In 1976 NASA did a series of studies on communications issues between flight deck crew. The NTSB picked up on this and ultimately developed the definition BE gave.
It seems that it was originally referred to as Cockpit Resource Management and sometime in the last 10 years or so changed to Crew Resource Management.
In the States, United Airlines have the reputation, amongst those who might know, of being the industry leaders. Most major carriers have some form of CRM courses.
There seems to be a trend now to encompass CRM under the umbrella of "Human Factors".
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