The Evolution of Crew Resource Management Training
Crew Resource Management (CRM) is a training philosophy that enhances pilots’ and cabin crews’ ability to communicate, work together, and make decisions, ensuring safety and efficiency in the operational environment. CRM essentially focuses on mitigating human errors by fostering situational awareness, assertiveness, and effective leadership during critical situations and in high-pressure environments.
But how has CRM become what it is today?
In this paper, we trace the origin of CRM and examine its evolution.
From reducing “pilot error” to avoiding, trapping, and mitigating human errors.
1970s: A Deadly Decade
In order to understand why CRM constitutes such an important requirement in commercial aviation today, we need to travel roughly 50 years back in time. The 1970s saw some of aviation’s deadliest accidents, including the Tenerife airport disaster. In 1977, two Boeing 747s collided on the runway, killing close to 600 people.
Consequently, NASA conducted a workshop on the topic, concluding that human errors and lack of non-technical skills serve as major contributing factors to aviation accidents. In 1979, NASA psychologist John Lauber coined the term “Cockpit Resource Management”. A term which referred to the structured approach of improving communication, leadership, and decision-making among pilots in the cockpit to reduce errors and enhance flight safety.
CRM: A Global Standard
In the years that followed the fatal incident in Tenerife, CRM garnered increasing interest from the global aviation community. In 1981, United Airlines was the first airline to initiate a comprehensive CRM programme. Soon, other airlines followed.
In the beginning, CRM was intended to reduce an authoritarian cockpit culture by encouraging the co-pilot to ask questions about the Captain’s decisions and errors. As training progressed, it became evident that CRM training should be a recurring event in which the good principles of CRM was reinforced on an annual basis.
However, many of the training programmes still incorporated group exercises which did not relate directly to aviation, leaving a gap between classroom training principles and the operational environment.
By the 1990s, CRM had become a global standard.
From Cockpit to Crew
Studies have shown that joint CRM training helps reduce communication barriers between the cockpit and the cabin, increasing effective teamwork, assertiveness and critical problem-solving.
These studies were supported by the 1990s emergence of new CRM training programmes which began to focus more on crew dynamics, changing the name from Cockpit to Crew Resource Management. Delta Air Lines were among the first commercial airlines to build their CRM training around team dynamics in flight operations. Their modular-based training included concepts such as team building, situational awareness, stress management, and decision-making strategies to mitigate human errors which can result in fatal accidents.
The Human Factor
Alongside the joint CRM training aspect, the industry began to recognise the identification and assessment of human factors issues in air operations. The human factor is an integral part of CRM training, emphasising how training can help crew understand and mitigate human errors and enhance knowledge, attitudes, behaviours, and non-technical skills, including teamwork, decision-making, and communication.
Human error is an inevitable and natural consequence of human performance limitations. Nevertheless, CRM serves as an important tool to avoid, trap, and mitigate errors. But CRM cannot and will never completely eradicate errors and ensure absolute safety in high-risk and high-stress environments like aviation.
Why Do We Train CRM?
While the vast majority of the aviation industry acknowledges the need for CRM training programmes, there is still a tendency to focus on how people work together, communicate, and make decisions, rather than why working well together, communicating effectively, and making critical decisions is important.
The overarching purpose of CRM is to reduce and manage the occurrence and severity of human errors. Therefore, it is crucial that pilots and cabin crew know WHY we train CRM – and WHY Threat and Error Management remains a crucial part of training.
Some aviation professionals, regrettably, continue to hold unrealistic attitudes about the effects of human factors on their performance. There have been cases where crew members believe that it is entirely possible to act professionally despite personal issues – or that their ability to make decisions is not impacted during critical events.
Training can break down these negative attitudes and emphasise why personal issues and natural limitations to human performance may have a negative effect on safety and performance.
Normalise Errors & Promote a Just Safety Culture
Error management remains a crucial part of CRM training to this day. Organisations in aviation must make sure to communicate that errors will occur – and subsequently create a culture where errors are not punished but used to proactively improve safety initiatives and fill training gaps.
A just safety culture encourages pilots and cabin crew to report errors and safety concerns without fear of reprimand or punishment. This helps create a culture of psychological safety in which CRM principles apply beyond classroom training.
CRM Today: Integrating CBTA, EBT & SMS
The evolution of CRM the past 50 years is truly remarkable. The 1977 accident in Tenerife serves as a reminder that something good comes out of every crisis.
CRM and Human Factors training has become a mandatory requirement for pilots, crew, maintenance staff, Flight Operation Officers, and dispatchers, emphasising that flight safety is a joint effort.
Modern CRM integrates Evidence-Based Training (EBT), Competency-Based Training and Assessment (CBTA) and Safety Management principles to enhance non-technical skills and mitigate human errors.
Today, CRM helps foster a just safety culture that promotes teamwork, situational awareness, assertiveness, and continuous improvement, strengthening the overall safety framework.
For the benefit of the global aviation industry.
