Aviation of Business

posted by Andrew Hartley - Business Consultant & Entrepreneur on Sep 25

Most everyone by now has read or seen (or at least HEARD OF) The Secret. It’s a really good book about the power of positive thinking, AKA the Law of Attraction. I read it fairly recently, and liked it quite a bit. If you aren’t familiar with the concept, it essentially says that “the universe” provides whatever you need and want, but it doesn’t understand negatives.

In other words, you can’t think “I don’t want to get sick” because the universe won’t understand “don’t.” So it hears, “I … want to get sick.” And voila, you’re sick. From an entrepreneurial perspective, thinking “I don’t want to fail” all but guarantees your failure.

The answer is to think positively; think about what you WANT, not about what you don’t want. Thinking “I want to be healthy” will help stave off illness; thinking “I want my business to succeed” will help to avoid failure. And I think that this is true as far as it goes. Where it starts to get a little iffy, at least for me, is where the book and the film say that if you act as if you already have a million dollars, and feel like you’ll feel when you have a million dollars, that a million dollars will come to you.

Every result comes from action. And I absolutely believe that saying to yourself, “I want a million dollars” is better than saying “I don’t want to be broke.” But you still have to work toward that goal. If I wake up every day and say to myself, “I want a million dollars,” but then go to work like always, do what I always do, come home and watch TV all night, drink beer and eat Doritos, I’m still going to get what I always got. The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result.

So why do people love the idea of “The Secret?” Because it sounds easy. But it’s not. You have to work as if you already have a million dollars before you will ever receive the money. And the positive thinking part of it is only beneficial inasmuch as it sets your mind in the right direction. If you are running away from something, you’ll stop running as soon as the threat is gone. That is negative thinking - an “I don’t want” thought.

But if you are running toward something, you’ll keep running until you get there - if the goal is motivating enough. This is “I want” thinking. The REAL benefit of positive thinking is that it opens your mind and senses to opportunities and possibilities that you never would have noticed before. The opportunities and possibilities always existed, but your negative mindset had you focused on what you DIDN’T want instead of what you DID want. So things slipped by unnoticed and uncapitalized upon.

Think of it this way - when you bought your most recent car (let’s say it’s a Volkswagen Jetta), all of a sudden you notice that there are Jettas EVERYWHERE! Where did they all come from? They were always there, you just never had reason to notice before. This is a function of your Reticular Activating System (RAS) - a part of your brain that subconsciously notices things that are important to you. And it does not have to be trained. It’s automatic. As an example, I rent small airplanes to do my flight training. I fly different aircraft, which have different identification, every time I fly. But if Air Traffic Control says the ID of the plane I’m flying, my attention is piqued immediately. Not because I am used to the aircraft ID, but because my RAS determined that it was important to me. It’s how you can hear someone whisper your name across a room; it’s how you recognize possibility and opportunity once you’ve told yourself it is important to you.

So even if you can’t bring yourself to believe that The Secret is scientific fact and all you need to do is think positive thoughts and good things will appear out of thin air in front of you, know that there is good evidence that a positive outlook and “positive thinking” can absolutely make your goals more reachable, in a more timely manner, with less frustration and work.

So run toward something good - not away from something bad!

Fair Winds,
Andrew

posted by Andrew Hartley - Business Consultant & Entrepreneur on Sep 18

After nearly four years of no flying, I am again current to fly myself and passengers! 2.1 hours of instruction (over two flights) was enough to get me comfortable in the cockpit again, and my instructor signed me off for both my Biennial Flight Review and to rent aircraft from the flight school with no instructor needed to come along.

Getting back into a plane was a little weird after such a long absence…. I had to read the checklists very closely just to remember what certain things meant - even on the preflight - and I had to repeat several things because I had forgotten to do them… even though they were right there in front of my eyes, in writing, on the checklist!

I had a little trouble starting the engine on the first flight, but the second went smoothly. It didn’t feel very real to me until I started doing maneuvers - specifically steep turns - on the first flight. Once I felt the extra Gs of steep turns though, It started to come back to me pretty quickly. The first landing since October of 2003 was a little ugly - picture a dollar sign ($). The straight line is the runway and the S is the path I was flying the plane trying to land… It didn’t help that it was also at night!

The second flight we did mostly touch and goes at a small airport to the south of the field we departed from - and I started to get my bearings back on landings. By the end of the second flight, my instructor was pretty much staring out the window as I did all the flying and radio calls.

Finally! I’m ready and raring to go at this thing again… I even feel like I’m a better driver when I’m a current pilot.

Anybody interested in helping pay for flight training? I’ll put up a PayPal donation button soon… and tell people about this blog! Every little bit helps.

Fair Winds,
Andrew

posted by Andrew Hartley - Business Consultant & Entrepreneur on Sep 17

The following is a paid review, but is completely my own opinion and is not at all influenced by being paid.

I recently signed up for Pay Per Post, a blog marketing site which has been gaining and gaining in popularity with bloggers as a way to use a blog to make a little (or a lot) of money. It’s also very popular with internet marketers as a way to drive traffic to their sites! If you’re already writing, and you already use products and surf the web, why not make a little money while doing so, right? I’ve been experimenting and learning about online business for a little while now, and have not had much success. To be fair, I’ve also had a lack of focus and not spent my time where it might make the most impact. I’m trying to change that, because - as you see from my last post - I am edging my way back to my original career goal (since high school or college) of becoming a professional pilot.

Since flying isn’t cheap (my first flight in nearly four years lasted nine-tenths of an hour - that’s .9 hours or 54 minutes - and cost $115.64!), I’ve newly refocused my online ambitions to help me pay for the cost of flight training. I figure that if I can make $30 per day, every day, from my online businesses, my flight training will be nearly paid for! With that in mind, I am refreshing my interest in Pay Per Post, starting with this post. I hope to be able to use it to get a good start on my goal of $30 per day. If I am able to make more than that through Pay Per Post (and/or other advertising, donations, etc.), I will increase my flight time commensurately.

Up to now, I have found Pay Per Post to be pretty easy to use. It was very easy to add this blog to my account and get started. I actually got an offer for $30 to review a site - which I was pretty excited about, but then I got distracted and forgot to actually post about the site. The offer was susequently rescinded - unfortunately it happened on the day I remembered and was going to post about it! I ultimately would like to add some of my other blogs to my account at Pay Per Post (blogs like environmentastic! and Teacher’s Forum, but Pay Per Post requires that you have 10 approved posts before you can add any more blogs to your account. I wasn’t aware of this (or I had forgotten), and I was a little frustrated trying to find out how to add another blog to my account… you actually have to do that under the “my posts” tab. That was a little confusing to me, and then frustrating that once I found out where and how to add another blog, I wasn’t able to until I did more posts.

Other than that I think Pay Per Post is a really nice site to work with. It’s easy to learn, use, and navigate, and it has already given lots of people another stream of income! I know Tyler Cruz (visit his blog) has had some success with it… I hope I can make enough to start subsidizing my flight training soon! If you’re interested in making some money with your blog (even if only a little), check out Pay Per Post.

Have you used Pay Per Post? What did you think about it? Let us know - leave a comment!

Fair Winds,
Andrew

posted by Andrew Hartley - Business Consultant & Entrepreneur on Sep 13

Today I will be getting back in the cockpit! I finally got in touch with my friend (a former student of mine when I was a training consultant in aviation) who is a flight instructor. We will be flying tonight - I’m going to attempt to pass a biennial flight review and aircraft rental checkout after nearly FOUR YEARS of not acting as a pilot of an aircraft.

Wish me luck - it’s a first step to return to my journey of becoming a professional pilot! The teacher again becomes the student…

Fair Winds,
Andrew

posted by Andrew Hartley - Business Consultant & Entrepreneur on Jun 19

My wife and I got a dog when we moved into our first (and current) house. We live in a depressed area in Columbus, Ohio - one that is on its way up, but is moving slower than we’d like - nonetheless one that is filled with beautful, turn-of-the-century (19th to 20th century) homes.

Our dog was “found” by the vet we took our cats to. He was found running around the neighborhood where the vet’s clinic is located, and was wearing a collar and dragging a leash. The vet put up flyers and contacted the local dog shelter in an attempt to find his rightful owners, but no one ever claimed him. So she gave him all his shots, neutered him, and sent him home with us. We decided to name him Merlin (after the Camelot Wizard) because he was an escape artist.

“Merlin the Magician” lived up to his name immediately. He got away from Jill as were going out to walk him within a week of us bringing him home. We had to go find him at the dog shelter his original owners apparently never contacted. Shortly thereafter, he broke a 40-foot dog chain at my mom’s house in middle-of-nowhere, Ohio, escaping once again and dragging the entire 40 feet of chain behind him. My thought was that someone would find him and return him to us or that he would wrap that chain around a tree, get himself stuck, and starve to death in the woods near the house. Ten minutes later, he walked right back up on mom’s porch and sat by the front door, waiting for me to let him in.

By far my favorite story about Merlin, however, is this one:

A couple Augusts ago, I came home from work, and Merlin did not greet me at the door as usual. I was a little concerned because it was hot, and our big, brick house is not air conditioned. I half expected to find a dead dog under our bed. But he was nowhere to be found in the house. I checked the basement, under every piece of furniture he could fit under, and in every nook and cranny I could think of (and he’s not a small dog… he’s a Golden Lab/Husky mix, we think - a little more than 50 pounds). I finally saw that a screen in the attic was missing from the window we had put it in. Our attic is on the third floor of our house….

I stuck my head out the window, trying not to look down and expecting the worst. As soon as I called his name, I heard a jingle from directly to the right of me. Running down two flights of stairs, and checking the “alley” between our house and the neighbor’s on the way past (just in case he had fallen - he hadn’t), I got to the neighbor’s yard and looked up. There was our magician - on the roof of our house!

Apparently he had jumped out the window (after a squirrel or something). Lucky for him, our neighbor’s roof is literally within inches of ours; we think he jumped out the window to their roof, didn’t like the pitch, and jumped about 2-3 feet from their roof to a relatively flat part of ours. Lord knows how long he was up there, but the black roof was HOT, and he hunkered in the shade of a tree that is right next to the house. He barely came to me when I called him from the ladder so I could get him down.

So, anyway - this a very long way to tell you the interesting discovery I made today:

I believe that I am meant to always be involved in aviation - we named our dog Merlin after King Arthur’s mentor, but today I found that Merlin was also a WWII aircraft engine - maybe the WWII aircraft engine. Aircraft sporting the merlin engine broke several speed records. So I’m going to start telling people that we named him Merlin because he’s fast, like the merlin engine.

Also, in some aircraft, the merlin engine was replaced with the griffon engine - so guess what we’re naming our next dog?

Jill and I think that it will be a cool way to remember Merlin, by naming his “replacement” after the replacement of many merlin engines in some of the greatest aircraft of World War II.

posted by Andrew Hartley - Business Consultant & Entrepreneur on Jun 19

Okay, so I’m learning to not make promises before I am sure I can follow through. I’m having a bit of writer’s block on the posts I’m trying to write about the “sacred six” instruments. I want to make sure they are interesting for you, the reader, while still making them as accurate as possible and as “real” as possible. I thought that laying out that pattern for myself would make writing easier, but I’ve found that it constrains more than anything, and makes it MORE difficult to write about them. So, while I will no longer promise that the sacred six will be the next five posts, I will promise that - eventually - I’ll get to them.

Perhaps I’m trying too hard to write posts that are substantial (read: longer) and not just short little blurbs - I don’t want to waste your time if you’re here reading my blog. On the other hand, shorter posts written more often will bring more visitors, which is a goal I have for this blog. So I’m a little torn.

So leave me a note in the comments telling me whether you would prefer shorter posts written more often or longer, more substantial posts written less often. In return, you have my thanks, and the short story in the following post.

Namaste,
Andrew

posted by Andrew Hartley - Business Consultant & Entrepreneur on May 20

 The Directional Gyro - a.k.a. Heading Indicator - is used by a pilot to determine an aircraft’s heading.  It actually uses a gyroscope, which allows it to maintain its position in space as the aircraft “rotates” around it.  This allows the Heading Indicator to always show the correct heading to the pilot. 

Why not use a compass?  All aircraft are equipped with a standard magnetic compass as well; however, these compasses are nearly impossible to use while maneuvering.  Want to experiment?  Grap any free-floating compass (in an aircraft they are actually liquid filled - they used to be called “whiskey compasses”), then manuever it like an aircraft turns, leaning (or “banking”) it to the left as you turn it left (or leaning it to the right as you turn right).  See how the compass doesn’t want to “lean” with its container?  This causes false readings during turns or accelleration/deceleration.  The Heading Indicator doesn’t suffer from these limitations.

So what does this have to do with business?  Well, Mahesha hit it right on the nose in her comment to last week’s post.  All business is planning - just like aviation.  You plan your flight - you plan your business (or at least you SHOULD).  To have a successful flight, you need to know ahead of time where you’re going and how you’re going to get there.  It’s the same in business (and anything you do in life) - as Lawrence J. Peter said, “If you don’t know where you’re going, you will probably end up somewhere else.”  So the heading indicator helps a pilot who knows where she is going make sure she is still on course to reach her destination.  Just as a business plan helps an entrepreneur get where he is going.

Let me clarify before I end this post - if a pilot does not look at the heading indicator, it doesn’t do him any good.  On the same token, if an entrepreneur doesn’t go back and reference her business plan to make sure she is still on the right track with where she wants her business to go and what she wants her business to be, it won’t do her any good either. 

Other ideas?  What do you see as YOUR “Heading Indicator?”  Tell us by leaving a comment!

Fair Winds,
Andrew

posted by Andrew Hartley - Business Consultant & Entrepreneur on May 12

So - comparing running a business to flying an airplane is a pretty big stretch, huh?  It’s all really a crock - I’m just trying to link two of my passions together so I can feel like when I’m doing one I’m not ignoring the other, right?  For the last three or nearly four years, I have not been in an airplane that I was flying myself, so I have really stretched the limits of feasibility to convince myself that I have not actually given up flying for so long.  I’ve actually been keeping it in my head and using what I learned through my pilot training to help me start and run my businesses.

How’s that sound?  Convincing?

Because it’s crap.  Aviation and business are strikingly similar - and the next six posts will help convince anyone skeptical (and will help me gel my thoughts about the subject for myself as well).  So keep in tune over the next few weeks as I post about how each of the “sacred six” instruments in an airplane coincide perfectly (or nearly so) with ways that people judge the performance of a business.  The pictures below are examples of the “sacred six” instruments… take some time and think about how they help a pilot better understand the performance and activity of her aircraft - and how they might be similar to the way business performance is judged.

I’ll post again soon and explain one of the above instruments.  Leave some comments if YOU have ideas about how these instruments might tie into typical business performance tracking!

Fair Winds,
Andrew

posted by Andrew Hartley - Business Consultant & Entrepreneur on May 5

An airplane is an amazing piece of machinery.  During some portions of a flight, it is required that the pilot make large changes and major corrections to the path of the aircraft.  Takeoff and landing are obvious places where this comes to mind.  This is called “hand flying” the airplane.

At other times, however, it is unnecessary to “hand fly” the plane - during straight and level “cruise” flight for instance.  During this phase of a flight, the pilot will use what’s called “trim” to make very slight corrections to the flight path of the airplane.  If the plane is descending slightly, the pilot will use “nose up trim” to stop the descent.  If climbing slightly, “nose down trim” may be used.  Some aircraft have trim for rolling (aileron trim) and turning (rudder trim) as well.  Keep in mind here that I am not talking about any kind of “auto-pilot;” this is just a way to more carefully and precisely control the plane once it is in “cruise” flight and flying at a single altitude and in one direction for a length of time.

This can be likened to a business (as always!).  At some points in the life of a business, like during the startup and initial growth, it is necessary to “hand fly” the business - you as an entrepreneur (pilot) must “control” the business more directly and make larger changes to its direction.  In an airplane this is during takeoff and climbout and only lasts a few minutes.  In business, it may last a few years. 

Additionally, if you plan on selling or in some other way “exiting” the business, you will, again, need to “hand fly” for awhile.  You may not be “hand flying” the business directly, but you will be directly and significantly involved in the process of finding a buyer and negotiating a fair price for both of you.  This roughly coincides with the approach and landing of an airplane - again a time when the pilot must be significantly involved in the aircraft’s control. 

Most other times during a business’s “flight,” small corrections and tweaks are all that is necessary to keep the company moving in the direction you want it to go.  This is, of course, assuming you have a good business plan (flight plan) and a good team (crew).  You also must be in a well-designed company (stable aircraft).  See my post on Tradeoffs for more on business design and aircraft design.

There ARE times during cruise flight when a business (or an airplane) DOES need to be hand flown - any time a change of direction is necessary.  In aviation, it is all about navigation or avoidance of other aircraft (which are subjects for other posts), and in business it is during times of change, when a new direction is needed to grow to the next level or to outmaneuver competition.

Times to hand fly an airplane / business:

• Takeoff / Startup
• Climbout / Initial growth phase (combination of trim and hand flying)
• Change in direction / New business opportunity
• Traffic avoidance / Response to competition (can be proactive or reactive)
• Initial descent / Considering exiting (combination of trim and hand flying)
• Approach to landing / Decision to exit made (combination of trim and hand flying)
• Landing / Exit of business (sale or other exit strategy)

The reason it is important to understand this is that is is possible to “hand fly” an aircraft (and a business) when it should be “trimmed.”  It is very easy to “overcorrect” when you hand fly an aircraft during cruise flight… this will cause large changes in altitude and direction because the pilot feels the need to directly control everything the aircraft does with relatively large control movements.  But in a stable aircraft, small adjustments with trim allow the plane to “fly itself” - and that is exactly what aircraft (and businesses) should be designed to do.

posted by Andrew Hartley - Business Consultant & Entrepreneur on Apr 19

There’s a saying in aviation: “Keep the shiny side up!”  Usually, it is said jokingly - often to a new student pilot or freshly minted private pilot. I imagine the saying may have started in early aviation when aircraft were not built to be as stable and trustworthy as they are today - when it was entirely possible that an inexperienced pilot could end up upside-down or in some other “interesting” attitude that would take a decent amount of skill to recover from.  The belly of an airplane tends to get dirty more quickly than the “top” of the plane - hence the saying.

Here again, the metaphor to business is uncanny.  Marketing is all about “keeping the shiny side up.”  It’s about showing the benefits (NOT the features) of your product.  I can talk all day about the higher powered engines and the fuel capacity increase on my newly designed model of aircraft, but that doesn’t mean you’ll understand that my new design will get you to your destination faster and without stopping for fuel. 

Of course depending on how you market, speed and endurance could also be considered benefits.  Benefits are different to different people.  So the “shiny side” of your product can only be “kept up” if you know your customer (or potential customer) and if you use words that make the “shiny side” of your product valuable to them. If I am talking to a pilot, useful load, endurance, range, climb speed, etc. are benefits.  If I am speaking to a small business owner looking for transportation, those are features.  The coinciding benefits are “carrying more passengers” (useful load), “non-stop flights coast-to-coast” (endurance & range), and “spending less time in traffic at low altitudes and lower fuel burn” (climb speed).  If you’ve been in an industry for a long time, it is hard to remember that not everyone speaks your language, so be careful!

As an example, a couple weeks ago, I bought some bottled water at the grocery store.  It was the same bottle as any other water.  The same size.  The same water, essentially.  But this company did something just a little different: they wrapped the caps with a plastic seal that matched the color of the bottle and prevented tampering.  This is an example of a simple, inexpensive way to stand out from the crowd and add class to a commodity product.  Talk about “keeping the shiny side up!”

How do you “keep the shiny side up” in your marketing?  Leave a comment and let us know!

Fair Winds,
Andrew