and your "managers" what is expected for the salary that is paid. Clearly define the job in writing and watch your centers for abuse. Why isn't 100% enough?
By the way, 2% merit increases?!? WTF!! 2% doesn't even keep up with cost of living.

Pros

Nice facilities, good benefits in comparison to other companies. Was a great place to work when the Centre first opened for business.

Cons

The company is in denial regarding disrespectful health harming behaviour by some personnel in positions of power. Management manage by e-mail and seem to not notice any covert bullying tactics. The Company issues Care Cards with the promise of applying the principles of trust, honesty, respect, integrity and commitment, but regrettably those qualities, and trying to adhere to Company policies and the QMS system, make people targets of mobbing, work sabotage, physical intimidation and offensive name calling. Trying to resolve the problem results in accusations of lacking a sense of humour, being too sensitive and being overreactive, even when the events escalate.

Advice to Senior Management

It is hard to be sure if the Management care about the personnel as they seem to ignore patterns in departments, including multiple dismissals and a resignation due to stress injury. If you do value your employees watch the patterns and be aware that having a covert bully does affect the bottom line and leaves the company wide open to litigation for failure of Duty of Care.