Avionics News March 2021 - 15

Decisions are made by the individual subject
to the challenge - usually, the technician.
How do you make sure the technician and the business
owner make the same decisions? Communication.

The second area of discussion is the organizational
communication: employer to employee communication.
As stated earlier, lack of communication is one of the
human factors' Dirty Dozen. From SKYbrary.aero, " Poor
communication often appears at the top of contributing and
causal factors in accident reports, and is, therefore, one of
the most critical human factor elements. Communication
refers to the transmitter and the receiver, as well as the
method of transmission. Transmitted instructions may be
unclear or inaccessible. The receiver may make assumptions
about the meaning of these instructions, and the transmitter
may assume that the message has been received and
understood. With verbal communication, it is common that
only 30% of a message is received and understood. "
In a paper titled " Introduction to Human Factors &
Ergonomics " by Martin Anderson (martinanderson.
com), the author discusses communications. In this
paper, Anderson states, " Communication is concerned
with the creation, transmission, interpretation and use of
information. There are four basic steps to communication:
*	 Intent: the sender has information that they wish to
communicate to others;
*	 Transmission: the sender chooses a method to
convey the information (e.g. speech, writing, signs);
*	 Receipt: the receiver hears or sees the information;
*	 Interpretation: the receiver makes sense of the
information that they have received.
However, what is interpreted is often different to what
was intended - leading to a communication failure. "
As we have asked in regulatory sessions during the AEA
International Convention & Trade Show and AEA Connect
Conferences, who makes the daily decisions in your
organization? Of course, the business owner, managers, and
supervisors raise their hand claiming, " I do. " Unfortunately,
that simply is not the case.
Decisions are made by the individual subject to the
challenge - usually, the technician. How do you make
sure the technician and the business owner make the same
decisions? Communication.

According to SKYbrary, " Detailed information must be
passed before, during and after any task, and especially
across the handover of shifts. Therefore, when messages are
complex, they should be written down, and organizations
should encourage full use of logbooks, worksheets and
checklists, etc. Verbal messages can be kept short, with the
most critical elements emphasized at the beginning and
repeated at the end. Assumptions should be avoided and
opportunities for asking questions both given and taken. "
From a continued airworthiness perspective,
communication is fundamental in most troubleshooting.
Interview the owner/operator to find out the core
performance issue you are contracted to fix.
In my day job, I don't work on components, but I do
work with the regulatory operation of repair stations, and
installation and maintenance regulations. A lot of my AEA
consultation service is, in essence, troubleshooting. It's also
communicating; asking questions; listening to answers;
and understanding the answer. Essentially, this involves
answering the who, what, when, where, and why, so that
we can offer the regulatory guidance needed to support the
efficient and regulatory compliant operation of the member
companies.
Like all troubleshooting, it takes more than simply
hearing words, but also a good bit of the time to understand
the words. Regulatory language is a unique language -
almost like translating a foreign language. As Anderson
said, you must consider the intent, the transmission and the
reception.
When supporting the AEA membership, the
conversations usually begin with " my inspector said... "
So, what did they say? What did you receive? How is it
being interpreted? What were they trying to say? And why;
what is the intent?
When asking what was said, it is not unusual for the
member to not fully understand what was being sent from
the national aviation authority inspector. If you do not
Continued on page 69
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Avionics News March 2021

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