Airline jobs have always been hot commodities, but now carriers can’t get enough workers

Southwest Airlines never had problems recruiting, because good salaries, hefty bonuses, flight discounts and regular awards as one of the best places to work in the country were always enough.

But now Greg Muccio and the Dallas-based airline’s recruiting team are working harder to find good applicants and make sure they keep them when those applications come in.

“After 24 hours of silence with a candidate, they will assume they are no longer a candidate and move on,” said Muccio, Southwest’s director of talent acquisition. “Basically, you will hear from my team at 3:30 pm every day, even if to tell you that there is no news, but you are still in the race.”

Once among the country’s most sought-after employers, the airlines are suddenly struggling to find workforce while at the same time needing thousands of new employees to keep up with the new realities of travel. Despite ups and downs, the jobs are among the most stable and fluctuation is low, thanks to the predominantly unionized workforce, which regularly guarantees salary increases and adjustments to the cost of living.

In March 2020, Southwest employees took home an average of $ 11,190 in profit-sharing rewards, although there were no bonuses the next year due to the heavy losses caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. The average worker in the Southwest had average pay of more than $ 101,000 in 2019, including salary and benefits.

But oh how things have changed in 18 months. Across the travel industry, airlines are competing fiercely for new talent after laying off workers in the first year of the pandemic.

Southwest Airlines is in the middle of a hiring spurt to add 5,200 new employees through November, which hopefully will give some relief to tired employees before the holiday season. American Airlines, based in Fort Worth, has approximately 4,000 positions open across the company, in addition to a long-term need to hire thousands of pilots in the years to come to keep up with retirement.

An applicant receives help applying for a job at Envoy Airlines in Irving during a recent job fair.

(Lawrence Jenkins / special article)

Delta hires 3,000 flight attendants and JetBlue needs 2,500 flight attendants. In an industry where convincing friends to work with you was never difficult, airlines have turned to recruitment bonuses ranging from $ 300 to $ 500.

Airlines are among the largest employers in North Texas, with 30,000 employees at American Airlines and 10,800 at Southwest, including thousands more who work at airports or for one of the dozen other airlines here.

“I don’t think a year ago anyone could have guessed that we were looking for so many people here,” said Thomas Rajan, American Airlines’ vice president of global talent and total rewards. “In a way, that’s a good problem. But it’s more difficult. “

It’s a problem, especially for airlines, which had big problems this summer when the travel season got bumpy and there weren’t enough additional pilots, flight attendants, and other staff to keep operations running smoothly.

Both American and Southwest went through long routes with hundreds of cancellations due to pilots and flight attendants out of position and out of hours after weather events.

Following complaints from union leaders, both American and Southwest said they would cut flight schedules in the fall.

“These schedule changes are designed to relieve you of the staffing challenges we are currently facing and provide our customers with a more reliable travel experience,” Southwest CEO Gary Kelly said in a statement to employees in late August after reducing flights on October and November schedules .

“In terms of staffing, we are planning our staffing for the remainder of the year, relying less on staffing models based on historical trends and continuing our hiring focus to support our future growth.”

Luggage trolleys travel on the tarmac near American Airlines aircraft in front of the gates of Terminal C at DFW International Airport.(Smiley N. Pool / Employee Photographer)

Workers may be reluctant to apply for airline jobs for the same reason they don’t flock to retail outlets and restaurants, aviation consultant George Hamlin said.

“Some people are right to be concerned about going out in the world and getting COVID,” Hamlin said. “If one of your perks is free travel, there are just not that many people who want that perk right now.”

But getting these new employees on board and into the airports will be critical to vacation travel season, a busy time that almost every airline employee must work.

“Airlines have essentially two months, but who knows what will happen to the virus by then?” He said.

Southwest’s greatest need for frontline labor is in airports and call centers, Muccio said. These are essentially the same workforce that is hard to find for restaurants, retailers, and other customer service jobs where bottlenecks are rampant.

Southwest raised its minimum wage to $ 15 an hour this summer to attract front-line workers and even behind-the-scenes workers, such as ramp agents who help load baggage onto planes.

“There’s a really big group, over 9 million people, who just haven’t got back into the job, and that’s really hard for people who work hourly,” said Muccio. “But there are also challenges on the professional side, and the challenge is that some companies have a high internal turnover and people don’t stay that long.”

Southwest Airlines is still getting a lot of applicants for jobs, Muccio said. But where before the pandemic 28 applications were received for each job posting, there are now 14. And often the list has already shrunk by the time these applications are examined and contact is made.

Southwest and other companies actively hire mechanics – jobs that are essential during peak travel times.

Emilee Mayfield, who works with recruiting firm HSGI Inc., said skilled mechanics receive sign-up bonuses, higher salaries, and even paid housing to move to new businesses or take on short-term contract jobs.

“There’s a desperate hunt for mechanics,” Mayfield said. “People still want to work for airlines, but there is a lot of demand right now.”

For the first time in more than a decade, aviation recruiter Sharon Ballgae said she had received a request from a major regional airline to help locate pilots. It’s a rare request as airlines usually have their own large recruiting departments that draw from flight schools and military bases for pilots.

Ballgae said airlines have long known that new pilots are needed. American Airlines will have more than 7,000 pilots retiring between 2021 and 2030 due to mandatory age limits set by the Federal Aviation Administration. There is also growing demand from overseas startup airlines that require skilled pilots.

American lost an additional 1,000 pilots to early retirements during the pandemic, accelerating the need for employment as passenger demand picks up.

“There have been ups and downs for the flight crews,” said Ballgae. “Some people don’t want to deal with what’s happening on a plane now when you have to take personal defense courses to deal with people who get upset about masks.”

Pay for pilots moving from airlines to corporate jobs or charter services has also skyrocketed, from about $ 125,000 a decade ago to more than $ 175,000, Ballgae said.

But not all positions are difficult to fill. Flight attendant jobs are still attracting a lot of interest, said Rajan of American Airlines. Perhaps that’s because of frequent trips and the ability to set convenient schedules.

American Airlines opened the hiring to 1,000 flight attendant jobs and received more than 27,000 applications. Southwest has sparked similar interest in the first new class of flight attendants hired since the pandemic. Both airlines have reduced the number of flight attendants on staff through voluntary buyouts during the pandemic.

“It’s still kind of a glamor position,” said Muccio.

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