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Speech

FAA Managers’ Association

Thanks, Steve [Baker]. It’s a pleasure to be here. Let’s start things rolling with a clip you’re going to recognize.

[Clip from “A Few Good Men".]

I love that clip. I really love that clip. I tell you:  When it comes to portraying an ugly character, Jack Nicholson is the man.

But I’ll tell you something else. Jack Nicholson’s the man, but the character he’s playing, Colonel Nathan R. Jessup, he’s no leader. There’s no leadership going on there. It’s not leadership by any stretch of the imagination. It takes absolutely no skill to scream and yell or make clever remarks about punch lines at a party.

A few months ago, I called together all of the FAA’s senior executives to make sure we had our eyes on the ball. It was just like here tonight — a meeting of the minds, a chance to recalibrate, to make sure we’ve all got the same “true North” in mind when we talk about “true North.” I called the executives together because as you all know, we’ve been getting hit pretty hard lately. It’s been tough on the Hill. It’s been tough in the press.

What made it toughest of all was that many of our mistakes were self-inflicted wounds. I’m not just talking about the ATO here. Southwest Airlines, the DFW TRACON, contracting irregularities. That’s all stuff where we flat out should just have known better. I mentioned this at the ATO leadership summit, but it’s worth repeating.

I brought in a tough old Marine to talk to the group. Art Athens is a retired colonel who holds a chair in leadership and ethics at the United States Naval Academy. Ramrod straight. No BS. I didn’t know what he was going to say, but he was going to talk to us. He didn’t say a single word about management.

Instead, he talked about leadership — only about leadership. His son was getting ready to go off to war and asked his Dad for advice. Art relayed a message he received from an old gunny many years earlier.

At the core of his message were what he called “the three C’s”:  compassion, courage and competence.

Right off the bat, he said, you’ve got to know your job or be doing everything you can to learn it. That’s competence. Second comes courage. Are you willing to do the right thing even if it costs you personally?

The third C is the one I don’t think any of us were ready for. That third C stuck with me. Compassion. And that’s where he spent most of the message.

What Art had to say was that leadership is all about putting yourself in someone else’s shoes and walking a mile with him. Call it caring, love, empathy, the adjective is yours to pick.

I used to work for a chief pilot from West Virginia. The laid-back Chuck Yeager type with the drawl. You can just picture him saying “I got this little light up here …” He always said, “Treat everyone with courtesy and respect.” It’s the same message.

So we had a tough old Marine talking about loving your employees. He wasn’t syrupy. And he was by no means weak.

But he was direct. Kind of like the way Reggie White used to blast someone on a tackle and then say, “Jesus loves you, man.”

And I’ll tell you, what Colonel Athens had to say was a whole lot more powerful than Colonel Jessup on the witness stand.

Let’s talk about that video clip. There’s a lot in there we can learn from. Number one, Jessup is arrogant. As far as compassion goes, Jessup isn’t even in the game. There’s no place for that kind of pride in leadership. I’m certainly proud of this organization, but I’m not arrogant about being in charge. It’s a privilege and an honor, but it’s not a right.

Number two, Jessup lacked self-control. He was at the boiling point from the very start. I’ve litigated, and I can tell you that pressing someone’s button is the whole idea. But when you come up against someone who’s completely in control, well, there’s no moving them. Even when the cross-examination started, Jessup was a stick of dynamite looking for an ignition source.

So, always maintain your composure. Don’t react to or tolerate abusive language.

Back to the video for point number three. Jessup also had no respect for authority. Oddly enough, Jessup’s character thrives on getting respect. But he doesn’t show it to the lawyer. He doesn’t show it to the Court. As a lawyer, I’ve seen firsthand that mouthing off to a judge is generally one of the weaker go-to moves out there. Asking a judge, “Who do you think you are?” is a big-time non-starter. Trust me on this one:  the judge knows exactly who he thinks he is.

Number four, he lost sight of his mission. Protect the country. Do a job that others find too hard. Work with people from all walks. Do any of these sound familiar? They’re on the PDs for any number of you.

But Jessup’s job was also to serve the country. More to the point, his job was to serve the people with whom he served. That’s the compassion Art Athens was talking about. And it’s not about giving people whatever they want. It’s not about co-management. It’s about listening. Taking input. Being fair. Doing the right thing. Providing a reasoned response. Be principled in your decision-making.

You know, we’ve gone through a lot together in six years. And during that time, we’ve made some tough calls. But I have tried to make those decisions with the best interests of the taxpayer, the agency and the employee in mind.

Lately, we’ve had a couple of win-wins, like the ATSAP program for controllers and an agreement with AFSCME.

I’m also pleased to announce that we’re about to begin placing automated external defibrillators in FAA facilities with 50 or more employees. That’s something labor and management have been working on jointly for a while. We’re going to put these devices in place over the course of a year and then we’ll take a look at how it’s going. Are the actual costs comparable to our estimates? Are people getting trained in their use?

Eventually, we hope to put them in facilities with 10 or more employees, which will cover about 97 percent of us. We worked this through OsheComm, and I don’t think anyone is getting 100 percent of what they want, but we’ve reached a fair result. Thanks, Ventris.

And I’m confident we’ll get a FAA program going again. And I’d like to see it cover TechOps.

I have another decision to make shortly, on MSS pay. Some won’t like it, but I hope you will understand it. It is about the long-term cost structure of the agency. But it is also about providing a clear path for career progression and incentivizing people into management.

Following our executive meeting I talked about earlier, I committed to having lunch in the cafeteria once or twice a week, just to meet with employees. I’ve been trying to do that, and I’ve eaten the food there, too. It’s been tough, because my schedule is always tight. But I made that commitment, and I try to stick to it. You’d be surprised what I hear, what I learn — sometimes to the dismay of my colleagues on the management team. But I learned a lesson. You’re not going to hear or learn anything eating lunch alone at your desk.

That wasn’t the only pledge I made. I also committed to a weekly broadcast to employees for the web site. That’s been just as tough. Every Tuesday, I’m down in the studio. But it’s about keeping commitments — to my management team, to my employees, to myself. I’d like to see you all find ways to connect with people. Get out of the office. Get on the Ops floor. Get engaged with the operation.

We have a lot of training — new ATCS, new technology. It’s more important than ever to be engaged in the operation and reinforcing the basics. Connect and communicate with the workforce.

Let’s bring this full circle. When we get beaten up on the Hill or in the press, keep your chin up. When people who don’t understand what we do — or those who understand and deliberately mislead — have their say, keep your chin up. We have the toughest system in the world to run, and we’ve got to keep doing our jobs better and better.

We need to keep the focus where it belongs. We’ve gone two years without a fatality in large transport aircraft. Serious runway incursions are at an all-time low. ICAO just completed an audit of our entire system in which we received an unqualified endorsement. We just completed a review of airworthiness directives and found a compliance rate upwards of 99 percent. I challenge any other regulatory agency to make any one of those statements. And the credit for all of that goes to you.

But don’t be satisfied. We’ve got areas to improve — ops errors, efficiency, throughput. And — always — safety. We’re public servants, which means we’re holders of the public trust. We’re known for doing it better, for holding ourselves to a higher standard, and that’s just how it should be.

I’m going to close with this:  I think leadership is the key. I think “compassion” can help us get there. Start looking for ways to engage. Keep a watch on the new generation coming on board. And let’s get there together. This is one thing I do not want to stay in Las Vegas. Take it home. Thanks.