Like Copilot, Like Captain: The Importance of Left-Seat Mentoring

With the airline industry now upgrading at warp speed, the opportunity for these pilots to experience all types of leadership remains limited.

Les Abend

Wednesday, March 20, 2024 at 09:29 AM ET

Verified

As of April 2023, all Part 121 carriers are required to have a leadership and command program in addition to mentor training for captains. [Adobe Stock]

Key Takeaways:

The author recounts negative experiences with two captains: one exhibiting hostile, dismissive leadership and creating a dangerous cockpit environment; the other, while decent, lacked people skills, leading to an embarrassing air traffic control blunder.
These diverse interactions, both positive and negative, served as an informal yet crucial mentoring process that helped the author develop their own leadership skills for future command roles.
The article emphasizes the importance of new formal leadership and mentorship programs in the airline industry to equip rapidly promoted copilots with the necessary command abilities, compensating for fewer informal learning opportunities.

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I stepped across the cockpit door threshold. The captain was in the process of testing the weather radar on board our Boeing 727. Shuffling behind the flight engineer and slithering into the copilot seat, I glanced at the green screen of the old but reliable RCA display. It took more art than skill to operate.

With a scowl on his face, Captain Dave turned to our wet-behind-the-ears flight engineer and said, “Call maintenance. The radar is spoking in the video band.”