How often do you make a decision based on an assumption?  You “paint with a broad stroke” instead of taking the time to investigate with an open mind?

If you were the recipient of an unfair decision, how would you feel?  Too often we are immersed in our own world and not realizing that the “others” we are dealing with have thoughts, feelings and motivations just like we do.

Shari will be giving a 75-minute breakout session at the First 2010 Cessna Pilot Center Conference to be held in Orlando.  The topic will be Emotional Intelligence and Flight Instruction.

This session is sponsored by Mountain State University’s Aviation Department.

BC&A reports that the “Top Ten Threats Cited in EMS ASRA [NASA's Aviation Safety Reporting System] Reports:

Mission Preparation/Operational Pressure                    93%

Excessive Workload                                                      84%

Communication Difficulties                                            75%

. . .

Distractions                                                                  28%

Pilot                                                                              17%

Assume that EMS personnel are trained and are accustomed to working under stress.  75% of the time they consider communication difficulties a threat?  What does that mean for the rest of us that do not generally work under stress …. our stress experiences has peaks and valleys.

How many times in a typical day do we ‘visit’ the fight/flight/freeze arena?  And how long do we remain that prisoner?   When we sense that our unconscious reactions will overtake our conscious actions, we need to focus on the outcome we want, not escaping from the current situation.

How difficult is it for us to communicate clearly the first time?  And what are our consequences if we don’t.  And how do we know if our meaning and intention are clearly stated?  We can take cues from the other person/people, we can restate our communications several times in several different ways, we can ask them to repeat [not regurgitate] what you said … and you can ask for feedback.

It’s not what you said … it’s what they think they heard.

NBAA Schedulers & Dispatchers Conference, San Antonio, TX

Winning the respect of chief pilots, directors of maintenance and others in your organization is crucial to your success, and possibly the success of your flight department – but your expertise only gets you so far! Using your personal power and influence, along with adapting your behavior patterns, can make you the “go to” person in your department. This session will cover techniques to recognize and anticipate communication patterns from others; you will practice persuading and negotiating with a structured checklist. You will develop skills to stop defensive attitudes and words, and heighten your awareness of signals that others send you. This session will enhance and develop your natural and learned skills.

How Leaders Inspire, Influence & Achieve Results

It’s a fact of organizational life: to lead well you must communicate well, especially in the fast-paced results-oriented atmosphere of business aviation where time can be of the essence. Identifying your triggers and patterns, and objectively diagnosing your behaviors to resolve issues faster and serve your passengers in the smoothest way, both confirm your value to the organization. This course teaches communication styles to improve all business interactions and ways to build more efficient teams, make better decisions and ensure buy-in from all parties.

Contact NBAA for registration.

Mountain State University, Altamonte Springs Florida Campus. 

This three-day three-credit course is offered as part of MSU’s Aviation undergraduate degree.  We will be touring Cessna’s Service Center and FlightSafety in Orlando.

I’ve been doing research on the aviation accident that happened in Tenerife in the Canary Islands, Spain in 1977. This is an absolutely fascinating study in looking at how each element contributed to the fiery crash.

A chain of events is a sequence of events that, occurring consecutively, caused an accident. Had only one or two of these events happened, the accident may not have happened.

It all began with a bomb explosion in the Las Palmas terminal, diverting all flights to Tenerife. The KLM captain opted to let his passengers off the aircraft. Heavy fog rolled in. When it rolled back out, briefly, passengers were not quick to reboard.

From a communications perspective, the dialogue between the air traffic controllers, the KLM pilot, and the Pan Am pilot is a comedy of errors. When people from two aircraft talk on the radio at the same time, squelching occurs. This happened at a critical time when Pam Am stated they were still taxiing down the runway.

We will never know exactly what was rolling through the Captain’s mind … possibly expiring crew duty times, possibly the monies the airline would have to spend if the flight stayed overnight, perhaps “we’ve come this far we need to complete the task” …. was it loss avoidance or a tightly-held commitment?

As in all our lives, it isn’t what you said, it’s what they think they heard.

Yes there really is a sickness called “Hurry Up Syndrome”!  I knew this disease existed, I was surprised that it had a real scientific name!  According to University of Manchester’s Dr. James Reason, this time crunch that we operate under increases the chance that we will make a mistake by 11 times.*

When we are operating with this malady, we tend to make decisions based more on emotion than relying on fact, or on a combination of facts and emotion.  Our perspective changes, and our natural cautious checkpoints are crushed.  We are focused on completing the task, resolving the uncomfortable or threatening situation, or wanting the offending person to leave us alone!  In other words, our amygdala [Amy, as my clients know it] hijacks and takes control of our thinking.  Our neo-cortex is not given the opportunity to take over.

EMS pilots are especially susceptible to this … they have a critical care patient they must fly from Point A to Point B.  Knowing this is a critical flight, can cause these pilots to take risks they may not have taken otherwise.

Think of how your communication changes when you are experiencing “hurry up syndrome”.

It isn’t what they said, it’s what you think you heard!

*B&CA magazine, October 2008, p. 44

NBAA Annual Convention, Orlando FL

Contact NBAA for registration

From this fatal accident in February 2009, Shari has analyzed the captain’s words and behaviors from a leadership standpoint. She focuses on three areas: empathy, self-confidence/self-esteem, and intiative.  Her white paper has been met with excitement and fascination. Email her for your own copy!