Just pulled my notes on that particular staff meeting and you’re right - it WAS time-served promotion to Wg Cdr that was done away with.
Obviously too much Jammy Red Roo or somesuch, the night before.
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My branch was pretty much dead mans shoes although a few who had the wink and handshake managed bang on the 4 years minimum
Moi, jealous…No! (tbh they had earned it)
I thought that you told us that you were promoted (and demoted) at your wife’s whim, every Friday night? 
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Only ever Acting - never Substantive
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I get that the pay difference between Fg Off and Flt Lt is reasonable, but as our parent service is time served to Flt Lt (with the assumption that you do also to some extent increase your responsibilities and experience) why do we not have a separate rank vs position VA? (Yes that issue again) As a Sgt/FS/WO who is OiC a Sqn someone is going to be doing very much the same job as a Plt Off/Fg Off/Flt Lt who is an OC. In our parent service there is to some extent a pay overlap between those levels, so there could be feasability for there to be an X base pay plus an extra for is you hold certain positions (call it an “X Factor” if you like)?
So much for “one organisation with one set of rules”…
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They had to decide on which “one organisation” to use and clearly decided that it made more sense for you to have time served across all branches of the CCF to avoid bad feeling on the same contingent. If a tone served Sqn Ldr were to transfer to the ATC they almost certainly would get bumped down in rank.
Whilst I agree to the theory…
Remember this is HQ RAFAC that has to administer it and they don’t/barely have the staff to be able to administer a simple rank based system - throw in rank/post and activity/participant/director differentiators and no one will ever see any VA…
Other than removing a whole cadre of people in unpaid rank of course.
IF the aim was to ‘pyramid the heirachy’ then mission accomplished.
If it were something else… who knows.
It was the RAFAC = ATC + CCF (RAF) I was referring to.
Just how much CCF do you need to be? Makes it tempting to game the system and double hat 
That’s a long game to play to get Sqn Ldr
You’d get it quicker in ATC, but don’t keep it.
I know. My point is that with CCF we’re always walking the line between one RAFAC and one CCF with the other sections and sometimes end up with the best of both and sometimes the worst of both.
I would say that CCF would have to be your primary post if you wanted to play that game. We recently had a former ATC Wing Commander join us and although he “just” section staff he’s got his Sqn Ldr based on time served. I don’t know what would happen if he goes back to ATC as squadron staff but assume he’d be dropped back to Flt Lt?
You get it quicker if you hold a contingent commander role on a big enough contingent (I think it’s 150 cadets total but not got the figures to hand), but like ATC would lose it on relinquishing the appointment
That might be the reasons for it, but like I said, no benefits.
Reducing the number of Flt Lts in the hierarchy is pointless or worse. I think the logic was to push people to take command so that they could get a bigger barcode, which would be completely the wrong reasons for taking on OC, but HQAC don’t understand that.
TBH the most important thing is how it looks to the cadets
In the days of time served Flt Lts there were so many swishing around with several on a Sqn made the rank structure look strange
Now with (theoretically) one Flt Lt on a Sqn and others Fg Off/ Plt Off it looks balanced
Remember, at the end of the day it does not affect how we do things - it is just dress up for the formal ‘military’ bits
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Maybe so but there are a fair number of 21+ year Flt Lts out there. I wonder how many don’t realise this is possibly the case, or is it a case of the CoC not highlighting it to the individuals as there will be an increase in individuals walking around with Sqn Ldr tabs
No different to having a Squadron with multiple WO’s or even CWO’s within its structure but neither of those things are outlawed and indeed are common. Yo also regularly see adult rank structures with more Flight Sergeants than Sergeants, are we going to introduce something into the NCO promotion matrix that says you can’t be promoted if you have no one manage?
TBH I think it looks stranger to the Cadets when Flt Lt Smith who has been the OC for 10 years gets demoted for daring to change roles than it would be to have more than 1 Flt Lt on a unit.
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I don’t think it has much if any impact on cadets. If cadets don’t realise who the OC is, of whatever rank, that’s not because there’s 2 staff of the same rank on the Sqn.
In the past we’ve had Flt Lt OC, Flt Lt WSO and a Lt Cdr service instructor on the unit. Other units have WO OC, Flt Lt adj etc. No issues at all and as you say, it’s only dress up. It doesn’t change how adults work together.
But it is a form of recognition both for long serving staff and those that take on additional responsibilities. Many staff value their rank and have worked for years to earn it. It doesn’t cost anything, so why not recognise staff who do value it?
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Not quite… I believe the new proposed matrix takes this into account so WO just doesn’t become a default rank after 8 years. Dont know specifics though apart from its with the command WOs/Cmdt to decide
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