Delta Road Warrior Training/DO
Jun 27, 2009, 6:48 pm
#661
Join Date: Apr 2004
Posts: 5,630
For those of you visiting Atlanta this week. Dress like you have at least a dollar to your name. You are visiting a corporate headquarters and first impressions are lasting. Some of you are running around in flip flops, t-shirts and wrinkled clothes. Not just a little wrinkled, but a lot wrinkled. Not to say you need to put on a fancy dress or suit and tie, cause it hot and you will look over dressed. But tuck your shirt in and put on some descent clothes. Start with taking off those blue jeans with holes in them and wragged him lines. If you are that poorly dressed it says a lot about you and people are talking about you there. They may not admit it but they say, yeah you can't afford to affect the airline. Bet you hocked your car to come here didn't you. Of course you don't care, you are thinking. But they are saying "who cares what you think". Dress a little better and make a good impression. You then can be taken seriously.
Jun 27, 2009, 6:56 pm
#662
Join Date: May 2003
Location: Florida - Delta Charter DM/3.3MM; Lifetime SPG Plat; HH Gold;
Posts: 1,789
Jun 27, 2009, 7:40 pm
#664
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: May 2002
Location: NC
Programs: AAConciergeKey/1MM, DL DM/2 MM, UA Gold,Hilton Diamond, IHG Plat, Hyatt Globalist, Marriott Titanium
Posts: 11,962
I would be interested in knowing what exact terms we should listen for to indicate evacuation. I believe it was noted on FT after CO's incident in DEN that it is Echo, Victor on their airline.
THANK YOU atldlff and Canarsie for an AMAZING experience...Im so sad I had to miss today's events for a business trip, but I LOVED the Thurs-Fri events and had a fantastic time meeting some other FTers that Ive not been able to put faces with names before. This was better than ever imagined, and please let me know how I can help in the future for next time! Hope it's sooner rather than later
THANK YOU atldlff and Canarsie for an AMAZING experience...Im so sad I had to miss today's events for a business trip, but I LOVED the Thurs-Fri events and had a fantastic time meeting some other FTers that Ive not been able to put faces with names before. This was better than ever imagined, and please let me know how I can help in the future for next time! Hope it's sooner rather than later
Last edited by SkyTeam777; Jun 28, 2009 at 5:30 pm
Jun 27, 2009, 8:10 pm
#665
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Mar 2004
Location: Under an ORD approach path
Programs: DL PM, MM. Coffee isn't a drug, it's a vitamin.
Posts: 12,935
Note the smiley. I believe he was joking.
Jeff was very open with us Thursday night about SkyMiles benefits. There are a few that they'd like to implement (including some which exist on the NW side and not the DW side) which won't be there when the programs merge in Oct. and maybe a couple which will temporarily go away. This is due to a few reasons; a couple things are just too expensive, and the same amount of budget/cost/benefit was allocated to other features instead. Others just can't be done yet for technical reasons.
Both the DL and NW systems are built on top of 30 to 40 year old mainframe systems; those two can't really merge. There are some hooks to tie things into, some things the systems will do, and some which just can't be done. (or rather, could be done if you threw enough thousands of hours and tens of millions of dollars at them, but that isn't reasonable). Eventually they will have to replace the underlying system, but not at the same time as a merger- one giant change at a time!
So, some things can't be programmed into the system by Oct., and will have to go away for a while, but they'll try to bring many of those back as soon as they can create and test the code. Many of you in IT will understand how difficult this could be- these are huge antiquated systems.
So, if a feature goes away, or isn't implemented, let them know you want it (detailed constructive criticism is wanted, pure rants often don't give them info they can actually work with), but have some patience. They know we're here, they want to know what we want.
Jeff was very open with us Thursday night about SkyMiles benefits. There are a few that they'd like to implement (including some which exist on the NW side and not the DW side) which won't be there when the programs merge in Oct. and maybe a couple which will temporarily go away. This is due to a few reasons; a couple things are just too expensive, and the same amount of budget/cost/benefit was allocated to other features instead. Others just can't be done yet for technical reasons.
Both the DL and NW systems are built on top of 30 to 40 year old mainframe systems; those two can't really merge. There are some hooks to tie things into, some things the systems will do, and some which just can't be done. (or rather, could be done if you threw enough thousands of hours and tens of millions of dollars at them, but that isn't reasonable). Eventually they will have to replace the underlying system, but not at the same time as a merger- one giant change at a time!
So, some things can't be programmed into the system by Oct., and will have to go away for a while, but they'll try to bring many of those back as soon as they can create and test the code. Many of you in IT will understand how difficult this could be- these are huge antiquated systems.
So, if a feature goes away, or isn't implemented, let them know you want it (detailed constructive criticism is wanted, pure rants often don't give them info they can actually work with), but have some patience. They know we're here, they want to know what we want.
Jun 27, 2009, 8:40 pm
#666
Join Date: Nov 2003
Location: BOS/MHT (Lakes Region)
Programs: DL PM(sigh)/2.3MM & a bunch of other programs...
Posts: 692
Jeff was very open with us Thursday night about SkyMiles benefits. There are a few that they'd like to implement (including some which exist on the NW side and not the DW side) which won't be there when the programs merge in Oct. and maybe a couple which will temporarily go away.
So, some things can't be programmed into the system by Oct., and will have to go away for a while, but they'll try to bring many of those back as soon as they can create and test the code.
So, some things can't be programmed into the system by Oct., and will have to go away for a while, but they'll try to bring many of those back as soon as they can create and test the code.
What program features was Jeff so open about at the DO/RWT that are going to go away or are not going to be implemented when the systems merge?
I also think that if they are aware a feature in a program is being eliminated, again even temporarily, the onus should be on DL to put it back as soon as they can and not wait for FTers' opinions. That smacks of "let's see what we can remove from the programs and keep out until they BAL about it."
Jun 27, 2009, 9:16 pm
#667
Join Date: Dec 2005
Location: Hopefully on a plane...
Posts: 6,580
You've got to fight fire with fire sometimes.
Jun 27, 2009, 9:42 pm
#668
Join Date: May 2008
Programs: DL AA UA
Posts: 2,359
Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 3_0 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/528.18 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/4.0 Mobile/7A341 Safari/528.16)
It was awesome and, with respect to getting a gate pass, I am sure that my compadres can tell you that it's no easy task....
You've got to fight fire with fire sometimes.
I'm sure you had to try 32 or 40 times. 
Originally Posted by WBurcham
You've got to fight fire with fire sometimes.
Jun 27, 2009, 9:51 pm
#669
Join Date: Apr 2006
Posts: 1,572
Jun 27, 2009, 10:09 pm
#670
Join Date: Apr 2009
Programs: DL GM
Posts: 8
It was great meeting everyone these past few days. I am new to FT and DL (I recently made the switch from CO), and this weekend confirmed what a great airline DL really is. I promise to be more active with posts. I look forward to another FT event in the near future. Excellent work, Steven!
Jun 27, 2009, 10:14 pm
#671
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Mar 2004
Location: Under an ORD approach path
Programs: DL PM, MM. Coffee isn't a drug, it's a vitamin.
Posts: 12,935
And this is what they used at Firestation 32 to fight fire.
The one at 40 is similar, but theirs has a piercing nozzle on top- it can punch a hole in the fusilage and then pump water inside. It also has infared displays, so it can find hot spots in the plane, and locate warm people hidden by smoke on the tarmac. It can also hit 90 to 100 mph on a straightaway and carries 3000 gallons of water, plus chemical fire retardants. Pretty amazing.
And we got to ride in it!
And here is a certain unnamed venerable moderator getting evicted from an airplane.
Inside this life raft, under the canopy, are 40 or 50 wet Flyertalkers, struggling to set up all the posts to support that canopy.
Our fearless leader prepares to evacuate us.
The one at 40 is similar, but theirs has a piercing nozzle on top- it can punch a hole in the fusilage and then pump water inside. It also has infared displays, so it can find hot spots in the plane, and locate warm people hidden by smoke on the tarmac. It can also hit 90 to 100 mph on a straightaway and carries 3000 gallons of water, plus chemical fire retardants. Pretty amazing.
And we got to ride in it!
And here is a certain unnamed venerable moderator getting evicted from an airplane.
Inside this life raft, under the canopy, are 40 or 50 wet Flyertalkers, struggling to set up all the posts to support that canopy.
Our fearless leader prepares to evacuate us.
Last edited by Gargoyle; Jun 27, 2009 at 10:29 pm
Jun 27, 2009, 11:28 pm
#672
Original Poster
Join Date: Aug 2007
Location: Atlanta
Programs: DL:PM - Reserve, 2MM, FC, RW; HH: SILVER MR: SILVER
Posts: 1,225
THANK YOU!
Safe travels home everyone! What a fantastic 3 days…
I don’t seem to be able to make my posts short, and this one won’t break that tradition, but it certainly seems appropriate in this case.
It was my honor and a true pleasure to coordinate this event! It is hard to put into words how much I completely enjoyed this from the beginning to the end – and I am sure my brain is a little worn and frazzled around the edges now that we are at the end… so please bear with me, but I think it is essential to pause and give some thanks to so many for the last three days:
First and foremost - Thanks to the many outstanding people from Delta, as stated before, you are simply the best! No doubt that your love and pride for Delta and your roles in our experiences as passengers with Delta is clearly present! I have been talking about the great team of people I have worked with at Delta , since I began planning this event, and now every one of the FT members that attended can see why. We all now have a new found appreciation for the enormous scope of what really goes on behind the scenes to make Delta run 365 days a year, around the clock! I am still in awe of what you do and how you do it! I think I speak on behalf of everyone of the FT members that attended when I say, thank you, thank you, thank you, for going above and beyond, at every single location we visited. I will be attempting to reach out to many of you over the next week to pass along our thanks individually. The once Delta slogan, “We Love to Fly and it Shows”… is so appropriate when I think about the many people we have all met over the last few days at Delta. You absolutely make me want to be a Delta employee too!
Thank you to our sponsors Aircell, and the Delta SkyMiles program that made the evening portions of this event really fantastic. Not only were the dinners were both outstanding, but we had the distinct pleasure of your company at those social and fun events.
A HUGE thank you to the many FT volunteers, Flyin'Mom, scoow, ShopAround, bennos, WesNSpace, davakkar and atl runner that worked so hard to pull this event together. From registration, to transportation, to group leaders… you all pitched in without hesitation to make this event run flawlessly. Thank you Flyzabit for those great T-shirts. Your efforts to hand them out to the many Delta employees along the way were not only a great idea, but also greatly appreciated !!! Thank you to Sylvester our bus driver, who even joined us for dinner last night, told me that he had a great deal of fun with our group too!
Thank you to the staff at Fire and Rescue Station # 33 and # 40. What a terrific time we had!! You guys are incredible and were so accommodating and fun to be with. Watch for us waving from those Delta planes as we taxi by your stations! We will be back, and as I said in an earlier post – you might even have some FT members “camping” out your grass next to the runway.
A HUGE Thank you to the 63 FT members, who took their time away from their busy schedules and lives to all come together for this absolutely incredible event. We started as a collection of individuals, many of whom had never met, and by the end of the three days - we became a team. I am deeply honored to have met so many wonderful people over the last three days, and built a foundation of memories and new found friendships that I hope will continue to last for years. This was MY first FlyerTalk DO, so I didn’t really have a benchmark to go by, but the 3 days with all of you GREATLY exceeded even my highest expectations and I hope it did for you too!
Finally, thank you is too simple of a word to express my gratitude to Canarsie, who has been there to encourage me, support me and been a guiding light for what just a little over 2 months ago - seemed like such a formidable task.
While this was my first official DO, it certainly won’t be my last! We are already thinking and planning for the next event. We have the good list of lessons learned, and I love the enthusiasm and excitement that Canarsie has as we discussed everyday - what we would do next time, and trust me, there is a LONG list of ideas already! You will laugh at this, but when we were on the TOC tour, our group leader asked him, I know you guys already spend so much time on the planes, you think anyone would want to go inside?... he practically jumped up and said loudly in true FT fashion: YES... of course!
I SMILE when I think back on the last 3 days, before I head to sleep to get some much needed rest!!! Just know that I am fully on-board for doing this again. I know that I will be able to count of so many of you again, and when I reach my hand out, as I did today on that life raft, I will be pulling so many of you into that venture with me!
Good night, safe travels home, and until next time… stay tuned.
P.S. I want to know how many of you newly "Certified RWT" told your FAs on the way home, "I am your designated ABP"? For those of you who have no clue what I am talking about... you should attend the next Road Warrior training.
I don’t seem to be able to make my posts short, and this one won’t break that tradition, but it certainly seems appropriate in this case.
It was my honor and a true pleasure to coordinate this event! It is hard to put into words how much I completely enjoyed this from the beginning to the end – and I am sure my brain is a little worn and frazzled around the edges now that we are at the end… so please bear with me, but I think it is essential to pause and give some thanks to so many for the last three days:
First and foremost - Thanks to the many outstanding people from Delta, as stated before, you are simply the best! No doubt that your love and pride for Delta and your roles in our experiences as passengers with Delta is clearly present! I have been talking about the great team of people I have worked with at Delta , since I began planning this event, and now every one of the FT members that attended can see why. We all now have a new found appreciation for the enormous scope of what really goes on behind the scenes to make Delta run 365 days a year, around the clock! I am still in awe of what you do and how you do it! I think I speak on behalf of everyone of the FT members that attended when I say, thank you, thank you, thank you, for going above and beyond, at every single location we visited. I will be attempting to reach out to many of you over the next week to pass along our thanks individually. The once Delta slogan, “We Love to Fly and it Shows”… is so appropriate when I think about the many people we have all met over the last few days at Delta. You absolutely make me want to be a Delta employee too!
Thank you to our sponsors Aircell, and the Delta SkyMiles program that made the evening portions of this event really fantastic. Not only were the dinners were both outstanding, but we had the distinct pleasure of your company at those social and fun events.
A HUGE thank you to the many FT volunteers, Flyin'Mom, scoow, ShopAround, bennos, WesNSpace, davakkar and atl runner that worked so hard to pull this event together. From registration, to transportation, to group leaders… you all pitched in without hesitation to make this event run flawlessly. Thank you Flyzabit for those great T-shirts. Your efforts to hand them out to the many Delta employees along the way were not only a great idea, but also greatly appreciated !!! Thank you to Sylvester our bus driver, who even joined us for dinner last night, told me that he had a great deal of fun with our group too!
Thank you to the staff at Fire and Rescue Station # 33 and # 40. What a terrific time we had!! You guys are incredible and were so accommodating and fun to be with. Watch for us waving from those Delta planes as we taxi by your stations! We will be back, and as I said in an earlier post – you might even have some FT members “camping” out your grass next to the runway.
A HUGE Thank you to the 63 FT members, who took their time away from their busy schedules and lives to all come together for this absolutely incredible event. We started as a collection of individuals, many of whom had never met, and by the end of the three days - we became a team. I am deeply honored to have met so many wonderful people over the last three days, and built a foundation of memories and new found friendships that I hope will continue to last for years. This was MY first FlyerTalk DO, so I didn’t really have a benchmark to go by, but the 3 days with all of you GREATLY exceeded even my highest expectations and I hope it did for you too!
Finally, thank you is too simple of a word to express my gratitude to Canarsie, who has been there to encourage me, support me and been a guiding light for what just a little over 2 months ago - seemed like such a formidable task.
While this was my first official DO, it certainly won’t be my last! We are already thinking and planning for the next event. We have the good list of lessons learned, and I love the enthusiasm and excitement that Canarsie has as we discussed everyday - what we would do next time, and trust me, there is a LONG list of ideas already! You will laugh at this, but when we were on the TOC tour, our group leader asked him, I know you guys already spend so much time on the planes, you think anyone would want to go inside?... he practically jumped up and said loudly in true FT fashion: YES... of course!
I SMILE when I think back on the last 3 days, before I head to sleep to get some much needed rest!!! Just know that I am fully on-board for doing this again. I know that I will be able to count of so many of you again, and when I reach my hand out, as I did today on that life raft, I will be pulling so many of you into that venture with me!
Good night, safe travels home, and until next time… stay tuned.
P.S. I want to know how many of you newly "Certified RWT" told your FAs on the way home, "I am your designated ABP"? For those of you who have no clue what I am talking about... you should attend the next Road Warrior training.
Last edited by atldlff; Jun 28, 2009 at 12:02 am Reason: Added PS
Jun 28, 2009, 6:54 am
#673
Join Date: Dec 2004
Location: DFW
Programs: DL DM (where is my Diamond Tiara?)
Posts: 1,006
Me!
My flight attendant was fascinated about the whole thing and asked me a lot of questions about what we did. I got to throw around terms like "ABP" and "ditch tank", but I did manage to hold back and not fish out my new Delta Road Warrior Certified Bag Tag to wave around. (that was a close thing though, and I'm sure I'll lose that battle before my next flight)
I'm heading off to work the trade show I'lve been AWOL from to attend this DO so I'll keep it short...
Others have and will post with great details about the event and what we learned and saw and did. My brain isn't wired that way to remember details so I'm going to leave that to them.
For me the event was all about a group of amazing people...starting with atldlff. Honestly, I just love this guy. How can we not love the person who made some of our dreams come true?
The people of Delta are indescribably wonderful. Everyone went out of their way to make us feel welcome and special and important to them and to Delta. To all the Delta employees - thank you. You Love to Fly and it Shows! And it is that attitude that has kept me on your planes for so many years.
This was my first DO and I am still reeling from meeting so many interesting, nice, and just plain cool to hang out with people. We are a very diverse group of folks and I really feel like I just made 60+ new friends. You all have a standing invitation when your travels bring you to DFW - PM me and we'll go have some fun!
Jun 28, 2009, 7:14 am
#674
Join Date: Aug 2008
Location: MCO
Programs: DL-DM/1MM, HILTON-DIA, .HYATT-DIA/GLOB , IHG-PLT,HERTZ 5*, NATIONAL ES
Posts: 8,691
OK, I'll ask (politely please note) for everyone who could not attend (including me in Seoul) one more time:
What program features was Jeff so open about at the DO/RWT that are going to go away or are not going to be implemented when the systems merge?
Knowing in advance what features may disappear, even temporarily, will lessen people's angst and surprise-generated anger.
I also think that if they are aware a feature in a program is being eliminated, again even temporarily, the onus should be on DL to put it back as soon as they can and not wait for FTers' opinions. That smacks of "let's see what we can remove from the programs and keep out until they BAL about it."
What program features was Jeff so open about at the DO/RWT that are going to go away or are not going to be implemented when the systems merge?
Knowing in advance what features may disappear, even temporarily, will lessen people's angst and surprise-generated anger.
I also think that if they are aware a feature in a program is being eliminated, again even temporarily, the onus should be on DL to put it back as soon as they can and not wait for FTers' opinions. That smacks of "let's see what we can remove from the programs and keep out until they BAL about it."
Jun 28, 2009, 7:22 am
#675
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: The best state in the USA - Florida!
Programs: Marriott Titanium/LT Plat, AS MVP75K, AA PlatPro, UA Premier, Disney AP
Posts: 14,497
It wasn't as much about pending changes that Jeff was up front and honest with, it was him discussing the changes that have already happened. In regards to award ticket cancellation fees, etc. he was extremely open with us - telling us some pretty specific numbers of how much X cost, how much Y cost, what the total cost of taking the best of both programs and putting them together, how senior leadership felt that cost was too high and needed some small pullbacks, and weighing those options. I was expecting Jeff to come in and talk in terms of generalities such as "we had to save millions, so we cut back here". Instead, the detail and depth he gave really impressed me and now that I've heard him give a rationale for why things happened, I can't complain - it made sense.