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Welcome to an aviation podcast that caters to all aviation enthusiasts, ranging from pilots to airplane spotters. Our show covers a wide range of topics, including private pilot training, airline operations, and the latest aviation news. Our knowledgeable host, an experienced airline pilot with eight years of flying under his belt, is thrilled to share his own experiences and offer valuable advice to help you pursue your aviation dreams. We are here to support you on your journey, constantly wishing you Tailwinds & Sunshine!
How's it going, everyone? Welcome back to the show. My name is Manny Ramirez, and this is a Tailwinds and Sunshine podcast. From the Baltimore Studios in Colorado Springs, Colorado, this is the Tailwinds and Sunshine podcast. So Thursdays, typically, I answer emails.
Manny:I give advice. I answer questions, and today is no exception. I have 2 really good emails I got from you guys, and I wanna give you some advice or my take on what you should do with your situations. Also, I'm gonna talk about taking responsibility for your life. Right?
Manny:It's so easy to point at others or circumstances when bad things happen to you, but more often than not, we look we need to look in the mirror and really take responsibility for our actions because most of the time, there is something you can do to make your life better or to turn your life around, right, and see the silver linings in certain situations. So I'm gonna be talking about that. Also, just to give you a heads up, there's a more content on the shelf. I have a couple more guests coming up, and I have a guest scheduled for the month of May. And if you wanna be part of the show or if you know someone that you wanna hear on the show, go ahead and, let me know.
Manny:Send me a message or an email, and, we will get that show, scheduled. So I have a couple more, and you can go ahead and there's a link in the show notes, or you can reach out to your friend or you can reach out to me, and we can get that started. I'm close to running out of those, trading cards. So for those that submit questions or send me emails, I'm running out of those trading cards, postcards. I haven't bought any, so I'm running low on those.
Manny:So I'm gonna have to go find some trading cards and some of the domiciles. I don't know if they have them anymore, but I'm gonna try to look for some more, but I'm running low on those cards because I've sent out quite a handful of them. Also, as a reminder, if you have not submitted your review on Apple Podcasts, go ahead and submit a review, please. That makes a huge difference, and I really do appreciate if you do that. Go tap that star and leave a review and do that right now.
Manny:I'll wait. Go ahead. I'm waiting. Okay. Now you're back.
Manny:Thank you so much for submitting that review. I appreciate it. So anyways, let me get started with this episode. The first question I got actually is from, email. I have this one here.
Manny:It says, from Nick. Nick says, recently I missed my interview with United. I showed up 10 minutes late. They showed me the door and asked me to email my contact, my contact to reschedule. I have emailed my contact but I have not gotten a reply in a couple of weeks.
Manny:Do you think I've missed my opportunity or am I overreacting? Nick, I think that, missing an interview is a really big deal because they don't care what your circumstances were. Right? They just met you. They don't know who you are.
Manny:And for the most part, companies are not going to give you the benefit of the doubt because they have so many applicants. Right? Especially United. Right? Everyone wants to go to United.
Manny:So I think here, the possibility is that they're not gonna call you back, unfortunately. They're just gonna kind of push your application to the side, or they might just be another couple weeks. I mean, the the the recruiting teams are usually really busy, so you gotta give them a little leeway. Right? But something like missing an appointment, missing a job interview is a pretty big deal.
Manny:Right? Because you're essentially communicating to them. You're conveying that, you know what? I don't care enough for your company to prioritize my time and plan accordingly. Now that may not have been the case whatsoever.
Manny:You could have just gotten stuck in traffic. You had plenty of time. You got there or your flight or something, your flight got delayed, you know, whatever the case may be, but they don't care. They just see it as you saying no thanks, you know, or you just they take it basically. They don't give you the benefit of the doubt.
Manny:They just said, well, they said thanks but no thanks. So if you really wanna go to United, I suggest you continue trying reapply or or or continue reaching out and say, you know, but, keep trying. I don't know the process at United. I don't know how that works, but definitely keep trying. Now you also have to look at this opportunity and see what is it that you can do better next time to prevent this from happening.
Manny:Learn from the learn from this, this tragedy. Let's call it a tragedy. Right? So learn from it. What could you what could you have done better to prevent this from happening?
Manny:And let me tell you something. Like like I said earlier, when bad things happen to us, we usually point fingers at others. We come up with, you know, excuses. We we try to justify our actions, and we hardly ever look in the mirror and says, well, what can I do to prevent this from happening? It's like when you show up late for work.
Manny:I'm sure all of us have you know, this happened to us before. We show up late for work and your boss makes a big deal about it. And you're like, it's only 2 minutes. What's the big deal? Right?
Manny:But your boss is on your, you know, on your back about how you're being laid and etcetera, etcetera. They might even write you write you up. So we're more pissed off at the fact that your boss didn't give you a break than you actually the fact that you were late. So we focused on on the person that didn't give us a second chance. We're like, well, wow, my god.
Manny:So, they were so mean or they were so unfair. You know, they could have just given me a break why they have to write me up. As much as that sucks, you still have to say, well, you know what? It was my fault. It was my fault.
Manny:I didn't show up on time. Whatever the case may be, traffic, you know, weather, whatever. Right? You have to be well prepared for anything that you do. You know?
Manny:And a lot of people say, oh, I don't have time. I don't have time. Listen, we have plenty of time. Each each of us has 24 hours in a day. And there's there's those that are really good at time management, and then there's me.
Manny:I suck at time management. You know, sometimes I set my alarm for 7 AM, I wake up, and I lay in bed for another hour looking at my phone. That's not good time management. Right? I'm wasting time.
Manny:And then when I'm running late for work, now I'm rushing. Right? Now I'm, like, cursing the heavens because of traffic or something happens and inconvenience along the way, and guess who I get mad at? The other drivers, the weather. Then I show up to work, and I'm all rushing, you know, and and I'm you know, I get there on time, but I'm rushing.
Manny:I feel rushed. And instead of blaming myself, I blame the circumstances all like, oh my god. Everything outside of me is at fault for what happened to me. Poor me. Recently, there was a delay.
Manny:We had a delay going out of Bakersfield into San Francisco because of weather. And during I went back to the gate and I made my announcement the passengers and I said, hey, we're delayed for an hour based on weather. And I asked them is if anyone has any questions, please let me know. I'm gonna hang out here for a little bit. And passengers started asking me questions, you know, mostly about if they're gonna make their connections.
Manny:Others asked me if it was worth it just to drive to their destinations, you know, or if they're gonna make, you know, there was one guy that was supposed to he was supposed to fly down to Southern California for work. They were sending him up to San Francisco, connecting in San Francisco, and down to Southern California somewhere. And I said, well, at this point, I mean, it's gonna take us probably an hour than an hour to get there, then for you to fly back. By the time all is said and done, you probably if you just start driving now, you probably get there before, you know, your air the your flight. So, you know, he left.
Manny:But there was this one lady that came up to me, and she said, hey. Listen. I have an interview in San Francisco, and it's like in 3 I think it was like in 3 hours. And I go, well, that's really tight because we're not set to leave here until an hour from now, and that may not happen. They might extend the delay, so I don't know.
Manny:And my initial thought was, why is she doing this? Why is she traveling to San Francisco last minute? Right? So my brain defaulted to that. It's her fault.
Manny:Right? She didn't prepare. I didn't give her the benefit of the doubt. For all for all I know, she wasn't able to get time off from work from her current job to go do this interview. So this is the only opportunity she had.
Manny:But if you're like me, you'll know that most of us are really bad at time management and we procrastinate and we leave everything to the last minute. But if you have something this important like an interview, you wanna make sure you're at your location a day before. So that way if you have any hiccups along the way, they can happen the day before so you can still make it to your interview. So I don't know what this lady's circumstances were, but I thought of that. I'm like, man, she just didn't prepare.
Manny:Why didn't she go the day before? Now if she shows up late let's say let's take an example. Let's take let's just kind of, you know, talk about this one. Let's say that she didn't prepare. Right?
Manny:She just did it because she's a procrastinator. And then she shows up late to her interview, and then she doesn't you know, she shows up just like you do you know, you did, Nick. You showed up 10 minutes late, and now she's gonna be mad at the company. You know, it's like, can't believe it. It's not fair.
Manny:It's only 10 minutes. It could've let me in. They don't know how much I've traveled. They don't know how much I had to go through to do this. The company doesn't care, period.
Manny:But it's so easy to for us to point fingers. Right? Because we're expecting people to be kind to us. We're expecting people to give us a second opportunity. But just know that life doesn't owe you anything, so you cannot expect things to happen like that.
Manny:You know, you cannot expect people to give you anything or be kind to you or give you second opportunities. You have to hold yourself responsible. Why did this happen? Why did I get myself in this tight spot? Now, if you are in a position of leadership or influence, which person do you want to be?
Manny:You wanna pay it forward. Right? You wanna be a good human being. Do you wanna be the person that constantly holds the standard and follows the rules and just give doesn't give second chances because, hey, if everyone else is doing it, why shouldn't why can't you? Why should I you be the exception?
Manny:Right? It's not fair to the others. Right? Everyone is showing up on time. Why are you showing up up late.
Manny:I'm not going to give you any slack. I'm not going to cut you some slack at all. Are you going to be that person or are you going to be the person that just doesn't care. I don't care. You know they can show up.
Manny:I don't care. Or you want to be the the person, the leader that has compassion. A good leader also doesn't let people walk all over them, but we have compassion to make sure to let people know that, hey, I know things happen. Life happens to everybody, and sometimes we just need a break. You need a second chance.
Manny:But if you notice a trend, right, if people keep showing up late, then, you know, you can come down, you know, bring the hammer down on them. But which of those options is gonna make you a better leader and a better human being? The third option. Right? Be kind.
Manny:Show compassion. So, Nick, just to finish up with your with your question there, I'm not I'm not assuming that you did anything wrong. I'm gonna assume that, you know, you did everything right and then just, you know, you woke up late or something happened. Right? But see this as what can you do next time to figure it out, you know, so this doesn't happen again?
Manny:You know, I'll give you the example when I got my first SAD, my schedule assignment deviation at work. Right? That's a pretty big deal. That's a no show. And, initially, I got really mad, and I was mad at my boss and my supervisor because I'm like, it's my first one where they they just automatically take it off.
Manny:Right? Because I've heard stories of, like, oh, it's your first sad. They'll take it away. And I don't wanna be the one that asked her to remove my sad from my schedule. Right?
Manny:I didn't want to ask. I didn't wanna be the one that's, oh, can you please take it off? I don't wanna be that guy. And when I said that to myself, I was mad at myself because I knew that what had happened, it was a result of my actions. And I had to accept that I go, you know what?
Manny:Things happen. It's not the company's fault. It's not my fault, but I still have to take responsibility. So what did I do to take actions to make sure that didn't happen? So I had mitigation strategies to make sure that it didn't happen again.
Manny:But I had to look at myself. Right? At first, I was mad at my supervisor, my chief, because I'm like, why didn't she take it off? Well, she doesn't owe me anything. She doesn't have to do it.
Manny:And I was I wasn't about to ask anyways. But definitely, that's not gonna happen again because I learned my lesson, but I had to look at myself to make that correction. Alright, Nick. Thank you so much for that and I hope it helps. But keep trying, man.
Manny:If you wanna go to United, just keep trying. Learn from this. Take this set up. See the silver lining. Maybe United was not meant for you.
Manny:Maybe this is a universe telling you. Maybe this is not the airline you should be going to. I'm a true believer in that. Sometimes bad things happen to us, and it's a sign that we shouldn't go there. It's a sign that we shouldn't be moving in that direction.
Manny:You know, you have goals of what you wanna do, but sometimes that's not adequate for us. So we have to accept a reality and take a different path. Alright. Next question. The next question comes from an, an an anonymous fan.
Manny:That was a name. It says, Manny, a great show. As you know, SkyWest is currently going to be forced upgrading ERJ FOs into the CRJ aircraft. I find myself at a crossroads because I don't know what to do. On one end, I can just take it and take the upgrade, or I could leave with one of the other regionals as offering a lot of money.
Manny:What should I do? Well, yes. So to give you a little bit more color as to what's going on at SkyWest. So right now, SkyWest is in the process of just growth. Right?
Manny:So we're continually trying to, utilize our entire fleet. We do have some CRJs that we have parked that we need to utilize, and they're paid for. So we can use those planes as basically they're just moneymakers. So SkyWest has a lot of ERJs. In fact, has the largest ERJ fleet in the world, but they have most of them have payments like your car payment.
Manny:Right? So the revenue you get from those is less or not the revenue, but the profit is less because you have to put some of that profit into your payments so you're paying off your airplanes. But we have plenty of CRJ's that are paid for. So if we can fly those, do they're making more money. So from a company perspective is a really smart thing to do to get most of those planes flying.
Manny:But as a crew member, it can put you in a really tight spot. Right? As you mentioned, you know, you could just take it and go to the CRJ or you could go somewhere else and take the, there's a lot of companies out there. Well, not a lot, but there's a few companies out there that are offering really fat bonuses for upgrading. But the the thing is that once again, you have to do pros and cons of what is gonna be what you're gonna end up doing.
Manny:Right? And to also give you more detail about this upgrade is our, our vice president of operations, our senior vice president of operations, recently sent out an email saying that they were gonna do this. Now I think they lost, they wanna increase the utilization of that fleet, so they're gonna put more, you know, put more resources into that so they can get them flying. And that means they're gonna have to take some of the, qualified FOS that are gonna upgrade in the ERJ to transfer them over to the CRJ. That is not optimal.
Manny:Personally, I would hate to go fly the CRJ, but that is just what the company is doing. And believe me, if I was if that were to happen to me, I would seriously consider trying to go somewhere else. The saving grace would be if they still allow me to teach on the ERJ, then I would That's something to consider because I know I can probably transfer back. But, you know, I'm just kinda seeing it from the FO's point of view. Keep in mind that if, you know, the money is not everything.
Manny:Right? So if you take that huge bonuses, I mean, there's some companies offering upwards of $200,000 to do a go as an go in as a direct entry captain, and, you know, money is not everything. Quality of life is, you know, is as well. Now speaking of quality of life, SkyWest said that right now, the 3 bases that are in high need of, CRJ captains are Denver, Detroit, and Chicago. And so initially, if you're based somewhere and you're happy as an FO and then all of a sudden you're gonna have to commute to Detroit, Chicago, or Denver, that's tough, man.
Manny:You know? And I can't make that decision for you, and you're really gonna have to weigh your options. You know? If it doesn't bother you too much to commute, then okay. Great.
Manny:But know that there's so much movement in the company that eventually you'll be able to bid for your back for your base. So it's only a temporary thing. Because a lot of stuff, you know, we we still getting these feelings of FOMO. Right? FOMO, so fear of missing out.
Manny:So are you willing to stick around and do this transition over to the CRJ, or are you gonna go to another company? Are you gonna go to another airline? You know, there's this fear of I don't know what to do. I don't know if I'm gonna be missing out something better because I'm gonna stay here. It's really is really difficult to deal with that with that scenario.
Manny:You know, you're really kind of literally literally between a rock and a hard place. And you're just gonna have to discuss it with your family and say, hey. If we take the money, then we're gonna have to move or am I gonna commute? And it it you know, if you have a family, it definitely is a huge challenge. But, you know, it's unfortunate, but that's, you know, the company, is doing it for its own, you know, to maintain, stay afloat, right, to continue growing, but it really, really does suck for for the crew members that are gonna have to go to a plane they don't wanna fly into a base they never imagined they were gonna go to.
Manny:So start weighing your options, you know, start like getting that resume looked at. Right? Get it get it, get it reviewed. Look at it, you know, start putting applications somewhere else right now. I know every everyone slowed down their hiring, but there's still opportunity out there.
Manny:You can still go somewhere else especially with the time you have now. You have close to possibly close to a 1000 hours and you you're gonna be upgrading anyways. So start looking at other opportunities. I mean, if taking the money and running to another company is a good choice, just keep in mind that, you know, you're gonna go back to the, you know, the bottom of the pile of that seniority list at another company. Whereas if you stay here, you're gonna retain your seniority, and, maybe you're gonna be pretty senior in the CRJ at those particular races.
Manny:Who knows? But, it's it's a really tough choice to do that. And, it's exciting news from a company perspective. You We're continually growing. We like I mentioned before, we're adding, like, 20 planes.
Manny:We're I think we're getting, like, 38 planes in in the next 4 years. Cuatro no. In the next 2 years, we're adding about 38 planes to the company, ERJs. And the CRJs, we're bringing those out of pretty much kind of quote unquote retirement and try to fly them to make some money out of that. But definitely, the ERJ is the future of, regional flying.
Manny:The CRJ's eventually, they're gonna be they're just gonna age out. We're not gonna have parts to fix them. We're just gonna be they're they're not as popular, especially the CRJ 200 is not very popular with customers. Some of our partners have phased out the, the CRJ 200. I think American phased them out, Delta phased them out, and United really is the only partner that's flying the CRJ 200, but eventually because of customer demand, they're eventually gonna have to get rid of that 200.
Manny:SkyWest has been trying to get rid of some of those CRJ's and by sending them over to Contour, by using them in the SkyWest Charter, but they have so many of them that they, they're trying to utilize them as much as possible, and they have an agreement with United to continue flying them. And that demand is there because we need to continue. There's plenty of flying to do for United, and SkyWest is trying to keep up with that and keep flying more, getting more block hours for them. Good for the company, but it's a really tough position for crew members. Right?
Manny:So some people don't wanna upgrade and they're gonna be forced to upgrade here and go into the CRJ. So my condolences to those guys. But once again, like I mentioned with Nick, I said, this is a this is an opportunity for you to reassess your situation and see if this is the time that you need to go somewhere else. Right? Sometimes a drastic measure needs to happen for you to make that move, to take that leap of faith.
Manny:Right? Because, you know, you got to you gotta get furloughed or, you know, the company has to furlough you or something like this, something drastic like this needs to happen for you to say, you know what? This is the sign. This is a sign from God or the universe that I need to move on, that I need to finally dust off my resume, finally start putting my my logbook back together because I've been procrastinating and doing that. This is the call to do that.
Manny:Or maybe you just stick around because you're well established here, and you say, you know what? I'll stick around. I like the company. Fine. I'll go into the CRJ, get some more time or who knows.
Manny:But I I do believe that there's gonna be plenty of people that are gonna try to leave. I don't think we're gonna have as many people leaving because the opportunities have kinda dried up a little bit, but there's definitely opportunity out there even possibly even going in the business aviation. Right? So GA, might wanna go and shoot for that. You know, NetJets, Flexjet, or any of the, part 91 k or 135 operators, there's good opportunities there.
Manny:So, yeah, thanks for, thanks so much for that question, and I hope that helps. And speaking of business aviation, I have, a guest coming up in May that is, actually, used to do business aviation with me. We used to work together at the same company in North Las Vegas, and she's gonna be here, coming up sometime in the next month or so. I have a lot of more content for you guys. Anyways, guys, that's it for today.
Manny:Thank you so much for spending some time with me today. Once again, leave that review. And if you have any questions, you can email me or you can, there's a link in the show notes that you can ask a question. And until next time, remember, keep growing, keep learning because good enough to earn a living may not be good enough to survive. Hey, fellow aviation enthusiasts.
Manny:Before I let you go, I'd like to ask you for a huge favor. If you could please go to platform where you're listening this podcast in and leave a review, some feedback, and some comments. I really do appreciate that. I wanna make the Tailwinds and Sunshine podcast your podcast. I also want to give a huge thanks to my friends and coworkers that have shared the podcast with their friends and family.
Manny:That means the world to me. I really appreciate your support and your subscriptions. If you wanna reach out to me, you can email me at mannythecfi@gmail.com, or you can message me directly on Instagram at climbvx. That's climbasinvictorx-ray. You can reach me there with your suggestions or any feedback.
Manny:Once again, thank you for the bottom of my heart. I appreciate the support. And until next episode, I wish you tailwinds and sunshine. See you. The statements made on the show are my own opinion and do not necessarily reflect those of my employer.