Has ANYONE ever tried this????
Thread Starter
Join Date: Nov 2001
Location: Earth (unfortunately)
Posts: 74
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Has ANYONE ever tried this????
Hello All,
I am pilot at a regional airline in the US currently on leave and working with the University of California, Berkeley on an organizational behavior research. We are looking at the recent increase in incident trends among regional carriers and evaluating the different leadership training programs at several of these airlines.
During some of our research, several individuals in my team (who have little knowledge of the aviation industry) were surprised to learn about the lack of peer evaluations among pilots. While first officers are evaluated by captains during their duties (in some airlines on an ongoing basis, while in the US it's usually limited to the probationary period), I am not aware of any programs that allow first officers to provide feedback to the captain.
Has anyone ever heard of a program under which after each flight ALL pilots provide a confidential evaluation on each other regarding some key parameters (CRM, decision making, SOP compliance, aircraft handling)? The idea is not for it to be punitive, but rather to collect a large number of data on each individual crew member that can be used for trend monitoring as well as training purposed during the LOFT scenarios. Of course the program would have to be structured in a similar fashion at the ASAP, where a representative of the pilot group would ensure the confidentiality of the data and any information passed on to the training department would have to be coded in an acceptable manner.
My first reaction to this idea was negative. However, after seeing how similar techniques are used in other industries, I am starting to see the potential value. It is normal for team members in business units to evaluate each other on an ongoing basis. Of course, there is always the risk of certain crew members leaving negative comments for retaliation or other factors, but once the volume of data is large enough, these isolated instances become less significant. The idea is to see trends from a large number of reports. On flight decks with more than 2 crew members, the data would be more interesting as it would offer multiple perspectives on the same person for the same flight.
I am curious to hear your opinions on a similar system being used on an aircraft's flight deck.
Thank you in advance for all your comments.
palgia
I am pilot at a regional airline in the US currently on leave and working with the University of California, Berkeley on an organizational behavior research. We are looking at the recent increase in incident trends among regional carriers and evaluating the different leadership training programs at several of these airlines.
During some of our research, several individuals in my team (who have little knowledge of the aviation industry) were surprised to learn about the lack of peer evaluations among pilots. While first officers are evaluated by captains during their duties (in some airlines on an ongoing basis, while in the US it's usually limited to the probationary period), I am not aware of any programs that allow first officers to provide feedback to the captain.
Has anyone ever heard of a program under which after each flight ALL pilots provide a confidential evaluation on each other regarding some key parameters (CRM, decision making, SOP compliance, aircraft handling)? The idea is not for it to be punitive, but rather to collect a large number of data on each individual crew member that can be used for trend monitoring as well as training purposed during the LOFT scenarios. Of course the program would have to be structured in a similar fashion at the ASAP, where a representative of the pilot group would ensure the confidentiality of the data and any information passed on to the training department would have to be coded in an acceptable manner.
My first reaction to this idea was negative. However, after seeing how similar techniques are used in other industries, I am starting to see the potential value. It is normal for team members in business units to evaluate each other on an ongoing basis. Of course, there is always the risk of certain crew members leaving negative comments for retaliation or other factors, but once the volume of data is large enough, these isolated instances become less significant. The idea is to see trends from a large number of reports. On flight decks with more than 2 crew members, the data would be more interesting as it would offer multiple perspectives on the same person for the same flight.
I am curious to hear your opinions on a similar system being used on an aircraft's flight deck.
Thank you in advance for all your comments.
palgia
Join Date: Aug 2007
Location: Germany
Posts: 122
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Actually, some years ago I heard of one captain who was handing out questionnaires to FOs as a way to assess his CRM performance. This will not work for obvious reasons. But the approach you mentioned sounds pretty good! I would love to hear more about this 
Join Date: May 2008
Location: Kettering
Posts: 150
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
self assessment
Palgia,
I visited a MercyFlight rotary operation in NY State. After every flight the crew sat down and did a debrief on how things went. If anyone then sent in a safety report on something that happened the Safety Manager's first question was 'was this discussed post flight?'. If not, then the crew came back together to discuss the issue and the report was resubmitted.
Not quite what you are after but a similar approach.
I visited a MercyFlight rotary operation in NY State. After every flight the crew sat down and did a debrief on how things went. If anyone then sent in a safety report on something that happened the Safety Manager's first question was 'was this discussed post flight?'. If not, then the crew came back together to discuss the issue and the report was resubmitted.
Not quite what you are after but a similar approach.
Join Date: Jun 2006
Location: Australia
Posts: 1,186
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Many years ago. Ansett Airlines of Australia introduced a policy where a first officer or captain could choose not to fly with a particular individual. If crewing discovered that several pilots had entered bids not to crew with one particular captain or F/O, this crew member would be invited into the management office for a please explain why so many had opted not to be crewed with this individual. In other words, everyone can't be wrong and for the situation to become that obvious that it was affecting rostering, the individual needs to be closely looked at.
This remained a successful policy and the people concerned soon got the message and usually changed their ways. The complaints were sometimes aimed at check pilots autocratic manner or for instance continued rudeness or sarcasm. At the worse the pilot concerned would be removed from check pilot duties. This policy was a good safety valve.
The suggestion of writing up a report on each flight at the end of the day, by each other on each other, is fraught with opening up a deep resentment and there is nothing more contrary to flight safety than two crew regarding each other with deep suspicion as soon as they settle into their seats. Leave those sort of personal evaluations to the experts - psychologists, not untrained pilots
This remained a successful policy and the people concerned soon got the message and usually changed their ways. The complaints were sometimes aimed at check pilots autocratic manner or for instance continued rudeness or sarcasm. At the worse the pilot concerned would be removed from check pilot duties. This policy was a good safety valve.
The suggestion of writing up a report on each flight at the end of the day, by each other on each other, is fraught with opening up a deep resentment and there is nothing more contrary to flight safety than two crew regarding each other with deep suspicion as soon as they settle into their seats. Leave those sort of personal evaluations to the experts - psychologists, not untrained pilots
