CertifiedFlightInstructor

The work

Instructing is the most common first professional flying job, and it is a teaching job first. You are responsible for a student who will get things wrong at low altitude, and for knowing when to take the aircraft back. Most instructors say it is where they actually learned to fly.

A typical day

• 01Brief a lesson, fly it, and debrief against what was supposed to happen
• 02Judge when a student is safe to solo
• 03Sign records and recommendations that carry your name
• 04Fly several short lessons a day, in whatever the weather allows

How people get in

• Straight after commercial training

  The standard path. Add the instructor rating and start teaching.

How it unfolds

1. Month 1Instructor rating, then your first student, who will do something you did not expect on day two.
2. Year 1Several hundred hours, mostly circuits and general handling, and a lot of briefing.
3. Year 2Instrument or multi-engine instruction, which pays better and teaches you more.
4. NextMost move to an airline or a charter operator. Some stay, and become the reason a school is good.

Is there a job in it

The hard parts

It pays badly for the responsibility involved, and the responsibility is real: you are in an aircraft with somebody who will get it wrong, at low altitude, and you have to know when to take it back. The weather decides your income. Teaching the same lesson for the two hundredth time and still teaching it properly is the actual skill.

What you would need

• Teaching and patience
• Demonstrated handling accuracy
• Judgement about other people’s limits
• Record keeping