I am indebted to contributors on 'unsafe' or inappropriate attitudes
in pilots (and/or airspace managers, aviation executives, aircraft
loaders, engineers, company directors, aircraft manufacturers, anyone
who directs flight operations, etc.). I think my own list is now
complete as a result.
Now to get off the point of the original question, but -- there surely
is an angle we as professionals must consider. Anyone who's been
following my writing (and I'll admit there hasn't been any time to
take in what I say in the paper Neil's in the process of posting) will
recall I talk a lot about the notion of personal liability.
Yeah, I know I've been hanging around too much with my mate 'Fran' the
lawyer, but she is my running partner. More, we crm developers do need
to come to grips with it, our own situation in designing & propagating
'solutions'.
It's a commonplace that soap powder manufacturers have to be able to
justify a claim that 'Brand X washes whiter'. Pretty much the same
obligation stalks crm developers who say, 'This program will . . ..'
Which brings me back to attitudes -- they have to be treated as
skills, cognitive skills. Scratch back to your exposure to pedagogy,
and you'll recall that skills can only be learned by practice, and
that their presence can only be validated by demonstration. To be
sure, motivation comes into play, but I'll keep it simple.
Asking people to learn attitudes by reading a scenario, and then
selecting from a range of choices the most appropriate course of
action, will certainly assist in developing proper attitudes to
flying, but there will not be the degree of certainty my mate Fran
will expect of the organisation that claims to be thus strengthening
flight crew safety factors.
Attitudes are ways of thinking. Their genesis may be in the class
room, in reading, or in the ready room listening to the 'old hands',
but they are not actually implanted into the sub-conscious as a part
of the flight-management apparatus until an experience arises in which
to apply them. Repetition reinforces. Once implanted, they can only be
'over-written' by further exerience, and repetition. (Place yourself
in the mind of the pilot flying for too long under lowering cloud, who
gets away with it.)
My position on this may be specific to Australia. Here, the prevailing
attitudes to safety can be characterised as defiant of authority and
control (we've got pretty well everything on Vince's list). Sooner or
later, the schools that are the breeding grounds for these ways of
thinking will be held accountable. It may not be for a long while, but
the day will come. In the interim, professionals need to look closely
at their prescriptions to make sure what they are teaching actually
takes effect.
In doing that, returning to the basics of learning theory in skill
development will remind that experiential programs will beat the
lecture or reading-guide approach every time.
There's plenty more on this in the paper. If it applies in the skies
you operate in, I trust you'll be able to use it to your own benefit.
Cheers
Doug