CRM (crew resource management) has mutated and evolved over
the years since it was first introduced, from a simple effort to manage the
cockpit authority gradient in the wake of accidents like Tenerife, to a complex
integration of culture, style, decision making, communication and straight
forward procedural compliance. We see with hindsight that CRM has a sometimes
significant impact on the safe (or otherwise) conduct of a flight but it is
much more difficult to recognise good and bad CRM in the here-and-now, when you
are an active part of the dynamic. Harder still to do something about it. So
how do we improve CRM across the operation?
In the early days at Emirates as we began to amass an
astonishing array of nationalities and cultures on our aircraft flight decks,
the industry and several associated academics became very interested in how that
diversity was going to affect our CRM. Would there be an irreconcilable clash
of styles and expectations leading to unpredictable breakdowns in communication
and operational behaviours? Well to the surprise of many the answer appears to
have been ‘no’. What we actually discovered was that, finding themselves
slightly outside their cultural comfort zone or CCZ, (alright I’m joking, that
isn’t actually a TLA…) pilots resorted to the only common cultures they shared –
standard operating procedures and standard phraseology. I am not saying we had
100% compliance but it seemed to be better than most and the output was
generally good CRM.
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