American Airlines Flight Attendant Shares Heartwarming Message With Passenger Who Just Failed Job Interview With The Airline

An American Airlines flight attendant shared a heartwarming message with someone she noticed was looking ‘down’ on her flight, and it turned out the passenger was flying back home after failing a job interview to become a flight attendant with the Fort Worth-based carrier.

“Promise you won’t give up,” the flight attendant wrote on American Airlines branded stationery. “Think of it as a minor setback for a major comeback,” the encouraging note continued. “Never stop believing in yourself.”

Rejection
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The touching handwritten note came after the flight attendant gave the candidate a hug and made her “pinky promise” not to give up on her dream of becoming crew for one of the world’s biggest airlines.

Like other US airlines, American Airlines is in the midst of a major flight attendant recruitment campaign, and although the candidate didn’t get offered a job on this occasion, she should be proud of herself just for getting invited to a face-to-face interview.

Candidates who are lucky enough to get through a rigorous pre-selection process are flown by American Airlines to its headquarters near Dallas, where they face a variety of in-person assessments and a dreaded face-to-face interview that will determine their fate.

Sadly, the majority of people who apply to become flight attendants won’t succeed on the first occasion and that means being flown back home, rejection letter in hand, on the very same airline that has just crushed your dreams.

“I was really disappointed,” the candidate wrote about her rejection in a post on the social media platform Reddit. “A flight attendant noticed I was down, she gave me a hug and made me pinky promise to not give up. Lol I may have shed a tear,” the post continued.

Many commentators shared their stories of being rejected on the first occasion, only to then land their dream job with a rival airline. Some offered advice to help the unlucky candidate in the future.

“I got passed over by Alaska and then got hired by Delta not long after,” one commentator wrote. “What I did different – researched possible interview questions and what kinds of answers they want, recorded myself practicing over and over and over again, dressed exactly like an FA in my interview with a navy blue skirt suit, white collar, red lips and minimal jewelry – and a good attitude.”

Another shared how it took ten attempts over seven years to finally get a job offer.

“Please please please don’t give up,” the person wrote. “I applied at Delta ten times. It was a seven-year process for me until I finally got my CJO. [conditional joining offer] In the meantime, see if other carriers are hiring and maybe go from there until you can apply at American again. Best of luck to you, and don’t give up!”

It turns out that sometimes certain candidates just don’t ‘fit’ with some airlines while they can land a job offer on the first attempt with a rival carrier.

In many cases, it takes at least one failed attempt to see what a flight attendant assessment day looks like and what is expected of you. Essentially, a rejection is, more often than not, a minor bump in the road.

That bump in the road, however, can result in an agonizingly long wait before you can reapply. Many airlines make candidates wait between three and six months after a rejection before being allowed to reapply. In some rare cases, candidates have even been made to wait up to 12 months to try their luck again.