What is it like working as part of the flight cabin crew in an airline?

 To all the aspiring and future cabin crew

Being a cabin crew is one of the most challenging as well as one of the most rewarding professions. It may sound an exaggeration to some. However, anyone who has seen this profession closely (been flying or having associated with people who fly), they very well know this truth.

Your uniform will act as an inspiration to many, your wings will give you pride and the warm smiles around you will give you confidence.

Glamour, travel, a handsome salary are all part of this very elaborate profile. We will talk in brief about both the challenges and rewards. But trust us, even after all the challenges, it is a job that has unparalleled advantages and experiences.

First the challenges:

When one starts flying, some may find it difficult to cope up with the physical stress of it. Flying for 4-5 hours or more continuously while working becomes a very tedious task and mostly the body is not able to cope with the new change.

Also, there comes a sudden change in routine. Your roster (schedule) will show flights to different cities with different time slots. Also, there will be a lot of fluctuation of timings. Be prepared to operate any flight during your ‘available/stand-by days’ [but as long as you are flying to nice destinations, who minds :) ]

Majority of the Cabin Crew members join this profession straight after school. Hence there is an unexpected change of environment. The atmosphere will be truly professional and expectations out of you will be the same. It will all be result oriented and evaluation will be on the same grounds as for a 19 year old and a 30 year old. Performance cannot be discounted on the grounds of age.

Before every flight, it is a mandatory procedure to conduct the briefing, called the ‘Pre-Flight Briefing’. Crew are allotted different positions according to which the jobs are allocated for that particular day. Questions on safety and service are also discussed. As a new crew, you will always be under the radar. Since you will be new to the system, hence mistakes are ought to happen. This may discourage you sometimes, however it is only a phase and once you complete some months, things won’t seem this challenging.

On board, you ‘may’ or rather ‘will’ find passengers who will be extra demanding. There may be some who won’t abide by the rules even after regular announcements. The best way to deal with these situations is to be calm and composed. Do not lose your temper as this would aggravate things. The very first thing is that if the particular passenger is not behaving properly, this is bad at his part and you have nothing to lose.

Rewards:

You may also meet some good people rather many, who would make your flight a nice experience. There would be celebrities one of whom could be your childhood charm!

You would get layovers in cities that you would have always dreamt of visiting to. You would make some great friends and a large social circle. You would be flying with different set of crew each day and learning new ways of work.

A handsome pay awaits you. There is an increase in income with every layover that you do, flying more than the minimum hours, international flying. You and your family is entitled to free or very low fare travel across all the destinations of the airline.

Your knowledge of handling emergencies on board and the feeling that you are capable of saving lives, gives you the satisfaction and confidence level that you would have never imagined

So remember, this is more than a career choice. This is a lifestyle change to which you must give a careful thought.

“Keep your face towards the sunshine and shadows will fall behind you”

Join Kenya aeronautical college for your professional cabin crew training.

Kenya Aeronautical college is the International Air Transport Association (IATA) Regional Training Center.

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