PROFESSIONALISM
(Departures + Cancellations) X 100. NBAA goes on to precisely defi ne departure and delay, so this can be an easily measurable and universal metric. When properly framed within a context that compares your team against the average, it becomes very hard for any executive to deny the eff ectiveness of a well- trained, dedicated crew. For example, Gulfstream provides a DR of 99.88 % for the G-550 fl eet in its May 2018 Fleet Update. If a maintenance team responsible for a G550 can beat that percentage while delivering improved availability through scheduling control, they can begin to describe their value in an attractive and concise way. It is undisputable that the winning maintenance team will place a high priority on achieving a maximum reliability number, and I believe that every technician should understand how that metric will be used as an argument for or against the viability of their team. When analyzing the performance of an individual technician, however, dispatch reliability needs to retreat to a place somewhere behind the pillars of our creed: Integrity, Safety and Responsibility. Literally stated in the Mechanics Creed, written by Jerome Lederer of the U.S. Civil Aeronautics Board in 1941, (found at www.
FAASafety.gov), “… I pledge myself never to undertake work or approve work which I feel to be beyond the limits of my knowledge, nor shall I allow any non-certifi cated superior to persuade me to approve aircraft or equipment as airworthy against my better judgement, nor shall I permit my judgement to be infl uenced by money or other personal gain…”. The spirit of this ethos is in jeopardy when any individual technician is led to associate a specifi c reliability number with raises, bonuses, or personal advancement on their team. It is unfair for management
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to create such a direct and obvious confl ict of interest. It is even worse when elevated DR becomes linked to salary raises and bonuses for the entire team in a way that connects a single technician’s airworthiness decisions to other teammates’ earnings. We should reject this type of culture as it tends to lead down a path of incremental justifi cation for bending the rules. In a worst-case scenario, when investigators need to fi nd root causes and accountability, I do not want to be the technician leaning solely on “I promise I made the decision to dispatch that aircraft based on ethics and best judgement, disregarding the potential loss of income for myself and my teammates if I decided it was a no-go.” I could be the reigning champion of morality, with an unblemished record of ethical decision making, and this is still an undeservedly thin and feeble defense when motivations are called to account. For an example of how this
problematic culture is developed within a fl ight department, consider the clear confl ict of interest created when the DR metric shows up on an employees’ personal performance plan. In many maintenance organizations, individual performance plans are an HR tool that requires employees to create specifi c and measurable goals in the beginning of the year, and then review and rate progress at midyear and the end of the year. The process includes approval and feedback from a direct manager. When crafted thoughtfully and diligently, a performance plan can chart a technician’s ambitions and successes, and provide managers the rationale they need to off er promotions and raises. At fi rst, it seems perfectly reasonable, even admirable, for a tech to develop a goal that cites a specifi c dispatch reliability percentage for the aircraft under
their care. It feels good to predict yourself delivering high value to your team in this way, especially when prompted by management. I have had a manager who encouraged all direct reports to prioritize a DR percentage as a top personal goal every year. I have never complied with that request simply because I cannot justify the confl ict of interest. I do not want raises, promotions or personal gain anywhere near the space where I’ve been trusted to make critical airworthiness decisions. On a team that strives to create a
culture of integrity, there absolutely needs to be a delineation between rewarding ethics-inspired processes that lead to a high DR versus simply rewarding the eventual number. There must be a regard for how the number is achieved. How can we encourage a technician to specify dispatch reliability as a personal goal in an offi cial HR process and then send them out to the hangar fl oor to make the tough go/no-go decisions? It’s unethical because we have just linked their bank account to a result — returning the aircraft to service before its next scheduled fl ight. Sometimes an inspection reveals a condition that simply cannot be repaired in time. Sometimes there are part shipping delays. Sometimes there are on-ramp failures that create an unavoidable DR hit. In these, and in all cases, we are obligated to call only on technical knowledge and sound judgement informed by the highest ethical standards before we respond and react. Income reward should not even have the appearance of being a factor in the decision-making process. If high dispatch reliability is a result worthy to be rewarded, let’s do it by rewarding the behaviors that emulate ethical decision making and sound judgement. Let’s reward technicians that champion truth telling. Sometimes that will mean rewarding
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