New Tech manager search ??............

[Guest Maj Millard]

Does anyone know if the recruitment process has been initiated for the position of new Tech manager. I believe it was decided earlier this year, and generally supported by all, that this was the way to go in finding suitable persons to fill the paid excutive positions ??.............. So that we get suitably qualified personal.

 

Mr Barnfield seems to be settling in, even though he has been put foward as only the 'acting' Techman...........in retrospect we must remember what steered us towards the above decisions, which was the way that past CEO Steve Tizzard achieved his position, as an 'in office' appointee ..........Maj...

 

 

[Keith Page]

Does anyone know if the recruitment process has been initiated for the position of new Tech manager. I believe it was decided earlier this year, and generally supported by all, that this was the way to go in finding suitable persons to fill the paid excutive positions ??.............. So that we get suitably qualified personal.Mr Barnfield seems to be settling in, even though he has been put foward as only the 'acting' Techman...........in retrospect we must remember what steered us towards the above decisions, which was the way that past CEO Steve Tizzard achieved his position, as an 'in office' appointee ..........Maj...

Oh! Maj.. I do remember the noise regarding the recruiting.

 

There was a unanimous decision made, use a recruiting agent and all would be fare and above board.

 

OR is this another job for the boys.

 

I hear the silence.

 

Regards

 

Keith Page.

 

 

[Guest Maj Millard]

I hear the silence also Keith....woof............Maj....

 

 

[Teckair]

I think we need the best person available for the job, if it is perceived to be a 'jobs for the boys' by some that is beside the point as long as we get the best person available for the job.

 

 

[Guest Maj Millard]

I think we need the best person available for the job, if it is perceived to be a 'jobs for the boys' by some that is beside the point as long as we get the best person available for the job.

But how do we know its the best person for the job if it isn't put out for recrutment !?...there may be ten others out there who are better...we've already been through this in the recent future, in lue of the disastersous ST affair, which was a job for the boys situation.

 

Outside recrutment was widely supported on this forum as being the only way to go, as you may recall, but now everyone has gone silent...which to me is the height of hypocrosy........Ya can't have your cake and eat it too folks !...........Maj...

 

 

[Guest Andys@coffs]

Anyone who tells you there is a guaranteed way to recruit people is in fact telling you they haven't really been involved in the recruitment process. There is no guaranteed recruitment process.

 

Maj, your ex RAAF , how many of the Apprentices or Adult trainee's that enetered your course were present at graduation? There were always people dropping by the wayside....If the defence forces haven't yet found a way to get a guaranteed goody then what makes anyone think any other organisation can?

 

The point about people fighting for a recruitment process was to me never about ensuring that long term right person was recruited everytime, but more about following processes that are transparent and repeatable and no body can look at the recruitment and wonder if there is something not right with it...

 

I'll be the first to say I expect the same recruitment process that meets good business practises to be performed as we look for a replacement for Wayne. Anything less than that is unacceptable. What's more its my expectation that even though we do that we may still end up with someone that is not appropriate because as Ive said anyone who guarantees a candidate is lying. Its why the major headhunting firms tend to offer a no fault no cost repeat process if you end up unhappy with a candidate they have supplied and you have paid for....

 

If we were to look at what happened last time and argue that something was wrong its that we recruited both the GM and his report TM at the same time. Ignoring the realities of time (and in reality we couldn't do that) we should have recruited the GM and then allowed him to be part of the recruitment panel for the TM in an ideal world which this wasnt......

 

Andy

 

 

[Teckair]

Trying to hire the right person can be extremely difficult and I am glad it is not my responsibility, it seems with Tech managers there have been problems of some sort for years. If this Barnfield guy has demonstrated he can do the job it would be very tempting to give him the job rather than risk an unknown alternative and another possible failure.

 

 

[Guest Andys@coffs]

Richard, If the current acting guy goes for the job and is best at it then wont he be selected in the process? if he isn't then there will be a reason?

 

I cant help but wonder if its a bit of a moot point...... If there isn't a huge pool to draw from....and most of the pool wouldn't wish the role on their worst enemy then.......

 

 

[Keith Page]

I hear the silence also Keith....woof............Maj....

Yes Maj.

 

I get that feeling in this case governance is related to hypocrisy. We all have heard good governance mentioned a couple of times.

 

The silence is ruined from an echo from a woof way in the distance and the cleanness of spring is interupted by the distinct odor of nepotism wofting by.

 

We all have been told a few times how good a recruitment firm is and it is the only way to go.

 

How I read some posts on this thread, it is now good, to change governance and move away from a recruitment organisation. That is:- Do it in house.

 

Only what I have seen on this post are hints and excuses to move away from governance and recruitment firms.

 

As I see the picture, as presented to me -- if the acting tech. manager is given the position with out going through due process to me that equates to poor governance and a blatant act of nepotism.

 

Regards

 

Keith Page.

 

 

[Teckair]

Richard, If the current acting guy goes for the job and is best at it then wont he be selected in the process? if he isn't then there will be a reason?I cant help but wonder if its a bit of a moot point...... If there isn't a huge pool to draw from....and most of the pool wouldn't wish the role on their worst enemy then.......

What ever process is involved I think if Mr Barnfield ends up with the job there will be dissension within the ranks, if a recruitment process is followed then some will say why bother when they were only going to give the job to him anyway it was all just a waste of money. I would hate to be on the board with this I think those guys are going to be damned if they do and damned if they don't. No wonder there is silence at the moment.

 

 

[Guest Andys@coffs]

Keith

 

I cant speak for others, but for myself I don't 100% advocate the use of a recruitment agency. An Agency is of use when you are seeking specific skills and don't necessarily know best where to look or advertise, or how to hook into a pool of potential employees. For example, assuming that clerical staff are abundant in Canberra I wouldn't generally advocate paying a company to find us one if we are capable of running a full recruitment process with external advertising and there was a plethora of candidates to look through and shortlist and then put before a selection panel under the guidance of a HR practitioner.

 

Last time however there was only the board, the majority of them remote to Canberra and the majority of them with a full time job elsewhere. In that circumstance with a target audience that is small, and with no in-house HR skills I think the use of a recruitment agency was appropriate then, and more than likely appropriate again, however with the GM in place he may well choose to recruit in house, and I'm Ok with that as long as he follows a clear process and can at the end justify why the selection board chose as they did.

 

If the GM chooses to take it on himself he will be avoiding a head-hunters fee, but at the same time he will require to put in a fair amount of effort himself, where in my opinion he doesn't have a whole bunch of spare management time available......If I were the GM I'd recruit again through the head-hunter and would hopefully be taking advantage of their no fault no cost redo....assuming such an offer was in the original agreement we signed with them and it hasn't expired due elapsed time.....

 

Andy

 

 

[Keith Page]

Hi Andy

 

What I interpret from you upper post (11) .

 

It is now OK to not use a recruiting organisation, previous you went on telling us all of which is the only way, where is the consistancey? and I am not going to dig through previous posts to find them in what ever thread those posts were paced I have not got spare time.

 

Regards

 

Keith Page.

 

 

[Guest Andys@coffs]

Well Keith using the thread search tools is pretty easy and I went and looked for all posts made by me that had the word recruitment in them.... I couldn't find any that were even close to suggesting we absolutely must use a recruitment firm at all times under all circumstances....In fact I could find one where I specified that we must use a recruitment firm full stop..

 

I did find this which is pertinent http://www.recreationalflying.com/posts/280090/

 

And perhaps not so great I found this as well http://www.recreationalflying.com/threads/new-gm-announced-via-twitter.59146/#post-280067 which is all the more poignant because of the first link which is in the same thread. We mustn't forget the human tragedy here....

 

Andy

 

P.S when I said we could do it ourselves I was pretty clear as to what that entailed its not and cannot ever be a "do what ever feels good at the time"

 

".....running a full recruitment process with external advertising and there was a plethora of candidates to look through and shortlist and then put before a selection panel under the guidance of a HR practitioner"

 

 

[turboplanner]

which is all the more poignant

...and stunning when you look at someone's prior history.....

 

 

[Guest Crezzi]

In my experience of new hires not being kept on at the end of their probationary period, the company first reviews the other applicants for the original vacancy.

 

Only if none of these are suitable or available (or if the role has changed significantly) is the recruitment process restarted.

 

Cheers

 

John

 

 

[Guest Maj Millard]

Due process folks, this is what the big discussions were about previously, which is why we went to the headhunter in the first place.

 

And consistancy, .....you were all in favour of that, but now a are sounding very wishy washy once again. If this guy gets the job 'in house' without consideration of other suitably qualified individuals being duly considered, I for one will be shouting 'jobs for the boys'...and reminding you all of the ST debacle all over again...........due process ?...not impressed...........Maj...

 

 

[Guest Andys@coffs]

Then I'm obviously not great at getting my ideas across....I too only want due process and an outcome that if the same circumstances were to apply but a different recruitment team were involved would generally still deliver the same outcome.

 

Please do not read anything I've said to be support for an in-house appointment without a transparent and repeatable recruitment process being applied.

 

Andy

 

 

[Head in the clouds]

I quite agree with the due process thing but I think it's possible we may be jumping to conclusions prematurely here.

 

As some of you know I am working on the development of a kit of the biplane shown as my avatar and I needed a fair bit of info from the Tech Manager about what requirements there were, if any, for kit data packages to be submitted before kits could be offered on the market. From my own reading I determined that they are still required for a 95.10 kit but I couldn't find anything about data packages for 95.55 kits and I know for certain that a DP had to be put in previously for 95.25 and similar aircraft.

 

So - I eventually was able to speak with Wayne and whilst he was very pleasant he didn't have any idea what I was talking about (which I found a bit surprising for the TM) and he suggested I call Darren Barnfield who was providing Tech assistance at the time apparently.

 

Darren knew everything, and a hell of a lot more, it was one of the more enjoyable phone conversations I have had, believe me he is a very knowledgeable man where TM issues are concerned, and probably in a lot of other areas too.

 

When I spoke to one of the Regional Reps next I asked why we had a TM that didn't seem to know anything much about the TM subject and we have a bloke on the outside giving assistance who, in my opinion then, should have been given the job instead.

 

Later it was explained to me off-forum that Wayne was very suited to the TM job but it wasn't at all surprising he didn't know the answers to my very narrow questions since Wayne's background was/is military and he's from USA.

 

The Rep answered my question about Darren saying that we should be so lucky as to be able to have him on the team full-time but he's retired and a top bloke and helping out but doesn't want a full-time position.

 

Now I don't know that any or all of this is 100% correct but let's just find out what really is the go before we lose what is quite probably Darren being a good Samaritan and helping out while we're in a fix. Has anyone actually phoned their Rep and asked what's being done about advertising the vacancy?

 

 

[dazza 38]

After what has happen to the last 3 Tech men, I am surprised that anybody would actually put there hands up for the job.

 

 

[Guest Maj Millard]

Has anyone actually phoned their Rep and asked what's being done about advertising the vacancy?

 

Well we don't currently have a rep in NQ, so instead I have sent an Email of enquiry to the GM.........Maj...

 

 

[Teckair]

Has anyone actually phoned their Rep and asked what's being done about advertising the vacancy?

Yes I have, I was told it would be blessing if Darren would take the job on and a good day for RAAus and not at all a case of jobs for the boys, not that I got very far with convincing some on this thread of that. As HITC has said he does not want the job and we are lucky he is helping out, apparently one of the off putting aspects of the job is the requirement to reside in Canberra which I can understand.

 

 

[Guest Maj Millard]

I'm sure Darren is Probabily ok, however as drummed into us not that far back........we have to follow due process !..suddenly everybody who was crowing about it, has now very conveniently fogotten about it !...............Maj...

 

 

[frank marriott]

Another way to look at it is - elect a board to run the show for 12 months and give them a go and not try to micro manage from home on a computer.

 

Not that is is likely but if I was on the board I would give some people certain advice, which would probably result in another EGM.

 

 

[Spriteah]

Fellow Members. This was sent to the board by Ross at 1108hrs today:

 

Hi Mark,

 

Could you please advise if the vacant position of Tech Manager has

 

been advertised through a recruitment agency, or is there an intention to do so.

 

I am under the impression that this was decided to be the future normal course in filling a vacant paid excutive position, in view of past inadequecies in filling positions from 'in house', in particular with respect to the experience with your predecessor.

 

Your current position was filled by going through the recrutment process, as you would be aware, and appears to be working suitably at this point.

 

Looking foward to your reply...............Regards Ross Millard. 010233

 

Sent from my iPad

 

I replied the following at 1206hrs today:

 

Ross,

 

I am unsure as to if Mark has responded however I will provide you with what I know. The position has not been advertised. It will be in the future, when I cannot say. How it is filled will be up to Mark.

 

Regards,

 

Jim Tatlock.

 

This is obviously an operational matter and will be left to the General Manager to action when he see's fit. My personal belief is it should be advertised and I hope that will occur. When is more a matter of what is the best timing. Currently we are receiving excellent service from Darren in the role as a temporary appointment.

 

Regards and Safe flying,

 

Jim Tatlock

 

Vic State Rep...

 

 

[Keith Page]

:yes:Well?

 

This search for a new tech. manager has generated some noise.

 

As I see the situation if Mr. Barnfield walks into the position unopposed, to me that equates to "A job for the boys". ----- "Nepotism?"----

 

That situation equates to exactly the same bun fight as Myles with the STCC developing the SMS, now look at the noise that generated.

 

Myles is a bit special he was instrumental in developing the SMS for the local governments and the (electrical commision or what ever it was named then)

 

to me that indicated he was the best man for the task, the noise that generated saying that was not done through due process, the noise then and the silence now.

 

I do ask what is different to then and now?

 

Regards

 

Keith Page.