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Culture in the Cockpit: Implications for CRM Training

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Advances in Cross-Cultural Decision Making

Part of the book series: Advances in Intelligent Systems and Computing ((AISC,volume 480))

Abstract

Crew resource management (CRM) is an important airline training tool that was developed in the United States and has been used to train flight crews worldwide since the 1990s. Modern CRM programs cover a wide range of skill areas, including communication, interpersonal skills and decision-making. This paper describes the evolution of CRM and its underlying cultural assumptions. CRM has been criticized for being implicitly biased towards Western culture, and there have been calls for the development of different versions “culturally calibrated” to meet the needs of target participants around the world. This paper reviews research into national cultural differences, as well as airline organizational culture and pilot professional culture, and examines the implications for CRM training. This study is relevant to all international airline flight operations, especially those involving mixed-nationality crews.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    An important feature of this crew, enhancing their decision-making ability under stress, was that they were very experienced and had flown together before. The captain had 29,967 flight hours with United Airlines, while the first and second officers each had 15,000–20,000 flight hours. An off-duty check airman who assisted them had 23,000 flight hours [12].

  2. 2.

    It should be noted that this survey was conducted decades after Hofstede’s data collection.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Aviation Management Department, J. F. Oberlin University, 3758 Tokiwa-Machi, Machida-shi, Tokyo, 194-0294, Japan

    Simon Cookson

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  1. Simon Cookson
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  1. AdvancedDistributedLearning (ADL) Initia, Arlington, VA, USA

    Sae Schatz

  2. LockheedMartin'sAdvancedTechnologyLabs, Orlando, FL, USA

    Mark Hoffman

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Cookson, S. (2017). Culture in the Cockpit: Implications for CRM Training. In: Schatz, S., Hoffman, M. (eds) Advances in Cross-Cultural Decision Making. Advances in Intelligent Systems and Computing, vol 480. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-41636-6_10

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-41636-6_10

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