Pilot in Command: A Pilot’s Guide to Leadership

(This is from a presentation I gave in August 2019 at a leadership symposium.)

Everything I needed to know about LEADERSHIP I learned from my flight instructor at 7,500 feet.

It was early Aug 2007. My flight instructor, Tom, and I were flying around our local area practicing maneuvers when Tom asked, “What is that off your left-wing?”

I turned and looked out the windscreen. “Where,” I asked, “I don’t see anything. What did you see?”

While I was distracted, suddenly and without my knowing, Tom reached over and pulled the throttle all the way back. The engine – which is normally pretty loud in the little plane – went silent.

I could feel the plane slow to a stop; suspended in mid-air.

You know the feeling when you’re on the highway at speed and you take your foot off the accelerator, how the momentum lifts you slightly out of your seat and forward?

That’s what I felt. Deceleration. And silence.

I spun around and looked at him, wild-eyed and panicked. “What just happened?”

My instructor was cool and calm in his aviator sunglasses. He smiled, which seemed totally out of place considering the panic I was feeling. “You’ve just lost your engine. What do you do now?”

I would like to say that I handled it like a grown man; I’d like to say that I was as cool and calm as he was, but I can’t. I freaked. I actually thought the engine had died and we were going to crash.

But I looked at my instructor, saw his smirky confidence, and knew that this was one of his lessons. He wanted me to feel that moment of panic so I would know how to get past it, rely on my training, and work through the issue to resolution.

I looked around the cockpit to try and determine what had happened, but my instructor told me to slow down, take a breath, and remember my training. He reminded of the mantra he had instilled in us during ground school and our first few training flights. I repeated aloud: “Aviate. Navigate. Communicate.”

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I am a business and leadership coach. Prior to that, I spent over 25 years as a management consultant in the areas of Organizational Change and Business Transformation. I flew every week – out on Monday morning and back home on Friday evening. I traveled to business clients around the US, Canada, Mexico, Europe, and the UK. I put in a lot of miles.

I’m also a private pilot. I received my license in 2008, so flying is a huge part of my life.

As a business coach, I draw from that experience. I use the analogy of flying to talk to my coaching clients and prospects about business transformation. During the 1:1 coaching sessions and group coaching sessions, I find that the business owners or franchise owners are so caught up in the day-to-day running of their businesses, that they can’t see the forest for the trees. So, I use analogies and stories related to flying to give them lessons on leadership and how to improve their business; to focus on strategies, growth, and taking care of the day-to-day operations.

Those lessons are easier to take when they come in the form of stories and the business owners can then take those lessons and apply them to their specific situations. I use analogies related to flying whenever possible.

I’ve written two books using the analogy of flight and stories of flying. The first book, FLIGHT PLANNING: A Pilot’s Guide to Business Success takes the analogy of filing a flight plan to discuss the need to a strategic plan in business. Identifying where you are, where you want to be, and the best route to get there.

My second book, BARNSTORMING: A Pilot’s Guide to Growing Your Business uses the stories of the early barnstormers and how they started from scratch, created their niche, and then generated a market for their aerobatic “flying circus” acts.

How many of you are entrepreneurs?

In the book, and during the coaching sessions, I draw similarities between how the barnstormers were the ultimate entrepreneurs; they created their own target market and niche, constantly improved their skills and even created strategic partnerships to grow their business.

There are a lot of similarities between flying and business.

Today, I want to talk about leadership and using my flying experience, I want to introduce you to the concept of PIC – Pilot in Command – and how the PIC uses Aviate, Navigate, and Communicate to methodically manage the business of flying.

Most of you have been on a commercial airliner, right? You’ve no doubt looked into the cockpit, the flight deck, so you know that there are usually 2 or 3 pilots in the cockpit. There is the Captain in the left seat and a first officer and a flight engineer or second officer. The Captain will be designated PIC for that flight, the pilot in command.

Even if both pilots are ranked as Captain, there is still only one PIC. In fact, EVERY seat on the plane, including the passenger compartment, could be filled with captains; there is still only one PIC, pilot in command. That PIC is responsible for the plane, the flight crew, and the safety of all the passengers, everything that happens during the flight. The PIC is the leader of the business of flying.

There are lots of leadership traits or characteristics that you can find in books, YouTube videos or TED talks. You’ll hear a lot of leadership traits and characteristics here, today. I’ve decided that, rather than talking to you about how to BE a leader, I wanted to talk about how to THINK like a leader, how to remember your vision, mission, and purpose. I want to talk about how to react under pressure, to rely on your knowledge, skills, and training, and never forget your responsibility for getting your team successfully to the goal.

For the next 30-minutes or so, I’d like your permission to be YOUR business coach, to help you learn to THINK like a leader using this simple framework. Would that be okay?

I want to embed this in your minds, so that you think about it whenever you find yourself at a crucial point in your leadership. The framework I learned all those years ago has helped me more than I can tell you, and the framework that I’ve shared with my clients have helped them manage and grow their businesses. And this simple framework consists of these three words: Aviate. Navigate. Communicate.

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By messaging me below, how many of you are LEADERS?

If you did NOT message me below, I would offer that each of you is a leader. One definition for a leader, according to the US Airforce’s manual for Crew Resource Management (CRM), is “a person whose ideas and actions influence the thoughts and behaviors of others.”

Leaders are agents of change; leaders influence, motivate and inspire others through their actions, behaviors, and their words.

Dan Cathy of Chick-fil-A once posted a story about his father, Truitt Cathy, and the lesson he learned from a six-year-old child. Truitt said the boy came up to him and told him he wanted to grow up and be just like him. Truitt had no idea what he’d done to prompt such a compliment but learned in that moment that young ones are always watching, looking to us for examples of what it means to be an adult, to be a leader.

It makes you wonder: What kind of example are we setting?

Think about times that you’ve had a direct or indirect impact on someone else’s thoughts or behaviors. People are watching you, seeing you, and they often internalize what they see and mimic the behavior.

You’ve likely experienced this in your life. You hold the door for someone, and you’ll often see them hold the door for someone else, returning the favor or playing it forward. Stop to help someone who is struggling, and you’ll often have others stop to assist.

Even through those simple actions, you are thinking and acting like a leader. A leader removes obstacles, assists their people, opening doors so that they can be successful.

The goal of a leader is to make more LEADERS; not more followers. We have enough followers, wouldn’t you agree? You make more leaders by setting the example and helping people to be successful.

That is leadership.

In business – as an entrepreneur – YOU are the PIC. But it’s not limited to business alone. You could be the CEO of your business, the President of your homeowner’s association, the Chair of your committee at your church or for a local charity; you are the Person in Command. You are ultimately responsible for the operations and the safety and well-being of your crew, your team, or your family. 

You don’t need special training or a special college degree. You don’t need a specific title. In fact, I just finished a book by Robin Sharma called “The Leader Who Had No Title.” It tells the story about a young man who thinks that leaders are those people in the big offices, the people who make a lot of money and drive big, fancy cars. A mentor takes the young man under his wing and introduces him to people of all ages, in all walks of life, in all types of situations; the one thing in common: they are ALL LEADERS. Right where they are, right where they stand.

You see, leaders are everywhere, every day, in all situations. Look around you. You’ll see people acting as leaders. Display leadership values like Honesty, Integrity, Charity, Diligence, Compassion.

So, with all that said, what does it mean to: Aviate. Navigate. Communicate.

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AVIATE. Essentially, fly the damned plane. With everything else that might be going on, you must remember that you are still the pilot and your first responsibility is to fly the plane.

As a leader – whether as the CEO of your business, as the chair of a committee at your church, school, or non-profit – your job is to fly the plane. Conduct the business of business. I could have easily let the panic get the better of me. I could have frozen up, focused on the throttle (sales), the fuel mixture (cash flow or service offerings), or running the engine restart checklist, but at that moment, I was in the left seat. I was the PIC. Whatever your situation, YOU are in the left seat; you are the pilot in command. Focus on your one job; flying the plane.

Whatever is happening, you – as the leader – need to remember your mission: to run the business, maintain the business, while you resolve the issues/problems. If the business comes to a grinding halt, there may not be a way to recover. Keep running the business, serving your customers and clients, while you delegate the necessary corrective action and strategies to get back on track.

To be a leader, you must always be prepared to lead, whatever the situation. See the big picture, draw from your experience, and lead. Whatever is happening, if you take your eyes off running of the company the company will fail and all will be lost. Never stop doing the business. Keep a level head, remember your training, stick to the systems and processes you have in place, and work the business.

Don’t get so caught up in the minutiae that you lose sight of running your business. That can have disastrous results.

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United Airlines Flight 173 departed from Denver about 2:47 with 189 people on board; destination, Portland, OR, with an estimated time en route of 2 hours and 26 minutes. According to the automatic flight plan and monitoring system, the total amount of fuel required for the flight to Portland was 31,900 lbs. There were 46,700 lbs of fuel onboard the aircraft when it departed the gate in Denver.

As the landing gear was being lowered on approach to Portland International Airport, the crew felt an abnormal vibration and yaw of the aircraft as well as a lack of an indicator light showing the gear was lowered successfully. The crew requested a holding pattern to diagnose the problem, and for approximately the next hour the crew worked to identify the status of the landing gear and prepare for a potential emergency landing.

The crew, however, failed to AVIATE or fly the plane which includes keeping track of fuel consumption. By the time they realized how low their fuel was, it was too late; and the plane crashed about 6 mile southeast of the runway.

Whatever is happening, always remember to take care of business. Serve your customers, serve your clients, and take care of your employees. Of course, work on the problem to get things right, but never stop flying the plane.

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Navigate. “Last time, as you recall, our hero was stranded at 7,500 feet with no engine…”

When the engine first shut down, I panicked, but only for a moment. I knew I needed to look around to find a safe place to make an emergency landing. I had to navigate. I had to know where I was, where I was going, and how to get there as safely and efficiently as possible.

As the leader, you need to constantly be aware of where you are, where you’re going. I talked about the flight plan or the strategic plan that I help my clients put together. One of the most important aspects of the plan are the checkpoints or milestones.

My flight plan includes checkpoints to that at any time, I know whether I’m on track or not. If not, I know where I should be in relation to where I am, so I knew how to get back on track.

As a leader, your strategic plan includes milestones; by this point in the month or in the project, I should be at X or Y. If you find that you are NOT where you thought you should be, you have the information available to get back on track.

Knowing where you are and what’s around you allow you to come up with a Plan B or even a Plan C when the situation calls for it.

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US Airways flight 1549 departed LaGuardia airport at 3:25 PM. Its destination was Charlotte, North Carolina. The first officer, newly qualified to fly the Airbus A320, was in control. “What a view of the Hudson today” remarked the captain.

About two minutes into the flight, at an altitude of just over 2,800 feet, the airplane flew into a flock of Canada geese. Both engines were severely damaged, causing an almost complete loss of thrust.

Captain “Sully” Sullenberger took control of the aircraft as the first officer ran through the checklist for restarting the engines. Repeated attempts to restart the engines were unsuccessful. They were now at 3,000 feet and needed to make some critical decisions.

Knowing where he was, Sully thought about returning to LaGuardia. He radioed the tower and they cleared the airspace for him, but working through the scenario in his mind, Sully realized he wouldn’t have the power to get safely back to the airport. He asked, instead, for clearance to Teterboro airport, just over the state line in New Jersey. As air traffic control worked to clear the airspace, again Sully and his first officer determined they didn’t have the altitude or airspeed to make the journey. Sully and his first officer discussed the possibility of landing in the Hudson. “Any better ideas,” Sully asked? “Actually no” responded his first officer. Captain Sully radioed air traffic control “We’ll be in the Hudson” and the rest is history.

By knowing where they were and what was around them – by navigating and taking all of the information in – Sully was able to safely land the plane and bring all 150 passengers, 3 flight attendants, and the two pilots home safely.

As the leader, you set the direction for your team. You define the vision, mission, and purpose; you identify your strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats; you identify the result you are after, the goal, and what success looks like. No commercial or military navigator works in a vacuum; they draw information from myriad places to get a better understanding of their current location and situation so that they have options.

As John Maxwell says, a leader who follows the laws of navigation see more than, see further than, and see before others do. That’s what YOU need to do as a leader.

You, as the PIC of your business, need to make sure you stay on target. You’ve set a goal or result you’re after; you have identified the strategy or strategies you can use to achieve that goal. You’ve put the systems in place to implement the chosen strategy. Now you have to WORK YOUR SYSTEM.

But you do that always with your eye on the goal. Don’t let the strategy or system itself take the place of the goal or result you’re after forefront in your mind. You can always alter the strategy or system – those are the MEANS to your intended END – and they can be tweaked as needed to keep you on track. Remember, there are a multitude of strategies to accomplish the goal; more than one way to skin a cat; 50 ways to leave your lover; if your current strategy isn’t producing the results, if your current system isn’t right or there are steps or processes missing, select a different strategy or system.

This is critical in my coaching sessions: You should NEVER be locked into a strategy or tactic or system. You should remain locked in your goal, but your strategies – the means to achieve the goal – are flexible.

A good navigator can make course corrections or even plan a new course; never letting go of or losing sight of the goal or destination. A good navigator takes into account the current conditions, the knowledge of what’s happening around them, and they take input from other people. A leader isn’t expected to have all the answers. Many public leaders were very open about seeking counsel from others before making major decisions. 

As a leader, you set the path and it’s up to you to make sure all of your decisions, all of your directions are in-line with that goal, so your team knows where they are going and how they are getting there. As the leader, you need to keep an eye on the business climates, the trends in your industry, your marketplace, your competitors and keep abreast of anything that could threaten the eventual success of your mission. Using all of that information, you NAVIGATE.

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Communicate. During this “mock event,” my instructor and I talked through the communication that would transpire. How I would communicate with our home airport and the local air traffic. I would switch the radio to the local emergency channel and broadcast either a “MAYDAY” call – MAYDAY is reserved for life-threatening situations like fire, structural damage, or engine failure that will result in a forced landing – or the lesser-known “PAN PAN” which is similar to MAYDAY but for urgent situations that are not life-threatening like require assistance from the ground like being lost, electrical failure that knocks out navigation. Both calls result in immediate radio silence until the situation is resolved.

During my coaching sessions, I can’t tell you how many business owners wait for MAYDAY rather than listening to PAN-PAN. They know things are off track, but they wait for an emergency, wait for things to get to critical before they do something. Don’t wait for MAYDAY. Don’t even wait for PAN-PAN. Measure your progress, check your milestones, and take corrective action at the first sign of trouble.

Communication in the cockpit is crucial to the success of any flight. When I interviewed several friends, who are commercial pilots with Delta Airlines, they mentioned the ability to effectively communicate with your team is critical to the safety and security of the flight. Without clear communications, without timely communications, the results can be disastrous.

When emergencies happen, you – as the PIC – must keep a clear head, immediately assess the situation. The PIC must be able to take in information, then synthesize it and make decisions, put together a plan, and communicate to all involved, coordinating efforts to get things resolved. Failure to step into the role of PIC leaves everyone foundering.

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Air France flight 447 was in trouble. The flight, from Brazil to Paris, France, started out as normal. The Airbus A330 usually took a two-person flight crew, but because of the time and distance there were three pilots: the Captain and two first officers. The A330 is equipped with a crew rest compartment so that the pilots can take turns resting and rotate the piloting. The Captain, PIC, sent one of the first officers to the rest compartment.

About 3.5 hours into the flight, the Captain sent for the first officer to return to the flight deck. They had a short briefing to bring the first office up to speed, then the Captain took his turn in the rest compartment.

Two minutes later, the plane experienced a weather even over the Atlantic Ocean; not unusual for the area and, indeed, earlier flights had encountered the weather and continued their flights unimpeded. Flight 447, however, encountered turbulence and icing. Icing is a problem and in this case the pitot tube was iced over. The pitot tube, an angular tube projecting from the body of the aircraft near the nose, brings in air which indicates to the onboard computer and autopilot the airspeed.

The autopilot had disengaged because it was no longer receiving airspeed information because the pitot tube was iced over. The auto-thrust system disengaged and put the plane into a roll right.

One of the pilots took control of the stick and overcorrected to the left. The aircraft rolled uncontrollably left, then right, then left again. The pilot also pulled back on the stick raising the nose. The angle of attack – the nose up attitude – had gone from 3 to 13 to 30 degrees. This was unnecessary and excessive under the circumstances and placed the plane in a stall attitude. About 30 seconds later, the airspeed started to register again but the pilot continued pulling the nose up. As the aircraft started to slow in the stall attitude, the pilot pushed the engine thrusters fully forward which exacerbated the nose-high attitude.

The other first officer called “controls to the left” indicating that he was taking back control of the aircraft. He took the stick and pushed the nose down, however the pilot in the right seat was pulling up on the nose and the two actions canceled each other out.

The Captain reentered the cockpit and asked the pilots “What are you doing?” The angle of attack, the nose up position, was now 40?. The engine thrusters were at 100% but with the nose-up attitude, the plane stalled. It fell from 38,000 feet to the ocean at a rate of 11,000 feet per minute. It hit belly-first into the ocean at 152 knots, roughly 175 mph, breaking up and killing all passengers and crew.

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On that flight, there was no communication. Clear, concise communication is essential for aviation safety. In ground school, we spend hours on cockpit communication, communication between planes, communication with the tower and with Air Traffic Control.

In business, you need to establish clear, concise communication. You as the PIC need to take control in emergency situations and lead your team through.

Statistics about aircraft safety shows that 80% of incident events are related to incorrect communication, 33% related to the absence of communication, and 12% related to correct but late communications.

I’m guilty of that myself. My wife stubs her toe and I say “Hey, watch out for that!” Good information; not at all timely.

In all my years as a business coach and consultant, I can’t tell you how many times the problems a business was having were related to communications. Just because you’re speaking doesn’t mean communication is happening.

Communication has three key parts: what you say, what the other person heard, and their interpretation of what they heard. In aviation, communication is said to have transpired with the message is sent, received, and understood.

It’s the same in business. You can send communication out all day long – verbal, written, or electronic – but if the message isn’t received or isn’t clearly understood, has communication really taken place?

As the PIC, think about the times and ways you communicate with your team. How will you give and receive communication, what jargon will you use and what is your meaning to the word? Every time you speak, you attach meaning to the words you choose. You choose those words because they hold a special meaning for you. However, communication – as my wife says – is an away-game. It doesn’t matter what you mean or what connotations you place on words, it’s the meaning or connotation the receiving party puts on the words.

If I say “sportscar” you all heard sportscar but the image you have in your mind is totally different than the image I have. If I say “red sportscar” you all have an image of a red sports car in your mind, but the car is different, and the color red is different.

If this is a life and death situation, I need you to understand exactly what I mean, without any ambiguities. You need to know what I mean or see what I see, not what you think I mean or what you think I see.

As pilots, we're taught to repeat any commands we’re given, either from an airport tower or from Air Traffic Control. By reading back, you’re verifying that you’ve heard correctly. Problems arise when you don’t repeat back, or you repeat back the directions you were EXPECTING rather than the directions given.

I read a story where a pilot, flying out of his home airfield, expected that his takeoff and climb would be normal. He would climb to 4000 feet and hold for clearance to 7000. However, that day, the tower instructed the plane to climb and hold at 3000. There was lots of radio chatter, so it took the pilot a few tries to get back with the tower. When he did, the acknowledged that he was level at 4000, per his usual habit or routine. “What altitude are you cleared for??” The pilot reviewed his notes, swallowed hard, and admitted “Ah, cleared to 3000, can we have 4000?” The center replied, “Nom you’re cleared immediately to 7000; by the way, we had you holding at 3000 because we have an aircraft on emergency hold at 4000 over the airport.” That pilot was lucky that his incursion into the 4000-foot airspace didn’t end in a collision.

Sometimes our communication breaks down because we have scripted in our minds HOW the conversation will go (or we hope the conversation will go) and we are so focused on what our script says that we stop listening to the other person. If we are so focused on what WE want to say, our rebuttal or the key point we want to make, that we don’t even hear the other person’s response.

Another thing we cover a lot in my coaching sessions is that LEADERS LISTEN. In business, whether dealing with customers or with employees, a good leader listens; they give their full attention to the person they are speaking with. They don’t allow interruptions, they don’t check their watch or their phone; the leader is fully engaged, giving their attention to the other person as if they are the most important person in the world at that moment.

I assume you have all eaten at a restaurant before. It doesn’t have to be a fancy or expensive restaurant, but just a restaurant that you’ve eaten at recently. The waiter or waitress has dropped off your food, topped off your drinks, and a few minutes later, what happens? The manager comes by to ask if you are satisfied. “How is everything folks?” or “How is everything tasting?” Are you with me? Now, question: do they really care if everything came out alright? Do they really care if you’re enjoying the food or not? How do you know?

Look at their feet.

More often than not, the manager’s feet are pointed up the aisle, which tells me they are merely doing what is expected. They were taught. So many minutes into the meal service, to stop by every table and ask if everything is okay and that’s ALL they are doing. They don’t care, and whether you said the food was good or the food was bad, they have performed their task – check-check – and they are off to the next table. They are NOT engaged.

As a leader, you don’t ever want to give the impression that you are just doing what is expected when it comes to your employees or team members. If you ask, “How are you doing” MEAN IT; listen for the response; engage your employees. Let them know that you care, that they are important. Make small talk, ask about their life outside of work. Engage your employees.

Engaged employees are more productive, their quality of work is better, and they have less accidents. Engage your employees.

There are times when communication needs to be one-way, with the PIC giving commands and those commands being carried out. Other times, communication is two-way, with the PIC asking and receiving input. Leaders take input and feedback from their teams in order to have all the information available to make the best decisions possible.

The problems start when either the leader is unwilling to listen – they are in charge, after all, and are fully capable of making decisions without any help – or when the crew or team members are uncomfortable or unwilling to challenge or question the leader. One such case reported happened with a small commuter plane in Canada. The plane was ready to take off, but the departure was delayed while the tower waited for a small private aircraft to land. Passengers looking out the windows noticed snow accumulating on the wings and were concerned. They raised their concerns with the flight attendant, but no one thought it appropriate to say anything to the flight crew. The flight ended in disaster with the one surviving crew member, the flight attendant, admitted that she had never been trained to question an area that in her mind was clearly a pilot’s responsibility.

Communication is a core leadership function. I would argue that leadership IS communication; verbal and non-verbal. Leaders must be effective communicators in various relationships and at all levels within and outside their organization.

Leaders must be effective communicators which include both speaking and listening.

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So, back to the original story. I was 7500 feet in the air with essentially no engine. By relying on my training and remembering the framework my flight instructor taught me, I was able to successfully survive that mock emergency.

I was able to AVIATE, to fly the plane to ensure all controls were operational; correct attitude, altitude, and airspeed.

I was able to NAVIGATE, identifying where I was, my approximate location and compass heading so I could alert emergency responders to my location.

Finally, to COMMUNICATE with my home airport and local traffic to alert them to my current situation, the type of onboard emergency I was experiencing, and I gave approximate coordinates to my chosen landing site.

If you follow this simple framework, THINK like a leader, then under pressure and extreme conditions, YOU will make all the right moves and bring your emergency under control.

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Again, each of you is a leader; whether you intend to be or not, whether you know it or not, people are watching you. Through your ideas and actions, you influence the thoughts and behaviors of others, so be sure to set a strong example; Honesty, Integrity, Charity, Diligence, Compassion.

You never know where you will learn your lessons in leadership. It could be thousands of feet above sea level; it could be at this moment, at this symposium.

Embrace the leadership traits and characteristics you will hear today.

And if I could get you to remember one thing from this article, if I could have you come away with a new perspective, a new appreciation for leadership, and if I could leave you with a simple framework, a framework that I learned years ago, a framework that I now teach in all my coaching sessions, it would be this:

When – not if, but when – the crap hits the fan, when emergencies arise, when it comes time to lead and be the PIC – the pilot or person in command, take a deep breath and THINK like a leader: Aviate. Navigate. Communicate.

Are you struggling to be the Pilot in Command of your business? If so, and you'd like to learn more about implementing this simple framework - Aviate, Navigate, Communicate - then schedule a free 20-minute telephone chat. Go to www.TimeWithCoach.com (or direct message me on LI) and let's get started!