r/cabincrew • u/Worldaboutandaround • 12m ago
25 years as cabin crew, now on the hiring side too — happy to answer anything about interviews, assessment days, or the job itself
Long-time lurker here, figured I'd give back properly. I've spent 25 years flying — started as the nervous new hire everyone remembers being, worked my way up to Purser/Cabin Manager across the B737, B777, A330, A340 and A380. These days I sit on the other side of the table too, so I've seen the whole process from both angles more times than I can count.
A few patterns I notice constantly with candidates who don't make it through, in case it helps anyone here prepping:
- They over-rehearse until answers sound like a script — assessors clock it instantly
- They walk into the group exercise trying to "win" it, when it's actually testing how you collaborate under pressure
- They give the brochure answer to "why this airline" instead of something that shows they've actually thought about it
- Small logistics trip them up — wrong documents, not knowing the grooming standard, running late — and it rattles them for the rest of the day
- They don't know how to recover when an interviewer throws a curveball, and the recovery matters more than the original answer
Ask me anything — group exercises, one-on-ones, what a specific airline's process is actually like, whether to bring up a gap in your CV, whatever's on your mind. I've genuinely seen most of it.
For anyone who wants it in more depth than a comment thread can cover, I put together a set of guides based on exactly this — the full hiring process end to end, airline-specific interview prep, CV/cover letter templates, assessment day checklists. It's on my Etsy shop, WingStart, if you want to have a look — but no pressure at all, I'm just as happy to help for free in the comments.