#190 More Than Pilots: 1.5 Million Aviation Jobs Ahead with René Banglesdorf Transcript

THIS IS AN AUTOMATED TRANSCRIPT… PLEASE FORGIVE THE TYPOS & GRAMMAR! xo-Lisa.

René Banglesdorf  00:00

It’s really interesting to look at Aviation as a career, because safety is so important in the culture of every single company that I’ve been around, and the amount of training that goes into making sure that people know what they’re doing flight attendant training is pretty intense. Pilot Training is intense, mechanic training is intense, quality assurance training is intense. And there’s a lot of redundancy that goes into all of the things around aviation. So yes, if you’re adventure minded, that’s amazing. If you’re process oriented and quality and safety minded, there are a lot of jobs for you in aviation as well.

 

Lisa Marker-Robbins  00:57

Is your teen or 20 something curious about aviation, but unsure where they might fit beyond becoming a pilot. With over 1.5 million new aviation jobs expected in the next decade and a wave of retirements on the horizon, this is a booming industry that goes far beyond the cockpit, from mechanics and meteorologists to safety officers and drone specialists. There’s a vast array of exciting careers, many of which don’t require a four year degree. My friend and guest, Renee bengelsdorf knows this firsthand with over two decades in the industry, from private jet sales to serving on the FAA Women in Aviation advisory board. She’s now launching her podcast, fly Girl’s Guide to aviation careers, and coming soon, a free, virtual career fair to help more students and especially women, soar into aviation careers. In our conversation, Renee and I dig into the expanding opportunities, the surprising skills and passions that align with different aviation roles and what families can do now to explore these possibilities early without committing to a costly college path, whether your young person is wired for adventure, detail oriented processes or hands on technical work, this episode will open your eyes to how aviation might be a fit. I’m Lisa marker Robbins, and I want to welcome you to College and Career Clarity a flourish coaching production, let’s dive right into a great conversation.

 

Lisa Marker-Robbins  02:32

Renee bengelsdorf, my friend and I truly mean my friend. For those that don’t personally know, both of us, welcome to the show. Oh

 

René Banglesdorf  02:41

my gosh, Lisa, I can I’ve been looking forward to this for weeks. I cannot wait to talk about your favorite subject and mine together.

 

Lisa Marker-Robbins  02:52

I know we cooked this idea up all the way back in April, I think. And here we are, aviation close up. So let’s talk a little bit about your background in aviation and why you are the perfect guest to talk about careers in aviation.

 

René Banglesdorf  03:11

Oh my goodness, I’ve been in aviation for 22 years, first as a marketer and then as a person who ran a company’s buying and selling private jets all over the world. I’ve been on a couple of software boards. I’ve served on an FAA board looking at why there are so few women in aviation and aerospace. I’ve done coaching in aviation companies and spoken and written and hosted podcasts, and I have my pilot’s license, so, you know, that makes everyone an expert, right?

 

Lisa Marker-Robbins  03:44

Yeah, absolutely. I remember when you were getting that pilot’s license, that private pilot’s license, and it was grueling.

 

René Banglesdorf  03:54

Yeah, I did it in a really unusual fashion. I had a dedicated airplane and a dedicated instructor, and I got my pilot’s license in 28 days. It takes most people six to nine months. So it was immersive,

 

Lisa Marker-Robbins  04:08

amazing. Okay, before we get into like, all the career potential in aviation, I have a question for you, because I think as as we’ve talked over the years, with all the different things that you’ve done in aviation. One of the things that I have loved the most is this. It was the FAA women and aviation Advisory Board, where you guys really dug into why are there so few women I you know, we just did a podcast episode in July that was about how to support STEM interested students, so they will females, so that they will persist, and how to find the right college settings for them to set them up for success. Which makes me curious, as females and we want to set females up for success. Were there any aha moments? Or things that came out of that time on the advisory board.

 

René Banglesdorf  05:03

There were a lot of findings that we had, and a lot of aha moments on that, but one of the things that we discovered is that women don’t choose a career in aviation because it’s STEM related. Women choose a career in aviation, either for the challenge of it or the adventure of it. They love travel. They’re a little bit of a risk taker. They’re a little bit of a like, hey, I want to do something outside of the box or outside of the norm. And so women approach aviation from a oh, this could be amazing. Not Oh, this is how I apply my interest in science and technology. So that was one of the things. Like, we’ve been marketing it wrong for a really long time.

 

Lisa Marker-Robbins  05:54

That’s so interesting. Okay, well, that, I mean, that’s just helpful for me as a career coach to know for when I’m curating those conversations and and when I sense that a student that we’re working with has that sense of adventure, so I love it, great. Okay,

 

René Banglesdorf  06:12

so then, but then other findings with that were no women don’t think about it early enough. You know, we need to talk about it earlier in a young woman’s life that a career in aviation is possible. Sometimes it’s a barrier discrimination, someone who maybe a parent or an uncle who’s like, yeah, that’s not for girls, when really it can be, and sometimes it’s it’s a financial burden, and then other times, it’s really about what the lifestyle does to perhaps what seems like a conflicting desire to have kids and raise a family. And so there are lots of barriers, and there are also lots of ways around them, so plenty of jobs in aviation that don’t require you to be gone every night. Well,

 

Lisa Marker-Robbins  07:09

okay, so let’s start talking about that. Because when you said, well, we should tell everybody you’re going to do a virtual career career fair for careers in aviation, which we will link to in the show notes, but that’ll be@flourishcoachingco.com forward slash aviation, where you can learn more. But you’re doing that, you’re going to pour yourself into. You’ve got your podcast, a fly Girl’s Guide to aviation careers. You’re doing a career fair about aviation, because, as you were explaining to me, this is ripe for opportunity for people who want really great careers, because you’ve got some compelling stats, so share with us, like, what’s going to be happening in the next I don’t know. Is it five years, 10 years, in aviation that gives so much opportunity

 

René Banglesdorf  08:02

for sure? Well, if we start thinking about just the big story of aviation, we’re starting to see a massive increase in the number of drones. So these happen in the same airspace that airplanes are flying in, and we’re also seeing a big growth in commercial space applications. In fact, we added a branch to the US military, the Space Force. So their careers, lots of careers in aviation that are coming up. But just the demand for what we consider aviation, which is airplanes and helicopters, is growing tremendously. There are probably 30 or 40% more airplanes in the air today than there were 15 or 20 years ago, and that’s continuing to increase, which means we need more pilots. We need more mechanics. We need more air traffic controllers. We need more engineers. We need more flight attendants. And the numbers that I’m seeing for the careers that are going to be needed to be added is 1.5 million in the next 10 years. Then when you take into consideration the number of people that are retiring, it’s staggering. So I read a stat in a study by CAE a couple of weeks ago that 20% of airline pilots will retire in the next five to 10 years. 80% of aviation mechanics will retire in the next 10 years, which means we need to have a massive knowledge transfer. As an aviation mechanic, you can make a lot of money. So

 

Lisa Marker-Robbins  09:52

yeah, well, do you know offhand about how much they make? Most

 

René Banglesdorf  09:57

aviation mechanics that I know are making. 70 or $80,000 starting out and then making well into the six figures, like other trades are. Now,

 

Lisa Marker-Robbins  10:08

I was gonna say that you should point out the fact that that is without investing in a four year college degree, because it’s a, it’s an associate’s degree, it’s a, it’s really, it’s a trade. It’s a hands on, you know, it’s interesting. And when we’re teaching students how to research, do the online research part of career development, career advising, before they even go out and curate experiences, one of the resources we give them is the Occupational Outlook Handbook that the Department of Labor, through the Bureau of Labor and Statistics has and they categorized jobs as like, does it have average growth? You know, is it a decline? Is it below average? Is it growing? Or is it like exponentially growing? Clearly, this is a field that is exponential growth, which you don’t want to always just go after the thing that’s growing if it doesn’t align and fit with who you are, but so many opportunities, so I love that. So because of it sounds like emerging fields growth and retirement is why this kind of is poised to really open up,

 

René Banglesdorf  11:20

right? And demand increased demand for travel. I mean, I think more and more people are traveling. That’s why airplanes are or airlines are buying more airplanes. And it is a growing field in every capacity right now.

 

Lisa Marker-Robbins  11:38

So would do you then place the drone work within like what you talk about, as far as career fields in aviation, does that? I do.

 

René Banglesdorf  11:49

I mean, there are so many different things, because we’re seeing drones be used in some rural areas to deliver packages. One of my friends has been working on the patents and the legality for certification of that we’re seeing Walmart deliver packages by drone. Eventually, we’re going to see some passenger drone activity going on. And there’s a lot to do with regulation and pioneering a new field there that’s really exciting, and I think we’re going to see a lot of additional jobs created out of that. And yes, I would include that because it operates in the same airspace and and require some of the same skills, which I think are really interesting and exciting. There’s no way you can get bored at an aviation

 

Lisa Marker-Robbins  12:42

but, you know, I have a previous podcast episode that we’ll put in the show notes. Because if somebody says, you know, my kid wants to be a pilot and go get the four year degree on the professional pilot’s license to do that pathway, we already did an episode on that. So that is episode 130 so flourish coaching, co.com forward slash, 130s Penny lens and Meyer, who’s an independent educational consultant, she specializes in that pathway. That is, I think, what most people think about when they think about careers in aviation. So you mentioned some others. Let’s kind of back up. Because one of the things Penny said, as in, for you, somebody who got your pilot’s license, she said, make sure you’ve got the stomach for it. You know, you made the point where, like girls sometimes are missing out because they don’t start the exploration side of it early enough. And she stressed early preparation, early exploration. And she just said, go up and do a flight in a small private plane to make sure you have the stomach for it, for sure. So if somebody’s like, I’m obsessed with aviation, and I did that test flight, and I don’t think I could do the actual be a pilot fly a plane. Let’s start talking about other jobs that would be in the aviation industry. Then,

 

René Banglesdorf  14:07

oh my goodness, there’s so many of them. So we’ll start kind of around that. We’ve already mentioned an aircraft mechanic, and so you’d be around to aircraft all of the time, sometimes working on the small ones, sometimes working on the really big stuff.

 

Lisa Marker-Robbins  14:27

I have a question, and I don’t know if you know this part yet, but like, if somebody says, Oh, I think I might like the aviation mechanic piece. What I know there’s like here in Cincinnati at one of our regional campuses for the University of Cincinnati, they have a two year program to become an aviation mechanic. If would somebody always start out on a small plane and then, like, if they said, oh, I want to eventually work for, I don’t know, delta and, you know, work. The jets like, is the educational pathway different? Or is it more about, like, getting work experience too? If you aspire to something

 

René Banglesdorf  15:08

bigger, the educational pathway is the same, because you have to be a certified aircraft mechanic. Okay? So it’s an an aviation and power plant. So you’re looking at the same the same certification in order to be a mechanic. So everyone starts out in either a small airplane or a small helicopter with a single engine to get their pilot’s license, same thing you’re looking at basic aerodynamics when you’re becoming a mechanic. So you kind of start in the same place, but then you get hired on and are working on very different equipment over time. And in fact, one of the one of the pathways I’m a little bit embarrassed to say this, Lisa, but Disney hires a lot of aircraft mechanics because they have a great basis for understanding how rides work, because they understand how I love playing that. So there are lots of different things you could do with it, right? But you start with the basics. How does an engine work? How do avionics work? What’s the electrical wiring that goes on with this so very basic foundation?

 

Lisa Marker-Robbins  16:34

That’s so interesting me, because I love looking at careers. When we teach researching careers. I always say, like, research the the careers that you’re interested in, but then do some research on the ones that are adjacent. So that design of rides like, that’s really neat. Okay, I like it. Okay, so we’ve got pilots, we’ve got mechanics. Yeah, gone

 

René Banglesdorf  17:02

vital, absolutely vital to the National Airspace System in the United States, which is by far the most used and sophisticated Airspace System in the world, are air traffic controllers, and they do everything from giving permission to land and spacing airplanes out to as I experienced last week when I was flying, the air traffic controller said, Hey, if you continue on the heading that you’re on, you’re going to hit some precipitation. And I was like, what heading would you recommend so that I can get around that cell of weather. So when there are big thunderstorm systems going on, they’re redirecting traffic, if you will, to keep the passengers in a comfortable environment when they’re flying and to keep the airplanes safe. So lots and lots of kudos to those air traffic controllers that keep us safe, but there are meteorologists that that specialize in aviation, because they’re looking not just at what’s going on on the ground, but what’s going on at 50 or 80,000 feet that we need to know about to fly safely. There are, well,

 

Lisa Marker-Robbins  18:17

I was gonna say that’s so interesting, because we I had a student that I was working with. He ended up going to Virginia Tech to study atmospheric science. And so many students, when they’re thinking about, what am I going to do for a career? And they’re thinking about like meteorology at all, they’re just thinking about the person they see on TV, not everything that you’re doing to study weather patterns and and all of that. So I love like, there’s that adjacent space again, right? So maybe, if you already were thinking about atmospheric science, and then you could consider, okay, well, maybe air traffic control, because I erroneously would think like, oh yeah, they’re just concerned about, are these two planes going to hit each other? Do we have the airspace for that? You know? Are we ready for them to land? Do they need to circle for a while? But like you said, hey, they are helping me on a small plane even avoid weather. Yeah,

 

René Banglesdorf  19:17

you know, we we see flight attendants, and we see customer service reps, and we see ground handling personnel when we travel. But there are some crazy things that go on in general aviation as well. One of the guests on my podcast does business development for a company that transports organs for transplant recipients. So about 30% of the organ transplants in the United States arrive by air, and so it is a quick turn charter in order to get a organ to, you know, a couple states away. To save someone’s life, and sometimes a surgeon that’s going with that organ to be able to do that. So there’s some of that. I’ve done all sorts of disaster relief work with airplanes. I have a friend who’s done some helicopter herding in South Africa. I think she’s going to be on my podcast as well, to kind of flush large game out of the bush so that they can be tranquilized and moved to thin auto population in one game park to another one. There’s all sorts of really neat applications for aviation that we don’t think about. You know,

 

Lisa Marker-Robbins  20:40

one of the so go back to the friend with the transplant piece. So what is her role like? Obviously, there’s the pilot of the helicopter or the plane, and there’s the team that flies with the organ, and possibly the surgeon. So, but what is she doing?

 

René Banglesdorf  20:55

So she’s doing a number of things. One, she is signing up new aircraft to be on their charter certificate. She’s helping to hire pilots who have the right personality to be doing that kind of work. And then they’re they’re overall, looking at in their organization, their their safety officer is doing something really different with the way that the airplanes operated, because the equipment that goes on the airplane has certain requirements. So maybe the turns are a little bit less steep to keep that right working in exactly the right position that it needs to be kept in. Maybe they have to operate at a different temperature inside the aircraft. So cat does business development. But then there’s also a safety officer that’s looking at the specific operations

 

Lisa Marker-Robbins  21:52

for that. What I love about that is I often get students, teens and and early 20s, somethings that we’re working with, and who have, like, a heart to know, I hear a lot with this generation about, like, I want to know I’m having impact, positive impact, and that that is the heartbeat a lot of a lot of them, but they’re like, I don’t want to be a teacher. Like, right away their mind goes to, like, social work, or teaching or something like that. But I’m like, you could be, I’ve often said you could be an accountant for a non profit like you. You’re a math wizard, and you enjoy accounting. But what if the work that you’re doing, they need all those roles fulfilled? Can you can know, like without the without the accountants, the American Heart Association, can’t go out and do the good work that they’re doing. So I love this example. That’s why I kind of hopped on that one when you introduced it. Because I’m like, I think that this generation, I know I can from working with them and working with 1000s of kiddos. And when I say kiddos, I mean teens and 20s and so don’t be offended if you’re a kiddo listening to this, but if you’re in that age group and you really have a heart to give back, it doesn’t have to be in the way that we have it boxed in in our mind. So we’re thinking outside the box.

 

René Banglesdorf  23:17

And a great example of that is my daughter. She got her pilot’s license. She does not want to be an airline pilot, and the thing that she does with her pilot’s license is she does ground school and operates a simulator for a specific type of airplane training pilots every single day how to respond in emergencies. So she’s increasing safety. She’s making learning fun. She’s helping people hone their skills so that they can be safer pilots. And she works with a lot of DPS agents here in the state of Texas. I probably shouldn’t say this, but I think she’s their favorite instructor, because she jokes around with them, but they will take the simulator to pretty extreme conditions so that they know that they’re flying safe when they’re out doing rescues or out doing surveillance or doing whatever else they need to do in their line of work as first responders. So it’s an impact that’s maybe not direct, it’s maybe not daily, but it’s an impact on the overall safety of our National Airspace System and the citizens that live in this country.

 

Lisa Marker-Robbins  24:39

I love that we It makes me think years ago. I think it was probably 2019 my husband, I were visiting. We had found his birth family, and I know you know a little bit about our story with that. And his uncle lives in Abilene, and his cousin is married to a former b1 pilot. Yeah. And we went in the simulator. And as somebody who would never have been like, Ooh, I want to go into a simulator, it was the coolest thing. And right after my husband went subterranean and crashed the b1 simulator and the computer needed to be reset, the real pilots were coming in for their training, and I was shocked by the fact our cousin’s husband told us those pilots do 100 classroom hours before they can ever step into the simulator, and then they do another 100 hours in the simulator. So this is not for the faint of heart. I mean, we’re not just talking about, like, Oh, this is like, video games. Go play fun, even with, like, what your daughter’s doing. I know they’re not B ones, but it’s serious work.

 

René Banglesdorf  25:49

It is. And, you know, we we see the news stories about airplanes that crash, and it’s, it’s heart wrenching, but the reason that they’re news stories is because it so rarely happens. And it’s really interesting to look at Aviation as a career, because safety is so important in the culture of every single company that I’ve been around, and the amount of training that goes into making sure that people know what they’re doing. Flight Attendant training is pretty intense. Pilot Training is intense. Mechanic training is intense, quality assurance training is intense. And there’s a lot of redundancy that goes into all of the things around aviation. So yes, if you’re adventure minded, that’s amazing. If you’re process oriented and quality and safety minded, there are a lot of jobs for you in aviation as well. So it makes

 

Lisa Marker-Robbins  26:55

me wonder when you say that there’s this attention to detail there is, I mean, it sounds like there’s some rote stuff as well. We’ve talked a lot about opportunities, and I love that we’ve hit some really different aviation fields that I would not have thought of, which I’m I’m going to go to your virtual career fair when you have it. I hope I get I can go. And so we’ve talked about, like, who it might be a fit for and why there’s great opportunity. When you think about aviation careers, is there a personality style, or something that you think about or or maybe even limitations where you’re like, it may not be a fit for you. If Is there anything that comes to mind when I kind of tee that up,

 

René Banglesdorf  27:45

no, one of the things that I notice about people who are successful in aviation is that they’re passionate about it. So I would say if you’re a person that wants something that you can be all in with, that you can get passionate about, that you can find your stride in, that you can grow and accelerate in Great choice. If you’re a person who just wants to show up, punch your time clock, do your job, collect your paycheck and go home, you’re probably not going to enjoy aviation, because they’re going to be a lot of people around you who are pretty giddy about airplanes and the things that that aviation provides.

 

Lisa Marker-Robbins  28:33

Yeah, it’s interesting you share that, because I’ve got a nephew. I recently visited him in Atlanta, and he let he works on more of the data side of the railroad system, and he works for, I’m not, I don’t have permission to say it. So he works for a major railroad organization, and he’s like, Oh my gosh, there’s people have so much passion around this, and we were talking about that, and so it’s not just with aviation. There are other niches where that’s extremely true and there’s no shame in there are people who literally, they want such an extreme work life balance that is nine to five and an out not do, like, if you know that about yourself, that’s good to know. Okay, so here’s another question. Then, what if you’ve never been exposed? You’ve got or maybe a parent’s listening to this and they have a teen, and they’re like, how could I expose? Would be an easy way to expose my kiddo to aviation to see if they potentially could develop passion. Because I don’t necessarily believe that we’re just born with all of our passions. I think passion shift over time. I think passion improves when proficiency improves in an area. Area. So what are some early ways to maybe see, like, could my kiddo catch that bug for aviation?

 

René Banglesdorf  30:07

Well, from a flying perspective, there’s an amazing Association, EAA, which is experimental aircraft Association. And don’t let that scare you, because they they do a lot of great work, and they have a program called the Young Eagles program, and this program, and there are 1000s of airports around the country, only about 500 of them you’ll find on Expedia having commercial service, but there are 9000 airports in the United States with a paved runway where you could likely go take a discovery flight. So look for those airports. Young Eagles does a lot of this, but any school does discovery flights, and that’s what it’s called, typically, 100 or $150 and you’ll go up in the airplane. You could probably go with your child in the airplane. It’ll be a little four seater airplane, and actually see what it’s like to be in the airplane and flying the airplane. And there’s no age limit for that you can do those really young I took my little four year old nephew for a flight, and he loves it. Obsessed with airplanes. He helps me with my pre flight, checks the flaps and looks at the propeller and all the things. Early exposure is great.

 

Lisa Marker-Robbins  31:39

Well, I’m on so we’ll link to that young eagles in the show notes, if people want to explore that. I’m also just thinking like, if you went and did that and just hung out on the airport property, and a lot of them have like, a cafe or just my daughter used to play soccer. One of our soccer fields was adjacent to a regional airport, you could get a good taste for what else is going on on that airport property. So that would be another

 

René Banglesdorf  32:09

way that’s great Absolutely. And a lot of aviators are pretty passionate about aviation, and they love sharing that with young people. So that’s super fun. A lot of times in the summer, there are also fly ins at those local airports, and so I’ve been at a fly in and I’ve let kids climb in my airplane and take pictures, and I’ve answered questions, and I’m not even trying to get them enrolled in a school. I just like answering questions about flying. So looking for fly ins at those local, small airports is another great way to get around airplanes and ask questions.

 

Lisa Marker-Robbins  32:47

Okay, I love it. Well, Renee, thank you so much for coming on educating us. I learned a lot, and we are going to highlight your new podcast. And so fly girls, Guide to aviation. Careers are flourish, coachingco.com, forward slash aviation will go to your podcast before and after your career fair, but we will absolutely redirect it to the career fair when registration is open. So Renee, thanks

 

33:19

so much.

 

René Banglesdorf  33:20

Thanks so much, Lisa, and that career fair will be free and it’ll be virtual, so anyone can come to that. Thanks

 

Speaker 1  33:26

someone when location not a problem. Absolutely. Thanks, Lisa, thanks Renee,

 

Lisa Marker-Robbins  33:40

from hands on roles like mechanics and simulators to emerging fields in drone tech and Oregon transport logistics, Renee gave us a glimpse of the sky high potential for those wired for purpose, excitement or precision, aviation might just be the path they never knew to consider to learn More and continue exploring aviation opportunities. Head to flourish, coachingco.com forward slash aviation, where you can find Rene’s new podcast, fly Girl’s Guide to aviation careers and details about her upcoming virtual aviation career fair. It’s a free and easy way to discover the full range of opportunities waiting in this rapidly growing field. Thanks for joining me, and as always, if this episode helped bring clarity to your family’s journey, share it with a friend, and be sure to follow rate and review so others can find it too. Keep taking those small, intentional steps that lead to big clarity you.