However, I would not hold up aviation as such a good example as he appears to do.
Aviation overall might well be that way, but do not paint all organisations with the same brush. I know there are certain operators who love collectiing QAR data and beat up any employees discovered infringing internal operating limits. And this unpleasant behaviour is certainly not confined to Asian and Middle East operators. There are others who love to take disciplinary action against staff who they believe have ‘endangered an aircraft’ when it was the staff member who reported their own transgression. If we are not careful we will end up like an African airline whose DFO reported “We are the safest airline in the World. Last year we did not receive a SINGLE ASR!”
But I don’t work for a company that works like this. ASR’s are a measure of how open we are. They combined with QAR data give us the ability to see what happens on line in the real world and support our staff through training for everybody or changes our procedures, not to punish individuals who were only trying to do their job.
The measure of how corrupt an airline is can often be determined by the proximity of the Human Resources and Chief Pilot’s office and the Flight Safety Department. It is often the former who are responsible vile, unpleasant, inhuman and totally corrupt actions taken against staff instigated by data obtained by the latter. The two together are an unholy alliance will create an organisation with deep rooted safety problems that will only be sorted out after a major incident.
But as I said, I’m very pleased I don’t work for a bunch of despots.
PM
ps. I’m also pleased to say Sidney gave us a two day seminar where he preached to the converted.