industry insights
How To Maintain A Qualifi ed Workforce
BY BRIAN F. FINNEGAN
I
f this struggling economy has taught target. The aircraft are more reliable the day. Leaving one’s post to get tools,
us anything, it’s that we work in a and therefore need less maintenance. additional manuals, or even working
cyclical industry. Nothing brings And the maintenance they do need is with engineering to ensure the repair
that into sharper focus than trying complex and requires advanced skills is designed and planned correctly
to analyze whether or not we have a – not something you can hire off the wastes time. If an eight-hour job takes
shortage of qualified technicians and, street when the cycle start its upward a technician 16 hours to complete
if so, what we should do about it. swing. Many businesses do use non- because numerous unplanned and
The consensus at the beginning of certificated technicians when possible, unproductive activities keep cropping
this decade was that, yes, there is a short- but even those shops relish the presence up, someone has to pay.
age of qualified technicians and the root of a robust FAA certificated workforce. The customer won’t – and shouldn’t
of the problem was poor pay. Examples The Professional Aviation Maintenance pay for unproductive work practices.
of individuals leaving the industry to Foundation (PAMF) takes a hard look at The maintenance provider cannot afford
make 30 percent more fixing computers this puzzle. During a recent conversation to double the cost of a repair just because
were everywhere. In the United States, with PAMF chairman John Boomhower, the job took twice as long. So, the tech-
we blamed the Department of Labor’s we discussed the foundation’s new initia- nician pays with reduced wages and a
lack of a specific occupational classifi- tive to gather the aviation maintenance sense their skills are under-appreciated.
cation for the low respect we received. providers and support organizations to find Under the tenets of HVM, aircraft
During informal polls of technicians solutions and encourage bright young peo- are inspected in advance and repairs
attending my presentations, I always ple to make their careers in our industry. are planned out and prepared before
asked, “How many of you would recom- Called “Under Our Wing: Future Aviation the aircraft arrives at the maintenance
mend this profession to your children Maintenance Professionals,” PAMF’s efforts facility. This philosophy respects the
or other young people considering a seek to gather industry investment in solv- significant and scarce skills of the
career path?” Hardly a hand went up. ing this chronic problem. They will need maintenance professional, provides
Even today, the FAA cannot reliably everyone’s help to succeed. a path for novices into the profes-
tell us how many A&Ps are employed Part of the solution may lie in sion through a sophisticated support
and therefore cannot accurately adopting some of the High Velocity infrastructure and helps ensure our
forecast future supply. There is no Maintenance (HVM) techniques country’s technical brain trust is not
requirement to periodically recertify, described elsewhere in this magazine. shipped overseas. Truthfully, it’s a mat-
like there is for pilots and mechan- Airlines and MROs, and now the U.S. ter of national security.
ics with an Inspection Authorization. military, are organizing their work I encourage our industry to sup-
Therefore we have no way to predict schedules better to achieve greater effi- port John Boomhower and PAMF’s
where specific shortages of mechan- ciency. Two interesting results occur: “Under Our Wing” efforts. We can
ics might occur. This affects safety. the need for highly skilled technicians work together to encourage future
A&P schools are closing, too. There goes down as they are focused on per- professionals to join us in ensuring
are exceptions in specific regions, like forming just their highly refined skills, the airworthiness of our increasingly
in Wichita, Kan., where the OEM’s and and the need for additional support complex aviation fleet. And I encour-
the local community have invested in staff goes up as they work to keep the age maintenance providers to imple-
a new, technologically advanced cam- maintenance professionals supplied ment Lean methodologies of repair-
pus east of town. But now the employ- with parts, tools and material to do ing aircraft so that maintenance pro-
ers there are laying off much of their their jobs without interruption. fessionals can do the jobs they have
workforce. Our industry, especially The technician-centric focus of been trained to do.
aviation maintenance, is more than HVM may be the key to solving our Brian Finnegan is a contributing edi-
cyclical – it’s downright unstable. shortage issue while also instilling a tor, A&P mechanic, former president of
There is no denying that the avia- measure of stability. The issue with pay the Professional Aviation Maintenance
tion industry is evolving and the need is really not about a lack of value that Association and currently president of
for highly qualified technical profes- technicians provide. It is more about Finnegan Aviation LLC, a professional
sionals is growing. But it is a moving them not being productive throughout service organization.
AM
44 Aviation Maintenance | avmain-mag.com | Oct/Nov2009
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