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Walter Jones is a flight line supervisor at Midwest Corporate Aviation in Wichita, Kansas. In the interview I conducted, Mr. Jones said that his responsibilities included, the hiring and firing of line employees; reporting to the executives and other managers in the weekly staff meeting; the ordering of uniforms, tools, and anything else the line might need; making the schedule for the line employees, the billing of aircraft hanger and ramp fees, and the billing of aircraft wash and detail services, just to name a few. Mr. Jones has been employed at Midwest Corporate Aviation for 7 years and line supervisor for 2 years. He says that since he used to work on the flight line, he realizes just how much work the men do everyday and believes that having that knowledge allows him to be better at his job.
When I asked Mr. Jones what he thinks are the worst aspects of being a flight line supervisor he joked that there are many difficult features that he has to deal with everyday, but that is the reason he gets paid the big bucks. Later, he seriously commented that a lot of the men who work under him are his age and it can be difficult at times to discipline or order them around, because he feels that they do not respect him enough because of the age factor. He also said that it is not easy to discipline employees because he tends to get too close to them and even commented on going out after work with some of the members of the line. One time, Walter mentioned, he was trying to tell an employee that he had done something wrong and how he should do it next time to make sure the customers are satisfied with the service and the employee just laughed and sa ...