FLYING…

Here’s a good 2010 resolution for you to consider if you want to give your big dreams some much needed rocket fuel.  

Stop reading the newspaper, your trade rags, and a couple other hours each day that you give to your media of choice.  Invest those hours in reading one or two books each week.  Study, learn, and apply your knowledge toward your chosen profession.  Remember, it takes 10,000 hours to master just about anything.  Now is the time to get busy building your “domain specific knowledge.”  Mastery requires a very narrow focus.  Does your reading list reflect this fact?

Next, embrace more failing in 2010.  As you apply your newfound “domain specific knowledge,” you will notice that you will make lots of mistakes along the way.  In fact, if you aren’t falling down, that’s cause for concern.  Experiment your way forward and expect plenty of early explosions on the road toward “chemistry.”

AND, remember that nobody is as smart as everybody.  The reason the airlines you and I fly on are so much safer today than they were just 20 years ago, has little to do with the TSA agents, the color coded system, or the limiting of your carryon liquids.  No, the reason that flying is so much safer today is simply because pilot error rates have dropped like a rock in the past two decades.

AND, the reason for the drop is telling.  Since 1980 the airlines have instituted a policy they call CRM (Cockpit Resource Management) and it’s sole purpose is to make sure that the Captain isn’t the only one sharing his or her thoughts when something goes wrong.  Too many crashes have been caused because, out of fear, nobody wanted to tell the Captain he was wrong.  Dead wrong…

Today you are safer flying because the airlines finally got smart.  They realized that the Captain was not GOD.  He was merely the guy in charge.  AND, thanks to a policy called CRM, more and more flight attendants, and co-pilots have the “authority” to speak up.  The result is fewer and fewer crashes.  Very cool.

In 2010, invest in your 10,000 hours.  Find the time.  Allow yourself the luxury of making more mistakes and give this same gift to your teams.  AND, remember that nobody, not the Captain, and clearly not the CEO, is as smart as everybody.  Get them all thinking in the same direction and soon you and your team will be…

FLYING.