No more boozy air cargo jobs
27 / 11 / 2012
BAD habits of the past, such as long, alcohol-fuelled lunches and business meetings with little or no formal structure, are no longer common practice in the air cargo industry, a specialist employment veteran reveals.
After 25 years’ experience in the air cargo jobs placement business, Kevin Theobald knows a thing or two about industry trends and traditions.
As a former airfreight worker, Theobald now understands the workplace inside and out – and in two and a half decades of successfully placing clients in air cargo jobs he has seen the freight forwarding world evolve into a much more sophisticated industry.
Kevin Theobald Employment Agency, near Heathrow, London, was launched in 1987 as a family concern. “I started working from home. There was a fax machine and two ‘phones. That was it,” he recalls.
“We soon got an office and I remember there were about four or five competitors. We were focused on quality service and keen rates.
“In those days there was this drinking culture and everyone knew everyone; people were offered jobs in the pub. That doesn’t happen any more.
“One of the other big changes has been the security checks and the referencing system.”
Today’s forwarders carry out drugs and alcohol tests on prospective employees.
Theobald admits that business is not easy in the current, depressed market, although the situation is improving. “It is not brilliant,” he says. “It could be a lot better.
“But we have the know-how and the experience to place people and a strong pool of talent to offer employers.
“A lot of our clients keep coming back to us – they know us and the trust is there that we will put the right person up for the right job.”
