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I Should Have Known Better
What are the key factors that go into making good decisions?
Pilot Decision Making is one of the chief training areas accident investigators focus on when examining "what went wrong?"
As pilots and controllers, there are probably countless situations where, with the benefit of 20/20 hindsight, we wish we could have gone back and made a better decision. The disturbing thing about this is that upon reflection of teh event, we seem to convince ourselves that in fact, we DID know better at the time, but made the wrong decision anyway.
Well, if we knew better, then why didn't we do better?
That's because there are many factors at play as our brain filters information but the fact remains, thinking about something and doing something are two completely different things. The secret is finding that moment, that gut feeling where the truth creeps in at a critical decision point.
When I was training as a controller, I believe good decision making was explained best to me as follows:
"You know that feeling you get in your gut when you are doing something you know you shouldn't be doing and you are just hoping it works out? Well, if you can avoid that feeling, you are going to have a long and successful career here."
More eloquent words have been spoken, but none more true.