asking questions on avcanada

[Tim]

It seems the recent thread about an instructor wanted to upgrade to class 2 without knowing the requirements is just the latest example of instructors who start looking for information in the wrong places.

If you're a junior instructor and you need advice or have questions about regs, etc you should first try to find the info yourself. Have an idea about where to look for this info in official publications. You might not know the exact spot, but you can get started by looking through headers in a specific section of the CARs, for example.

If you can't find the info yourself the next thing you should do is speak with your supervisor, CFI or other experienced instructor. Ideally instead of the experienced instructor just telling you the answer, they will help to find the answer yourself. Learning how to properly reference things (CARs, COM, CAP GEN, QRH, etc) on your own becomes even more important later in your career when you have to decide if you can or cannot legally complete a flight, as opposed to just figuring out if you can get the next upgrade on your license.

Avcanada is a great tool, but it does not replace a personal talk with someone who has the experience and knowledge to answer you and direct a conversation that helps you figure something out. Don't rely on it for your primary source of information...or even your secondary. When you do get information from here, make sure it comes with a reference to something official and take a minute to read through that info from the source.

[trey kule]

An excellent post...

IMAHO (the A stands for almost)

[Hedley]

Anything free (eg advice from an internet forum) is worth what you paid for it!

I don't like to discourage people from asking questions, but as you point out, you have to wonder where the supervision is (or isn't).

[sky's the limit]

FWIW,

I think the answers generally provided here on the Flight Training Forum are excellent, and several young guys I've partially helped along have expressed their thanks, just thought I'd pass it on.

stl

[Darkwing Duck]

Hey, I got it off the internet, so it must be true.

[Tim]

I don't mean to discourage people from asking questions here, but I don't think it should be the first place to come and look for info.

There's lots of very helpful former and current instructors on here who have a lot of good information to offer.

[FlaplessDork]

I've had a few moments on the forum where I've learned something new. Moments where I have said "Wow, I never even thought of that" but there are certain questions where an internet forum should be your last resort. The Class 2 upgrade question was one of them. The question should have been handled in order of precedence by consulting the CARs, the Supervising Instructor, the CFI, and lastly the CFI contacting TC.

[Big Pistons Forever]

There are at least half a dozen very experienced instructors who regularly post here and whose advice is of genuine value, especially to new instructors. I like to think I am one of them. I think my advice along with other posters opinions will result in a range of opinions which will be thought provoking and mind broadening. I think it provides a valuable adition to the formal published infromation/guidance/regulation and the personal advice of ones supervisor

However, The poster also IMO has some obligation to this forum. For example "how" many posters ask CAR's questions seems to me to be a particular flash point. If somebody posts a CAR's referance and says "this is how I interpret the information, what do you guys think? ", then I am happy to give my intrepretation not as the final word
but as one data point. BUT I think if an individual wishes to benefit from free advice from experts than they have a moral obligation to do a little work themselves. Asking to be a spoon fed a CAR's reference that is available with a little bit of searching IMO refects poorly on the poster........

Mods I think this thread should be made a sticky

[MichaelP]

One thing I have learned here is that Canadians are different people.
They can be very intolerant. (I was shocked by CZBB ATC when I flew here in the early 90's).

As instructors we learn "There are no stupid questions", when giving a lesson we are supposed to encourage questions regardless of how stupid we think they are as if one person asks there are always others who want to ask.
I don't think there's any of us who have not asked a stupid question once in a while.

On the other hand there is an expectation of each of us based on the licences and ratings we have achieved to be to the standard expected.
One of the biggest problems we have with students and instructors is the lack of initiative.
This lack of initiative is sometimes apparent in the 'stupid question' where the person demonstrates the lack of initiative to find the information in the proper place.

The one thing I try to pass on is enthusiasm for learning.
Enthusiasm tends to promote initiative, and it promotes learning.

Do High School students not do school projects these days?
Learning to fly is like a big school project. You go out and collect information, you study your books, and you do your best. If you want to get a higher school mark then you make sure that your 'school' project has a lot more research in it and therefore better conclusions... You want an A+.

Too many people treat flying training as an effort to get a licence. It should not be. It is an effort to learn, and the better your learning the more credibility you have amongst your peers. A+ is being the best you can be at what you do.

I get depressed here, and I lose my enthusiasm and I am not sure what I can do about it.
Certainly it was very very difficult for me to get the 07:00 flight out of Chiang Mai last Wednesday to come back to this situation!
I have surrounded myself with the most enthusiastic people you could know in the past... It grieves me now to be in a place where good enough is enough.

But I am fortunate, there's always a glimmer of light such as my Dutch friend who wants to challenge the Citabria, learn tailwheel and aerobatics, and increase his skills...
Many, too many can't be bothered, this flying little aeroplanes is transient, the skills not required in big aircraft (if only they knew!).

So to come back to the posted 'question'.
I think we should always be polite on this forum, we should not ridicule people for the 'stupid' questions they ask, instead we should have a sense of humour.
If you have a serious issue with someone on here then you should send that person a PM.

For me, reading some of the posts on here, I get upset.
I'm perhaps a fine one to 'talk', but we do get back what we put out in this life, and nasty out means nasty back. I prefer 'nice' myself.

I came to this forum to defend myself when some bright spark decided to write libelous things about me on here.
I left this forum because I did not like the tone of it... Of course there were some criticisms of me too!

I am on a British forum as well and the tone there is totally different. There's a sense of humour and no-one gets terribly upset publicly with anyone else on the forum. But Brits are known for their sense of humour and perhaps their stiff upper lips (restraint).

I think that regardless of our personal views, we should either post something positive or hold our 'fingers'.
Anything 'nasty' that has to be dealt with between people should be done by PM.

[Hedley]

I left this forum because I did not like the tone of it

Ignore the haters, Mike. Not everyone loves me as much as they should,
either, but you can bet I don't spend much time worrying about it





PS The gentle nudging that goes on in aviation is nothing compared to
the incredibly nasty, back-stabbing politics that I have experienced in
large, multi-national corporations. You try messing with a billion-dollar-a-month
revenue stream sometime, and let me know how that works out for you.

[trey kule]

Actually, I think we are talking about two different things here. A lazy question is different than a stupid question. Not sure that I agree there are no stupid questions, but I understand what you are trying to say. When one of your firends/kids/whatever the poitically correct term of partner is these days walks into the room you dont say....dont talk unless it is to ask a smart question. You might tell them to go look it up themselves if they are just being lazy. And quite frankly that is what a good instructor should do, but I have seen so many instructors who simply rattle off the answer when asked..That doesnt really help the student very much. Maybe an ego thing on the instructors parts..or maybe just trying to be helpful..In any case I believe it is misdirected help.

This is a social site. There are some young, eager , and smart new pilots on it. I dont mind reading the dumb questions though I dont necessary like reading people just feeding them the answers all the time, particularily when the answers may not be correct.

How about this...If it is a questions, such as about a CARS., we simply write LB..look it up...stands for Lazy...well you can figure out a B word to put in there.

I really dont want to discourage anyone from posting a question, but hope that they will understand that the answer may be to lookit up themselves.

It was disappointing to read your comments Micheal. I liked your posts. forgive those that have trespassed against you or whater the buddha said. I am as guilty as anyone. Sometimes Ijust get fed up with reading someone who I feel is spouting pure nonsense or shamelessly promoting themselves and post something I later regret.

Now kiddies.. Ask away..

[MichaelP]

http://www.wing41.rtaf.mi.th/

I was watching the L39s circling around waiting their turns to land at Chiang Mai a week ago Monday...

I once worked for one of those companies Hedley remarked on it was called British Aerospace and we were building Concordes, 146s, Tornados, A310 wings, and a variety of other things.
I worked at Weybridge and it was very civilised with little backstabbing and generally a productive atmosphere.
Chester was different, it was like a children's school, and I had to throw my weight around there (so to speak, all 150lbs of it!).
I worked at other places as well.
There's a difference between peoples even in different counties of England.

forgive those that have trespassed against you or whater the buddha said

That's a christian thing I believe (so to speak again!).
Buddha is live and let live, and if you don't like the company you keep find somewhere else to be at peace with your life. It's tolerance and acceptance.
My tolerance was at it's limit... Besides I have work to do and this is a diversion I shouldn't spare much time for.
Actually I lost some Buddhist tolerance (so to speak) by losing my temper with someone on Sunday, that most Christian of days. I don't lose my temper often, but the result has been good!

I do think that we should make efforts to practice tolerance on this forum.

[Pirate Pilot]

I will just interrupt this thread for a moment and then I will comment. Hedley, you are such a SH&%T I see there has been 532 views of this thread when I logged in. Take a poll/vote whatever and ask who doesn't think those photos you attached are not just the absolute best a GA pilot has ever viewed. I was on a motorcycle tour in 2005 on the Florida Keys and at Marathon Key Airport there was a couple of guys that offered the U.S. equivant of a PPC on a L39. Cost was $9995.00 I do have a U.S. FAA foreign licence and I had a valid visa card. What I didn't have was the queen's approval (if you know what I mean) Oh, I promised everything I could think of (well kind of) but it just didn't work out. Anyway, back to reality.....
Michael, we have met. You probably don't know me but thats O.K. In 2007-2008 I was one of the "adult" or "continuing education" customers at CZBB. I attended the "other" school. There was me, the kid from England, the kid from the Ukraine, and 65 Chinese guys. I was there on my own nickel. Every minute of airtime in my logbook has been bought and paid for by me. No company, no gifts, no employers.....just me. I am a businessman and have been for many years. When I deal with anyone that offers a service or a product for an amount of money I expect or in fact demand a considered measure of customer service. I have read ad naseum on this forum writings from flight instructors regarding students not paying attention, not doing their homework, showing up not motivated, and a mountain of other complaints. Well, if these instuctors are doing this for free and donating their time to further the aviation world they are absolutely correct. If they are being paid any sum of money they need to understand customer service. I know this will disturb the CZBB training schools. They are currently enjoying the foreign student influx where they can treat the students anyway they want and get away with it. I watched a young instructor embarass a chinese PPL to the point of tears. This young student had no where to turn. 1000's of miles from home in fierce competition with his fellow students to complete his studies and he is standing in the middle of a crowd crying!!! Yep, thats flight instruction at its best!! I made comment of this to the CFI as well as the owner of the outfit but quite frankly it fell of deaf ears. Anyway, enough of that....I did enjoy hanging around the restaurant (I hear you have a new one) between lessons to visit with the old guys. You would often be walking through the building or be in the restaurant and would always say hello. I had to stay at that motel close to the airport along the frontage road and I would say hi to you in the pub there. Rest assured, your reputation is intact as one of the good guys.....they are getting harder to find

[Big Pistons Forever]

Pirate Pilot

Your comment re customer service is a good one. The flight training industry in general could and should do a better job of taking care of the customer. But failure to pay attention, or showing up without your homework, at cooking class means dinner gets ruined. The potential worst case senario for not taking your flying lessons seriously is you and potentially your passengers die.

I will not work with students who are unwilling to apply themselves.....full stop. My "customer service" involves setting clear and complete expectations of what the course entails and what I expect of the student right at the beginning.... and then working very hard at making each lesson as good as it can be.

[trey kule]

BPF

I think we maybe have a bit of a different perspective on customer service. chewing someone out (particularily an Asian where face is so important) in front of a crowd is not customer service.

It has been a long time since I had anything more to do with FTU's than hang around the odd one waiting for weather. But let me ask you, and all th eother FTU operators this (no reply is really expected)

When you hire a 20 year old instructor, how much time is spent during their intital formal training discussing proper ways of dealing with student issues. Motivation, etc. so that incidents like the one described dont occur? when students dont progress as expected how much time is devoted by management to determine if it is a student of if several students of a particular instructor seem to be having a problem ( a common connection)

Perhaps things have changed but many moons ago when I was an instructor, the actual instructor course never included anything on respect or understanding of how to correct student behavior. It was pretty much all about individual lessons, and I witness so many instructors who just could not integrate the whole process. I taught at a great flight school back in those days, but never once do I recall the CFI pulling any instructors students PTRs and going through them to rate the instructor.

Customer service is so bandied around as to be as meaningless as "your call is important to us". or "we are experience heavy calling and you can expect yourwait time will be 201 days"

Tell me I am wrong.

[MichaelP]

Customer Service was discussed about an hour ago... When I got back from Thailand there was no milk in the fridge and most people take milk in their tea.
Here we have a lounge with tea, coffee, a fridge, a table on which I place scones etc from time to time, a shelf with chockie biccies in it... I get about 40% of what a spend back in the honesty box...
But to me this lounge is as important as any other room in the building. Customer comfort and relaxation are important in a place of learning.

Instructors who are hired here are given as much training as they need (within reason!) in the aircraft before they fly with customers.
The CFI observes their attitude, looks at how they behave, and makes efforts to increase their knowledge and abilities.
The instructors are generally happy here, and happy people work a lot better than miserable complainers.
I have a different slant on some things and how they are done and this comes from 37 years experience in flying, and a lot of reading.
I am not the standard CZBB product I come from elsewhere.

We have six Chinese students and one successfully passed his PPL flight test the other day.
I do not want these students to be to CZBB CPL standard, I want them to go back to their country being the best trained pilots they can be.
Part of this is you need a global understanding and know diverse things such as metre flight levels, QNH, 9999 etc.

The importance of having the right attitude towards learning and making one's own efforts rather than relying on spoon feeding from an instructor is fundamental to being the best you can be. This is encouraged in all students and Class 3 instructors!

From my perspective looking on this forum from time to time, we do not do ourselves a favour with some of the attitudes we publish here. People who read this forum could be your future students and does anyone want to fly with a person who demonstrates impatience on here?
We need to be careful what we write, and be to the point without any nasty attacks on each other.
Try to be positive and not get worked up so much.

[Shiny Side Up]

When I deal with anyone that offers a service or a product for an amount of money I expect or in fact demand a considered measure of customer service.

Lets be very clear here though what "customer service" means. As a FTU operator it means:

1) Our people will be on time for you.
2) Our people will be friendly and courteous.
3) All customers will get treated equally.
4) We will provide the service we offer to the best of our ability.

Number one's a no brainer. With number two you got to give to get, if you come in all hostile, you'll get just courteous. If you're bad enough, I got no problems tossing you out the door, the staff no where is there to put up with shit. Three means everyone gets the same treatment, usually that means first come first serve. This one I find is pretty alien to a lot of customers - you don't get to interrupt the other customer's service, if you're in a hurry that's your lack of planning, not my bad service. Everyone else in the world shouldn't have to pay for your mistakes. If you're late, it doesn't mean I inconvinience the person after you. If you're early, I don't ditch the person before you. Lastly, if you don't think we're living up to number four, then you need to talk to us or change where you get your service from, all there is to it.

There is out there the increasing Wal-Mart attitude that the customer is always right and that its ok to act in a self centered manner. That don't fly when it comes to aviation, that attitude gets you killed.

I will say that you're right that the instructor who made the student cry was uncalled for (though certainly the instructor wasn't R. Lee Ermy one must wonder at the metal of the student, thousand miles from home or not, can't say I'd want this person who cries when they are pushed to be piloting an airplane...) one must realise that if you are to be your best as a student then it's your instructor's job to push you to be that best. Coddling makes for crappy pilots. The stuff I might have to say to you sometimes ain't going to be soft, you're paying me to make you a good pilot, not to be your friend. To quote, I'm not here to blow sunshine up your ass.

Well, if these instuctors are doing this for free and donating their time to further the aviation world they are absolutely correct.

One thing that few flight training customers realise is how much time and effort a lot of instructors often put in on behalf of their students. A lot of the GA world continues to turn often on the good will of a lot of these people, many who've posted in this thread. While there are a few bad apple instructors out there, many of the ones I know have spent a good chunk of their lives - not understood often by their family or friends - to further the cause of general aviation and to make sure that its possible for them to be pilots. There's more unpaid hours that get put in than I can count - should every person in flight training suddenly stop and demand in a union type of way that they don't do nothing without compensation GA as we know it would come to a sudden and screeching halt. All these people are collectivley working for is so the little airplanes can keep making noise.

So you know what? If this is the third time you've shown up without reading the FTM for a lesson, maybe they got the right to be a little bitchy - you're wasting aviation in this country which is getting to be a more precious commodity every day.

But let me ask you, and all th eother FTU operators this (no reply is really expected)

Its cool, evil FTU operator here, I'm used to it.

When you hire a 20 year old instructor, how much time is spent during their intital formal training discussing proper ways of dealing with student issues. Motivation, etc. so that incidents like the one described dont occur? when students dont progress as expected how much time is devoted by management to determine if it is a student of if several students of a particular instructor seem to be having a problem ( a common connection)

Admittedly only a small ammount of time is spent on a few generalizations when it comes to the formal training. With good reason: there is largely an infinite ammount of customer/student personalities out there. One could spend a lifetime disecting what makes some of them tick and write volumes alone on how their mother breast feeding them until they were two, their father's transgender leanings or their older brother's regular hot wheels track floggings affected why they have trouble remembering best glide speed. You can't prepare the instructors for everything.

When it comes to hiring then one is generally looking for the individuals with the most robust personalities to be instructors, though you won't always be able to tell when someone has a hidden breaking point, the troubles of dealing with human beings. This, of course, should be understood by all when engaging in any endeavor, but few take it into account.

I can't really put it into words, but with experience I can pick out usually who will be a good instructor and who wouldn't.

I taught at a great flight school back in those days, but never once do I recall the CFI pulling any instructors students PTRs and going through them to rate the instructor.

One of the things with a good school and a good CFI is that if he does his/her job right, you probably won't be able to tell he/she is doing it at all. Going through PTRs and monitoring student progress is one of my big time consumers, one I don't make a big deal about, since if I annonuced "GOING THROUGH THE PTRS TOMMORROW EVERYONE!" I probably wouldn't be able to pick up any problems. That being said too, though, I try to keep low profile around the students (some think I'm the janitor) because often if they think Big Brother is watching it changes how they behave. Either way, I've thankfully had to have very few "chats" with the instructors over performance, and most of the ones have ended up with the desired increase in performance.

Customer Service was discussed about an hour ago... When I got back from Thailand there was no milk in the fridge and most people take milk in their tea.

The horror! THE HORROR!

The importance of having the right attitude towards learning and making one's own efforts rather than relying on spoon feeding from an instructor is fundamental to being the best you can be. This is encouraged in all students and Class 3 instructors!

As it should be.

[MichaelP]

I will say that you're right that the instructor who made the student cry was uncalled for

This is a difficult thing to judge on a forum over the internet. Much more information is required.
My experience in China was of many many students there crying from time to time, it was common.
["write volumes alone on how their mother breast feeding them until they were two"] Therein lies the problem...
In China with the one child policy I saw little fat kids being stuffed with steaks and pizzas while their slender mothers ate salad and doted on them.
These kids were in charge... In a restaurant I saw one tubby boy ignore his mother's indication to sit down with her and go and sit down at another table... She obediently got up and moved to his table thereby demonstrating who has authority!
As a child I would not even consider doing this to one of my parents, the punishment would be swift and painful!

So we take foreign students on and we apply our own experience to them and this does not always work.
You have to understand cultures and work with these cultures.
In China I learned that I need to avoid working for Americans!

In China I learned that up to 80% of the students there should never be allowed into the cockpit of an airliner! They were too immature, did not want to study, and they cried when I told them that no we would not run the bus back into town every afternoon for their 3pm sleep. A lot of them expected that, like with their university degrees, their parent's money would buy them their pilot licences.

The remaining 20% of the students were the best students you could have anywhere. They had genuine degrees, they worked hard, they wanted to be at the school learning, they asked questions, and they were diligent. You could not wish for a better attitude in the cockpit.

So we have to be careful how we judge our fellow instructors when we do not know all the circumstances.

These were among the best students:

[Pirate Pilot]

Heh, heh....well, I got everyone's heart rate up a bit. I did write "a considered degree of customer service" Nobody in their right mind puts up with blatant bullshit. This thread has wandered away but i'm O.K. with it if you are. Every FTU (unless its a college environment with outside funding or an expanded curriculum) can only survive if their income statement is in the black. As owner\operators and/or CFI's you are offering a service for payment. If the "customer" is not happy they will not return to continue to pay. That is all I was getting at. I am writing this from my home. I am not at work. We are open 24/7 365 days a year. I have 8 people working right now that are hopefully fufilling the "customer service" edit that we have laid out. Is it happening for me? I sure hope so. Its the old story. They don't fire the players, they fire the coach. In my case and in the case of any FTU owner/CFI that doesn't perform to the "standard" being fired is quite tramatic....it means you have lost your business.
I do see and accept the difference between my business and an FTU as my customers come and go on a minute to minute basis where a flight training "customer" (note the parenthesis) is there for the long haul and a personal relationship must be developed. Yes? No?
Anyway, Merry Christmas

[MichaelP]

The person who posts a silly question on this forum is also a customer of this forum like the rest of us.
So "Customer Service" in this context is what we write in response and the words we use.
The thread could be said to have drifted a little, but not by much. Interpersonal relations is behind the question, how do we deal with people who don't do their homework first?
Ultimately we are customers of each other where information is asked for and it is given. The fact that no payment has been exchanged is neither here nor there...

If the "customer" is not happy they will not return

In the flying school business sometimes the people offering the service are not happy...
I am not happy taking the money from someone for no good result.
If a student clearly is not performing I will do something about it... This might be change that 'customers' instructor...
Sometimes the instructors get frustrated by a student who has been through them all to no good result. We all like to see students progress, but some students are simply not going to become safe pilots, or even safe enough that we can trust them not to be a hazard to others when solo.

When I did my first instructor ride the Transport Canada examiner asked me if everyone should get a licence. I think everyone should have the chance, but once in a while you get someone who should not!
If someone has enthusiasm and makes the effort I will always put myself out to help them. I've dragged many a person out of a bad situation and into the successful completion of a flying course.

But, in the past year I have let go of two unsafe, non progressing, students who went to another airport.
Other schools will happily continue to take their money!
I can't do that, it's unethical.

[Shiny Side Up]

These were among the best students:

I don't mean to say... and get too far off topic, but did you train the three tallest people in China, or are you really that short?

[trey kule]

Reading the responses, I am not sure I was clear about my point.

Whether or not a student cries, and whether or not they desrve it, doing it in a public place, except in the most exceptional circumstances,is simply not warranted.
Tell it straight.Sure. Sometimes people need some tough talk. But to embarrass someone publicly. the only time I can think of that kind of confrontation being necessary is when , for example, someone has being spreading rumors and the rest of the group need to know it just aint so.. I am not impressed by those who claim rudeness and humiliation under the guise of motivation in all but exceptional circumstances. And they are few and far between.
There are very few instances I can think of where that is necessary.

My point with regard to customer service also was in reference that when we hire instructors little if any training is given in much else but the actual flight portion.

But maybe I am just from a different time..

[Big Pistons Forever]

If all else fails there is always the F-I-S-R method (Fear-Intimidation-Sarcasm-Ridicule) of flight instruction

[trey kule]

Well, BPF that was a bit disappointing. All along I felt I had a superior and distinctive approach to training and then you come along and advise their is actually a name for it. Next thing you probably will be posting that there are actually flight instructors using this method.

....and CFI's that are letting them..

[Pugster]

Instructors should be the type of people who get their thrills from witnessing the "light bulb" appear when a student gets it, not from ripping on a student when they don't.