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TG1 Retention again

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Talk Wrench said:
Just as a wah for our Gilbert, I'm a Technician in an engineering role with Chief Engineer signature rights. Why, because my technical knowledge helps engineer solutions which will be applied by technicians or other engineers depending on where in the engineering process that they are employed.
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Thats good for you, congrats. But in the RAF the list of people in the Engineering Profession who actually need a Masters Degree with the attached Chartered Engineer status is about as long as my little toe in the grand scheme of things. The actual list is there for all serving to see on the EPAT Modnet Page. Oh and its all Officer roles.

The whole us/them/TG1 fat wallet attitude is about as old as BBMF.
 
Gilbert said:
Thats good for you, congrats. But in the RAF the list of people in the Engineering Profession who actually need a Masters Degree with the attached Chartered Engineer status is about as long as my little toe in the grand scheme of things. The actual list is there for all serving to see on the EPAT Modnet Page. Oh and its all Officer roles.

The whole us/them/TG1 fat wallet attitude is about as old as BBMF.
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Well, let's just call them Technicians, as we (you / the RAF always) has done.

Now let's assess the point that qualified Technicians are extremely valuable outside of military life and can command extremely good salaries.

If you pay according to the lowest common denominator model as you alluded to (in general, not just the type of AC quoted, there will never be any growth of experience. Nor will there be any growth in fleet knowledge or the knowledge of individuals required for maintaining that fleet. Why? Because the clever ones will go where they won't be treated as the LCD, will get paid more and will be better supported with higher learning possibilities.

So there is a valid argument to support a higher technical pay grade for the Aircraft Technicians, the downside of course being that low performers receive good money for not a lot of effort.
 
Doesn't really matter what we are called, it still comes back to the fact that highly trained, skilled and capable people are deciding to leave RAF aircraft maintenance to get jobs with the likes of Amazon for significantly improved pay and conditions.

If there's no desire to pay them more to keep them due to the fear of upsetting the other trades then be prepared to severly reduce the flying output. If aircraft maintenance was so easy any idiot could do it we wouldn't have any issues.

F35 might be smart enough to tell you how to fix it, I don't know as haven't worked it.

Typhoon is renowned for reporting faults all over the place when there isn't any real issues. It takes experience to know what's real and what's not.

The various other platforms I've worked had very little fault reporting and require the technical skills to diagnose and repair.

I agree that the low skilled flight line tasks can be done by almost anyone with a little training. It's pretty much the way the army air corps works, they do day to day refuel, rearm etc with REME providing maintenance. It's also how we will have to start working if we are to embrace the ACE concept and I'm more than happy to hand over the job of standing in front of an aircraft for an hour in the pissing rain.
 
Flumpdaddy said:
I agree that the low skilled flight line tasks can be done by almost anyone with a little training.
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We could run a short training course of only a few weeks to get some "low skilled" mechanics out on there doing that sort of work.

As mechanics working on the flight line we could perhaps call them flight line mechanics that would be a new and novel solution.
..........Oh wait
 
Tin basher said:
We could run a short training course of only a few weeks to get some "low skilled" mechanics out on there doing that sort of work.

As mechanics working on the flight line we could perhaps call them flight line mechanics that would be a new and novel solution.
..........Oh wait
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I was refering to what Gilbert had said about the trial on the Reds a few years ago not reinventing the wheel and bringing back FLMs or AMMs. Both of those were heavily flawed systems and are better off left to history.

It's getting rather off topic, but why can't other trades do the see off/in, refuel or ground handling? Smaller airports often use the fire fighters to do these tasks
 
If rention pay isn't the answer what is?

I'm not sure it matters who scored what 20 years ago at the afco or what job title we have for people.

There's a skill set shortage in particular areas so there's a plan to pay them more to stay, surely that's it?
 
muttywhitedog said:
And a lot of those are the ones now that you seem to think deserve huge money and retention bonuses?
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That's because there is a huge shortage of engineers. It's not rocket science it's basic engineering for which companies even in your home town of Peterborough, crown holdings who make coke cans are willing to pay AS1(T) and Cpls 50k+ over time, we have lost 6 so far. So yes, engineers need more money or we won't have ground crew by 2025-6. It's that simple. HR has gone, Supply can go to Amazon and MT can go to Enterprise but you can't replace techies, simple as that.
 
ady eflog said:
That's because there is a huge shortage of engineers. It's not rocket science it's basic engineering for which companies even in your home town of Peterborough, crown holdings who make coke cans are willing to pay AS1(T) and Cpls 50k+ over time, we have lost 6 so far. So yes, engineers need more money or we won't have ground crew by 2025-6. It's that simple. HR has gone, Supply can go to Amazon and MT can go to Enterprise but you can't replace techies, simple as that.
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Aerospace engineers design, build and maintain aircrafts such as planes, spacecrafts and satellites. Their role combines aspects of both mechanical and electrical engineering.

Whats your engineering degree in Ady?
Do you design and build aircraft?
Have you ever designed and built an aircraft?
Or have you just maintained an aircraft?

- And its Stamford, not Peterborough.
 
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muttywhitedog said:
Aerospace engineers design, build and maintain aircrafts such as planes, spacecrafts and satellites. Their role combines aspects of both mechanical and electrical engineering.

Whats your engineering degree in Ady?
Do you design and build aircraft?
Have you ever designed and built an airctaft?
Or have you just maintained an aircraft?

- And its Stamford, not Peterborough.
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You're making a lot of wild assumptions about how aerospace works, but you can be forgiven for that as it's not within your realm of expertise.

An aerospace degree can be useful in manufacturing and design however the spectrum of application is way to vast to be adequately summed up in a few words.

When it comes to maintaining aircraft, an aerospace degree can also be useful for example in CAMO, quality and planning roles but without the technical know how of how to maintain aircraft, it's as much use as an ash tray on a motorbike.

Technicians / engineers (there's not really a difference) can constantly earn more than those in back office jobs simply because they know how to do things for real and not just in theory. The reason why is that they have the authority to sign off aircraft and release to service. That's a hard won privilege that can be lost very quickly if they don't follow the letter of the law.
 
Ah, the age old engineer versus technician debate rears its ugly head again.

Proper engineers get very grumpy about this misuse of THEIR title, "engineer" and use of post nominal letters. Technicians generally don't give a shit and are happy to accept the title bestowed upon them, (and the heightened pay,) by marketing gurus that don't have any real experience in the engineering world.

Hence we have washing machine engineers fixing your washing machine, Sky engineers nailing dishes to your house. All a marketing ploy to get the customer to pay more as they perceive the scruffy chap coming into their homes has done a course to prove their expertise.

People that have post nominals and then don't tend to use them because their experience and expertise shines through are usually more highly regarded than those that feel the need to use them in every bit of correspondence.

Having done the training courses/degree to get the post nominals is just the start of building a reputation. Reputation and responsibility count for far more than a fancy title.

Rant over...
 
With the move to professions for RAF Eng personnel, it is easy to draw a line between Engineer and Technician by professional registration with the Engineering Council:
Eng Tech - Technician
IEng and CEng or above - Engineer

Fulfilling the criteria for experience and learning.
 
muttywhitedog you seem rather hung up on titles along with a fixation on belittling the skill sets that the Engineering trades possess. Have you got any actual suggestions to solve retention or do you think disbanding TG1 and passing the maintenance onto the JEngO's and SEngO's is a good idea, after all they all have degrees so can be called engineers despite never picking up a spanner.
 
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