That’s really the question. How do supervisors know if they’re employees are good controllers? Most jobs can forgive an error or two, but in air traffic control, lots of people can die in a slight error.
My question comes from my contact with an old friend through Facebook. The friend is a fraternity brother of mine and through college, he was a bit of a drunk. Responsible was not a word I would have used to describe him. Heck, “sober” wouldn’t have described him either. Well, he found me on Facebook and we are “friends”. In the time since college, he was in the Navy. He is now a civilian and works in approach control at a very large, very busy, major hub airport. Judging by his Facebook posts, though, he is still the lush and man-slut that I remember. I have no reason to think that he isn’t an excellent air traffic controller, but the thought of thousands of lives resting in his hands every day makes me shudder.
Surely one’s job performance isn’t simply based on “No crashes today, John, so you’re a good controller” or “You bashed two 747s into each other. You’re fired!” So, how do they do it?
This is a complex topic and I can’t even hope to cover it so I will just be very general. Being a approach controller in a major ATC Center is basically like playing a video game and can be scored like one. It is all procedure based with strict rules about how everyone, including the pilots, has to play the game. Some mistakes are worse than others. Being an Air Traffic Controller at a major center is sometimes called the most stressful job in the world and requires special personality traits. The personality traits required are a lot more similar to being something like a trader in the Chicago Commodities Exchange than being a teacher for example so it is a different type of “responsibility”. The substance abuse rate for Air Traffic Controllers is supposedly very high (hopefully not on the job though) so he may fit right in. There are only about 15,000 air traffic controllers in the U.S. and it is a very skilled job that pays into the six figures so they won’t let just anyone do it.
This won’t answer your question directly but you can watch this video for more perspective:
You can also watch the movie, “Pushing Tin” on www.hulu.com (free and legit if you just create an account) for a slightly fictional representation of an air traffic controller’s job but mostly right. I have interacted with lots of them over the years over Boston’s very busy airspace. I also know a Boston Center Controller personally. They are special people and have some strange mental skills. Your friend must have that too because it takes a special type to make it to that level of air traffic controller almost like a pro athlete needs to have. They do tend to be a weird type of big thrill seekers though so your description of him makes it sound like he is a great fit. I would never want to be married to one but I do admire them.
Shagnasty, your description sounds exactly right. I did not paint my friend in a very positive light, but I’m sure you’re right. He is a bit of a thrill seeker. (He’s not a bad guy, really. I haven’t seen him in about twenty years.) I’ve just always wondered how to evaluate jobs where failure really isn’t an option. I saw Pushing Tin years ago. I might take time to watch it again. I’ll explore your link, too.
Air traffic controllers are allowed to get as drunk as they want on their own time as long as it doesn’t impair their ability to do their job. They are a strange breed, both admirable and annoying. Binging on their off time is certainly a stereotype for them, but as long as they’re sober and functional at work I’m not sure it matters. I think the technical term is “blowing off steam”.
Sexual escapades, multiple marriages, high adrenaline sports, hyper competitiveness, and extraordinary memory skills also seem to be features of air traffic controllers. They aren’t ALL like that, of course, but the ones that are, are certainly visible.
Assuming the primary goal of traffic separation is being achieved, the secondary goal of efficiency can be concentrated on. You can be not as good at efficiently handling traffic without being dangerous so in terms of efficiency a controller can display a range of skill and can make errors and so on that can be evaluated. There is also the case that a lot of being a good employee is not about how well you do your job but also how well you work within the company, relate to your work mates etc.
You can probably also evaluate a controller by how hard they appear to working at achieving the same outcome as someone else. Two controllers may be achieving the same outcome on their shift but one of them might be making it look like a lot of hard work while the other (better) one has an air of calm.
ATC also make use of simulators in training so you can put someone under a lot of pressure without worrying about people dying if they make a major mistake.
I know someone who ran ATC training in the UK - aside from the selection process (which is specifically designed to select those few people with the right mental abilities for ATC), the training relies on lots of simulations, often using real data tracks from historical data. I think they have a 30% washout rate, and controllers have a rigorous and regular re-certification regime.
I don’t think that’s quite accurate, I think controllers make errors all the time, it’s just that most of them are usually corrected. They may make an error which would eventually lead to a dangerous situation, but since they constantly rescan the rack and the radar to see what’s going on, they can usually alter their instruction with a mild “United 123, climb and maintain flight level two-three-zero” and the situation is mitigated (maybe throw in a “without delay” for good measure)… Even though no serious separation error occurred, a controller who needed to do lots of corrections like that during a shift would get a poorer evaluation than one who did everything right the first time. (I think this might be part of the *efficiency *that **Death Ray **spoke of.)
Actually, the term I’ve usually heard is “expedite” as opposed to “without delay”. “Expedite” will definitely get those of us in the cockpit hopping.
There are, of course, different levels of error. Aviation radio communication involves a lot of repeating things back to the original speaker just to guard against minor errors of misspeaking or mishearing. That’s not what’s usually meant by “air traffic control error”, though clearly someone who can’t verbally communicate on a reliable basis will eventually have to find another job. I’m not entirely conversant with the standards used to measure ATC performance, but an error that results in a plane being off course for five minutes but nowhere near any other aircraft or mountains or whatever is quite different than one that puts to airplanes on a collision course over a major airport with only a half mile between the two. The latter is far more likely to result in death in destruction and that’s the one we’re all most concerned about preventing. If a controller starts to have those sorts of errors on a regular basis that’s when their job is at risk.