Alumni Profile -Triffa Anaid 

What appealed to you about UNSW and your degree?

I wanted to get into business but wanted a niche or sector as I thought Business was not specialised enough. I scoured through those thick handbooks and found Aviation Management – I didn’t know this was an offering until then and I thought this focus on business in aviation would provide a competitive advantage.    

What is the most valuable thing you took away from your time at UNSW?

The soft skills, being able to present and speak and network to the guest lecturers as well as our own lecturers was invaluable. Those are things you can’t be taught but that is one of the biggest factors our school tried to leverage – real life, tangible skills. As a student, it’s hard to see it at the time. In mid second year this really kicked in and I fell in love with the degree.   Working in Industry, you really come to find that those in Aviation are utterly, and complete passionate, and that is a contagious feeling. 

When you study with people who study aviation, they are absolutely passionate, especially pilots who know from young they want to be a pilot, so it made me question what I was doing in this degree.   This changed in Second year when I appreciated being guided and taught by actual industry leads- the school creatively incorporates elements of theory and reality together, but you have to have the eye in picking up the invaluable learning curves when they present themselves. For example, I was being taught airline management by the ex-CEO of Fiji Airways. You start to really appreciate the practical experience Aviation brings into its program which is unusual for academia. 

What skills did you pick up whilst doing your degree that has helped you in your career? How has your degree helped you to get where you are today? 

Again, the opportunity to present in front of a 100 people is an opportunity you rarely come by. We did a lot of group activities and that was valuable for the workplace as well to be able to work within a group with a business goal in mind. These are two key things you pick up in the workplace.  The guest lecturers really did push us to engage and encouraged us to make ourselves known by reaching out to industry, network, ask them who they are and send follow-up communications to make sure you are in the back of their mind. They acted as great mentors if you were keen enough to follow their lead. They pushed for curiosity and critical thinking, and if they saw you were eager in both they provided you with networks- something you do not gain access for in ‘larger degrees’. The intimate nature of the lessons and tutorials allow for those who are eager to shine and leverage off of really caring and supportive industry leaders.

What about the program has really stuck with you? What features do you like about the program? 

It is such a small industry so the people that were in the cohort are now my peers in different sectors and the lecturers are actually in industry, if you network and apply yourself correctly, the way our lecturers pushed – you would benefit years down the road in ways you never knew. 

Where has your career taken you?  

I did a few years at an Aeromedical corporation that specialised in medical evacuation missions. The sales role in the private jets corporation led me to the Aeromedical world – one of my stakeholders in private jets corporation provided me the connection into the aeromedical world, he has now recently passed away. But it was this connection and his belief in me, the reason I am where I am.

I was hired during the height of the COVID pandemic, when there was a large supply of aviation professionals – this is the networking that our lecturers instilled in us, this is the skill, the practical skill that converts to tangible effects when implemented. Against all odds, I was hired whilst overseas, in the height of the pandemic where the aviation industry was affected the most.

The private jet corporation was my first role, and they were the largest brokerage in the world. They sent me to the London office for a month with everything paid for training.  It is a great job if you want to get into sales.  

The two prior bosses at Careflight are the best I have ever encountered, one has tragically passed away. My old boss still reaches out and believes in me and mentors me. 

I did a check-in role Aerocare while I was studying which was great hands on experience and the interesting thing about this was I was rejected when I first applied for the role. I had the email of rejection - and this is what I mean by opportunity – I was part of the AVSOC team and we had an aviation careers event the very night I randomly got a call from the GM of Aerocare saying we are lost and don’t know how to get to this event. I went down to the carpark to escort them. I seized the opportunity and joked with him - asked him why he called me as my number was at the bottom of the list and told him how random this was given I had received a rejection letter, and he was shocked.  By the next week I was hired.  

I also worked with an Air Charter Service brokerage coordinating charter flights for high net worth individuals in Australia. It is a sales role and I didn’t like it but it was good exposure to get my foot in the door into aviation as we didn’t have Work Integrated Learning at the time.

Where are you now?  

Current role:  I am currently working for KPMG in consulting. KPMG is great, because I have exposure in audit and compliance at a federal government level. Here, I have worked in resourcing, workforce advisory as well as data analytics operations - so different industries within three years. The hope is that I can bring that back into aviation. 

Before that I was part of a Safeguarding Risk Advisory team that was client facing. We would protect the most vulnerable populations in Australia, such as safe guarding children with disabilities, or those experiencing domestic violence. I was on a Federal Gov Portfolio and would lead teams on very high risk sites to assess for compliance, audit, internal audit and identifying deficiencies in business processes, governance systems based on what could potentially happen. We then made recommendations around system deficiencies. I have guest lectured for Dr Brett Molesworth and I remember that in my first year thinking I would never use the theory…can’t stand audit work and will never do it in my life, and now I find myself using Swiss Cheese Models and learnings from our aviation Human Factors courses. Now, I love me a good governance system and risk-based approaches.  I still have Brett’s Human Factors textbook! It is so important to be able to have the theory to back what you do in practice.  That is the biggest disjoint -- at uni you think, “I am never going to use this, why am I going to use it as it is so obvious?” It is an ignorant way to look at the world. It takes years for academics to build these notions that we can use in day-to-day governance. The critical thinking involved in asking, "how am I going to use this?" is one of the most valuable lessons you will learn in Aviation Management.     

What can we do to improve the program and grad outcomes?

Being clear about the context of the learnings to bridge the gap from theory to practice and being able to illustrate their relevance to the real world. This is always more powerful for the learning process. 

Manage expectations: In my very first class we were told, “If you are interested in money, the door is outside, as you won’t find it in aviation”.  I loved the honesty. I knew what to expect. I don’t have this idealism behind me. I know what I am working with and I love that. 

Upon graduating, what graduate knowledge and skills have you found to be the most attractive to employers?

You can teach anyone almost anything, but what we look for are those qualities such as whether you are you honest, hardworking, curious – these are inherent qualities.  I think aviation management promotes these qualities especially through those guest lecturers that come from years in industry and are real life proponents; they ignite an understanding of these qualities and their importance. These are old school qualities, involving tough mentoring.  They pushed me to rely on those qualities and myself. They taught me that no one is here to save you; you need that push from mentors.  Again building those presentation skills – we had to do it almost evry other semester and presenting in front of 100 people has been invaluable. 

What we can do for you?

I would love more opportunities to connect with alumni like the 30th anniversary celebration. It is such a small industry and I loved reconnecting with people I had known so having that is really important. 

Perhaps a portal where alumni that want to volunteer themselves as potential mentors for the current students.  When I did my lecture a few students came up to me. One didn’t know whether or not she wanted to get into audit and I was able to help her thought process. So finding a way for students to create connections and contact alumni about career pathways is important.  

What innovations do you think the industry needs?  

AI – the industry needs to be across it and it should be part of the skills for all the subjects before others are. We need to understand it, and how to effectively use it and integrate it for efficiency. 

What would your advice be for those currently studying or considering the study of Aviation Management at UNSW? 

Opportunities will always present themselves, but you need to be ready to grab it. And if you don’t you only have yourself to blame.