Psychologists have offered the aviation industry a lot of advice, but much of what we do comes under the general title of ‘High Performance Tasks’. The selection and training of pilots is designed to ensure that only those candidates who are capable of performing at a high level reach military cockpits or commercial flight decks. Nevertheless, once on the ‘front line’ not all pilots perform as well as the most effective crews. So let’s review the aspects of high performance tasks:

  • Extensive practise is required

The most effective crews seek out opportunities for self learning, maybe not every day, but regularly. They revise the manuals routinely, and don’t wait until just before the next line or simulator check. They hand fly the aircraft, but only when appropriate – there are too many hand flying ‘aces’ who’s knowledge of the autoflight systems are woefully inadequate. Equally, there are pilots who rarely hand fly and are always out of practise. It cannot be emphasised enough that experience only comes from regular, focused, practise, not the hours or years in the job.

  • Substantial numbers of candidates fail to achieve proficiency.

Hopefully, those that are on the line have already passed this hurdle, but there is no room for complacency.

  • Performance of experts is qualitatively different to novices

Once again, experienced doesn’t necessarily mean expert. The experts have put in time and effort to achieve the skill levels that they demonstrate.

One of the aims of the extensive practise mentioned above is to ‘automate’ a task in our brain. An automated task is one that can be rapidly executed with economy of effort. To become automated, the skill or task requires extensive practise – not just a few minutes thought before a check. Mentally and physically rehearsing a drill, and the location of the switches, will all help on that ‘dark and stormy night’ when life gets busy.

For the multi-crew pilots though, a word of caution – none of this means that hands should be flashing around the flight deck like lightning. The other pilot should never be taken by surprise by your actions. Often the most effective way to achieve this is to get the other pilot to carry out the action on your command. Funny old thing, that’s generally what the check list instructions say.