Grueling hours, mandatory overtime, and no hope for relief - Communications Specialist Air Methods Employee Review

The job is a combination of being an air traffic controller and an emergency 911 dispatcher, two of the most stressful jobs a person can have. This leads to a fairly quick turnover and being constantly short staffed. Admin in Denver is constantly trying to find new programs to add to increase their profit margin, but they can't manage to staff the programs they already have. Individual communication specialists are responsible for upwards of 15 aircraft each and are hounded for any mistake they make. Also, people are responsible for taking on call shifts in case someone on the opposite shift calls out sick. Unfortunately, staffing is so low that on-call has become mandatory overtime. Some people had to work 20 twelve hour shifts in the month of June. Admin is hiring people as fast as they can, but less than half of the people hired make it through the training process, and those that do quickly learn to start looking for alternative employment. On top of all of this, supervisors and shift leads are encouraged to micromanage communication specialists by deciding which resources they should use, how they should spend their down time, and by crushing and morale or camaraderie boosting activities by labeling them as distractions to the mission.