Ed Jenkins, managing director of Aviation Search Group, a direct-hire aviation recruiting company, joined the business—and the wider aviation community—in March 2024. His career background involves working as an executive recruiter in the business sector. At NBAA-BACE 2024 (and at home), he is focused on filling leadership roles for companies looking for executives to keep their Part 91, Part 135, FBO, flight school, or private charter operations running without a hitch.

When a recruiter reached out to him about filling the role at his current company, he was intrigued by aviation. “I thought that aviation would be an amazing field to get into and to explore, and it's been even better than I imagined,” he said. “It’s such a cool industry and there’s so much opportunity.”

Jenkins had zero previous background in aviation and doesn’t have one of those stories about falling in love with airplanes at an early age and following his passion for aviation with everything he had. Entering a new field has brought with it a learning curve, “but the cool thing about not having a background in aviation is that every day, I learn something new,” he said. “I’m engaged; it’s exciting. I listen to conversations that other people have and just learn through the process of hearing.”

“And the cool thing right now is about the transition of new talent—younger talent that’s coming into this industry, and they’ve got some really cool ideas,” Jenkins said. “They see things a little bit differently. So you have a generation of traditionalists, and then you have a generation of newbies that are coming in and they’ve got some really fun and cool ideas. That’s fun to watch—multiple generations are able to assimilate into aviation and make it all work.”

Jenkins pointed to some potentially groundbreaking or game-changing ideas he’s seen on the sales and charter side of the business. Some companies, he says, are really creative in the way they structure their charter services in particular, which is different from the way things were 20 or 30 years ago. “I think charter sales now has become this new thing and everybody is finding a new creative way as to how to do it and how to make it appealing and affordable to a much larger audience,” he said. “I think that’s really cool. It used to be exclusive for a certain group of people. And now it’s more accessible.”

What he loves most so far is discovering that everyone in the industry genuinely loves what they do. Aviation professionals are friendly and welcoming. And there’s no gatekeeping—people with knowledge and insights are eager to share and lift others up in their careers by sharing their own experiences. Aviation really is all about the people.