The career path is rarely linear
Aviation has a habit of pulling people in early.
For Jules Riel, it started with the classic childhood dream. Looking up at the sky, wanting to understand the world, wanting to travel, wanting to know how it all worked.
That curiosity took her from rural Germany to London, then into British Airways cabin crew in 1998. But the real turning point came when she asked a senior colleague a simple question:
How do airplanes fly?
The answer was, essentially, “I don’t know.”
For some people, that might have been enough. For Jules, it was the making of her.
Julia Reichel
Jules’ story is a reminder that resilience is not just about bouncing back. It is about learning something from every station you pass through. From cabin crew to pilot training, from recruitment to analyst firms, from airline tech vendors to executive search and now Retail Air, each chapter added another layer of skill, knowledge and perspective. Her view is simple but powerful: plan your route, but accept that the wind can change. Sometimes the next decision will not be perfect, but you still make it, move forward, and adjust. As she puts it, take the hit, dust yourself down, and go again.
She wanted to understand the technology, the physics, the aerodynamics, the systems, the reason this whole extraordinary machine gets off the ground and stays there. That curiosity led her into pilot training, and for a while, it looked like the path was set.
Then September 11 happened.
Her cadet programme was suspended. The career she had worked towards for years was suddenly gone. Medical circumstances later closed the door completely. In Jules’ words, it felt like a loss.
And this is where the story becomes relevant to so many people in airline technology.
Because the industry changes direction. Programmes get paused. Businesses restructure. Markets contract. Products shift. Leaders move. Funding dries up. Sometimes the runway you planned for is no longer available.
The question becomes, what do you do next?
Resilience is not a soft skill
We often talk about resilience as if it is a nice-to-have.
It is not.
In aviation and airline technology, resilience is operational. It is commercial. It is cultural. It is what keeps people moving when the map changes.
Jules moved into recruitment because she loved people, loved communication, and needed to rebuild. From there she placed herself with one of her best customers, Frost & Sullivan, moving into aviation, aerospace and defence growth consulting.
Then came Gartner, T2RL, HP, Radixx, OpenJaw, executive search, Endava and now Retail Air.
On paper, that looks like a varied career.
In reality, it is a career built on curiosity, reinvention and the ability to keep getting up.
That matters because airline tech is full of people who have arrived through unusual routes. Some come from airlines. Some from vendors. Some from consulting. Some from commercial. Some from operations. Some from data, payments, loyalty, revenue management, NDC, OOSD or retailing.
The best people are often not the ones who have done the exact same job before.
They are the ones who can learn quickly, connect the dots, and stay calm when everything is moving.
Thornton Gregory see this constantly in airline and airline tech recruitment. Technical knowledge matters, of course. But in 2026, the people who really stand out are the ones with judgement, clarity, resilience and influence. That tone and theme runs through Thornton Gregory’s own market commentary too, especially around bridging legacy airline systems with modern Offer and Order models.
The industry is moving again
This matters even more right now because airline technology is not standing still.
Over the past 30 days, there have been plenty of signals that the sector is still pushing hard into modern retailing and operational transformation.
Lufthansa Group announced on 19 June 2026 that it is evolving its NDC offering with version 24.1, focused on improving servicing processes and operational efficiency for agencies using its Direct NDC API or travel tech providers.
IATA’s Offers and Orders Forum also took place in Geneva on 16 and 17 June 2026, bringing airlines and technology partners together around continuous pricing and modern retailing standards.
Meanwhile, AI continues to sit right in the middle of airline retailing conversations. Aviation Week recently reported that United Airlines’ view is that the impact of AI on airline retailing will depend on whether airlines can remain the “source of truth” in the shopping and servicing journey.
And on the airport side, Ryanair has warned about disruption linked to the EU’s biometric Entry and Exit System, a reminder that passenger technology is only useful if infrastructure, process and operational reality are properly aligned.
The message is fairly clear.
This is not just about systems.
It is about people who can translate between old and new worlds.
Hiring for attitude, not just experience
One of the strongest themes from Jules’ story is sponsorship.
Again and again, someone saw something in her before she saw it fully in herself. Someone said, you might not have done this exact thing before, but you have the attitude, intelligence and drive to make it work.
That is a lesson many airline tech hiring managers should take seriously.
If you are building around NDC, Offers and Orders, customer data platforms, AI-driven retailing, payments, servicing or OOSD, the perfect candidate may not exist in a neat box.
You may need someone who understands airline complexity and can learn the product.
Or someone from a vendor background who can adapt into services.
Or someone commercial who can sit between product, technology and the customer.
Or someone who has lived through legacy systems and can help the business move forward without dismissing the reality of what already exists.
The mistake is hiring only for yesterday’s checklist.
The opportunity is hiring for tomorrow’s capability.
Environment matters
Jules makes another point that is easy to overlook.
You need to know what environment you thrive in.
Some people are brilliant in large corporates, with structure, process and scale. Others come alive in smaller businesses, where the path is less defined and the opportunity is bigger. Some need a clear mandate. Others enjoy the chaos of building the mandate as they go.
Neither is wrong.
But mismatch is expensive.
For employers, this means being honest about the role. Is it structured or ambiguous? Is it a build role or a maintain role? Is it a global matrix or a founder-led environment? Is it a product business, a services business, or somewhere in between?
For candidates, it means being honest about what gives you energy and what drains it.
Aviation is too specialist, too demanding and too connected for people to spend months pretending the fit is right when it clearly is not.
The people behind the transformation
Airline technology is full of big language at the moment.
AI. NDC. Offers and Orders. OOSD. Continuous pricing. Customer data. Modern retailing.
All important.
But none of it works without the right people.
People who can handle ambiguity. People who can connect legacy and future state. People who can build trust across airlines, vendors, partners and internal teams. People who can take a hit, get back up, and keep moving.
That is the real story in Jules’ career.
Not just resilience for the sake of it.
Resilience with direction.
And in an industry rebuilding how it sells, services and supports travel, that might be one of the most valuable skills of all.
