Manager – Flight Planning Standards & Delivery

Job Details

Salary: Competitive

Hours: 37.5hrs

Location: The VHQ, Crawley

Contract: Permanent

Closing Date: Sunday 26th February 2023 (We anticipate holding interviews mid March)

Many of our staff at Virgin work flexibly and in many different ways, different core hours or remote working. Please talk to us at your application or interview stage about the flexibility you need. We can't promise to give you exactly what you want, but we are happy to explore what's possible for the role.

In a nutshell

As Manager – Flight Planning Standards & Delivery, you will effectively lead the Flight Planning team (Duty Managers and Flight Planners), ensuring all policies, procedures and regulatory standards are met; to deliver the flying programme safely, compliantly and on-time.

You will provide leadership across the Flight Planning team, building a culture of excellence, continuous improvement, whilst maintaining team engagement and personal development opportunities.

You’ll work collaboratively with external industry partners, including national and international regulatory authorities, to ensure practices and systems in the field evolve to match standard process.

Day to day

Flight Planning Technical

• Ensuring that CAE FPM is configured to generate the most optimum Flight Planning results, includes system data management (fuel prices/route catalogue, etc.)

• In collaboration with Manager – Aeronautical Services & ATM (M-ASATM), maintain a thorough understanding of system capability and continued assessment of future functionality v business benefits.

• Responsibility for the production and control of all Flight Planning documentation,

• Support the M-ASATM with project management and delivery of Flight Planning system software and architecture upgrades, including validation testing, as required.

• Maintaining awareness of, and steer industry developments and regulatory changes, through partner engagement, which enable VAA Flight Ops to both innovate remain compliant in the medium term.

People Management & Leadership

• Direct line management responsibility for our Duty Manager - Flight Planning teams, as well as indirect management of the Specialist – Flight Planners

• Actively engage with OCC community and wider business to support and deliver the flying programme, safely, compliantly and on time

• Demonstrate a strong understanding of VAA’s strategy and actively promote and translate this into meaningful objectives for collaborators across the OCC

• Improve performance standards by providing feedback, coaching and development initiatives

• Responsible for Quality Assurance of Flight Planning, including auditing by IOSA, QA and administration of VAA’s Self Audit Program (SAP).

Flight Planning Training

• Responsible for design, delivery, and continuous improvement of, all Flight Planning training material, including ab initio and annual recurrent

Aeronautical Services Support and Liaison

• Provide support to the Aeronautical Services team handling business requests that have a Flight Planning requirement

About you

If you are a flight planning professional, with experience in leading teams and a strong systems knowledge, we think you’d love this role! If you have the following skills and experience, please get in touch, we’d love to hear from you!

• Experience of Leading a technical team

• Significant Flight Planning experience, ideally in a long-haul, ETOPS environment

• Experience using CAE/Sabre FPM flight planning system (highly desirable)

• Experience of creating/delivering training material covering a technically complex subject matter

• Experience of forming and maintaining working relationships across professional and operational boundaries

Be yourself – Our differences make us stronger

Our customers come from all walks of life and so do our colleagues. That’s why we’re proud to be an equal opportunity employer, and actively encourage applications from all backgrounds. At Virgin Atlantic we believe everyone can take on the world - no matter your age, gender, gender identity, gender expression, ethnicity, sexual orientation, disabilities, religion, or beliefs. We celebrate difference, and everything that makes our colleagues unique, by upholding an inclusive environment in which we can all thrive. So that everyone at Virgin Atlantic can be themselves and know they belong.

To make your journey with us accessible, and individual to you, we encourage you to let us know if you’d like a little extra help with your application, or if you have any individual requirements at any stage along your recruitment journey. We are here to support you, so please reach out to our team, (Recruitment@fly.virgin.com) feeling confident that we’ve got your individual considerations covered.

You'll be assessed against our values for a selection of your interview process, learn more about them here: Our Values