Crew Resource Management - Overview

Overview

United Airlines was the first airline to provide CRM training for its cockpit crews, in 1981.

CRM training encompasses a wide range of knowledge, skills and attitudes including communications, situational awareness, problem solving, decision making, and teamwork; together with all the attendant sub-disciplines which each of these areas entails. CRM can be defined as a management system which makes optimum use of all available resources - equipment, procedures and people - to promote safety and enhance the efficiency of operations. CRM although first established in the civil aviation industry as cockpit resource management has been adopted and adapted by many other industries, some of which are the commercial maritime shipping industry using a form called "Maritime Resource Management (MRM)" and the USCG uses it as CRM.

CRM is concerned not so much with the technical knowledge and skills required to operate equipment but rather with the cognitive and interpersonal skills needed to manage resources within an organised system. In this context, cognitive skills are defined as the mental processes used for gaining and maintaining situational awareness, for solving problems and for making decisions. Interpersonal skills are regarded as communications and a range of behavioral activities associated with teamwork. In many operational systems as in other walks of life, skill areas often overlap with each other, and they also overlap with the required technical skills. Furthermore, they are not confined to multi-crew craft or equipment, but also relate to single operator equipment or craft as they invariably need to interface with other craft or equipment and various other support agencies in order to complete a mission successfully.

CRM training for crew has been introduced and developed by aviation organisations including major airlines and military aviation worldwide. CRM training is now a mandated requirement for commercial pilots working under most regulatory bodies worldwide, including the FAA (U.S.) and JAA (Europe). Following the lead of the commercial airline industry, the U.S. Department of Defense began formally training its air crews in CRM in the early 1990s. Presently, the U.S. Air Force and U.S. Navy require all air crew members to receive annual CRM training, in an effort to reduce to human-error caused mishaps.