There is no feeling in the world like flying an airplane. The famous naval aviator Jack R. Hunt said, “For most people, the sky is the limit. For those who love aviation, the sky is home.” “Final check, then apply full power,” says the instructor. I’m hunched over the controls of the Piper, my palms sweating and my head full of figures. The pilot of a 747 couldn’t be concentrating any harder. Final Check means a quick glance over the million dials in front of me to ensure that‘temperatures and pressures’ are normal. Then it’s the Big White Numbers check which means making sure the runway number given by air traffic control matches the huge numbers painted on the runway in front of me – thereby ensuring I’m on the correct runway and not about to meander in front of a 737 on its way to Zurich. Flying is all about logical planning, together with the training and flexibility to deal with any eventuality, which strikes me as the same set of skills you need for crisis management. Continue Reading
Aviation and Business: what can we learn?
In 1993, I decided to start taking flying lessons. Flying had always piqued my curiosity. On one hand, it was an activity I felt compelled to do; on the other, like any exciting pursuit, it required both adventure and risk. It scared me. That mix of emotions is why, when I finally decided to burn some fuel and enter the wild blue yonder in a tiny but nimble Piper Warrior airplane, flying became one of the most incredible and empowering experiences of my life. In the aviation safety is given a lot of attention — and rightfully so. Redundancy and checklists are everywhere and there is very strict regulation where everything is codified. As importantly,there are aviation-related organizations whose main focus is on learning from past mistakes. The business world could certainly learn a thing or two from the aviation industry. I’ve realized that there isn’t much of a difference between piloting an aircraft and running a business. Each opportunity has taught me a valuable lesson about Continue Reading
Project Management and Flying: learnings from the flight deck
Some 50 years since the inception of project management, more than 50% of IT projects still fail because they run out of time, resources, funds, etcetera. If pilots flew aircraft like we run projects, no one would ever fly. However, every day millions of people fly for work or pleasure and flights arrive on time almost 90 percent of the time, delayed mainly by weather. Airline travel is also the safest form of long-distance travel with a fatal accident rate of .022 per 100,000 hours flown. We have been flying for just over 100 years, but project management has been around since the building of the pyramids and the Great Wall. Are there any learnings we can take from flying? I think we can. Aviation has always fascinated me. I’m on a plane almost every week and there isn’t a take-off or landing that bores me. When wheels go up, a slight panic ensues as any morsel of control vanishes completely. I am always thankful for the days when the only major task performed Continue Reading
Flying and airplane and (project)management: how to deal with a potential crisis?
When I passed the flight test and earned my private pilot’s license I was a safe and competent aviator, but not yet a good one. That would come a few years later. Piloting an aircraft is fun. It’s hard to describe the exhilaration that comes with being up in the sky and clouds. During flight training student pilots do everything by the books as they near the end of their private pilot training curriculum with their flight instructor. Checklists are methodically completed, which each item verbalized and confirmed. Intense focus is placed on objective standards such as maintaining the recommended climb speed with standards or holding altitude within limits such s flying straight and level. Once passed through this test the margin of error narrows when flying in an IFR flight plan, with Air Traffic Control (ATC) playing the role of the observer to ensure adequate traffic separation. Instrument pilots know their every move is being watched by both the controller and automated system: all Continue Reading
Moving forward: Agile Testing
Agile methodology is rapidly adopted by many project teams. Traditional methods of software development such as Waterfall, Spiral model, V-Model are becoming more and more outdated. First introduced by Dr. Winston W. Royce in a paper published in 1970, the waterfall model is a software development process. This model emphasizes that a logical progression of steps be taken throughout the software development life cycle (SDLC), much like the cascading steps down an incremental waterfall. Software developers and software testers are positioned as separate entities at different points along a production cycle. Waterfall is a respected methodology, but it's faced criticism: efficient production is severely hampered if developers are striving to refine their code to a state of perfection before passing it on to a separate testing team, who then strive to break it in as many ways as they can before sending their damage report back to the development team. This two-step process requires time, Continue Reading
Sabah – Malaysian Borneo Rocks!
“Hey I need to talk to you!” I don’t see him that often, my colleague working at the prestigious Hosting Team. I am more into End User Communication / End User Computing. He is - like me - a petrol head. That being said - he owns a 400+ break horsepower shiny Yellow Lotus Evora, a supercar by definition. And I…well I am allowed sometime to drive one. Anyway - he is heading to Malaysia soon which reminded me to write some about the two weeks I spend in that magnificent country. We travel, initially, to lose ourselves; and we travel, next, to find ourselves. We travel to open our hearts and eyes and learn more about the world .... And we travel, in essence, to become young fools again -- to slow time down and get taken in, and fall in love once more. (Pico Iyer) Kuala Lumpur, capital city of Malaysia is amazing.....! There is a lot to love about Kuala Lumpur, the modern and exotic capital city of Malaysia. Many people visit this magnificent city because they are Continue Reading