![To figure out the best approach for your training, your CFI needs to know a little bit about you. [Credit: Adobe Stock]](https://www.flyingmag.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/CFI-lead.jpg)
“I wish I had known you could fire your flight instructor.”
This is a common refrain when pilots compare training experiences. Just as most of us have had a bad date, pretty much every pilot has had bad instructional experience. Maybe the certified flight instructor (CFI) was chronically late. Or yelled. Or didn’t say anything. Or needed the manly deodorant soap. Or was more interested in his or her gaining hours than teaching you. In short, something just didn’t work in the instructor/learner relationship, and you realized after the fact—sometimes a very long time, even years and hundreds of dollars later—that you should have terminated that instructional relationship and flown with someone else.
