D.O.M. Blogs

NBAA's annual convention and exibition is the largest business aviation gathering in the world. I am writing this blog on the evening of the second day of the show. One more day to go!

It has been a productive show for the D.O.M. team. We have had the opportunity to meet with many of our readers and customers while we were at the show. There was a lot of news at the show, and we will be sharing that news in the November/December issue of D.O.M. magazine. In the meantime, I wanted to share a few highlights from the show that were particularly interesting.

I recently attended a NBAA Maintenance Committee meeting in Washington, D.C. During the meeting, I had a chance to talk to some of the committee members about what we can do to help promote professionalism in our industry.

I will be expanding on this topic in my next editorial column in D.O.M. magazine. In the meantime, I would like your feedback on the topic. Here are a couple of things to think about:

1. Is there a need to improve our professionalism in the industry?

2. What can we do to accomplish this?

It’s that time of year again – EAA’s annual AirVenture celebration in Oshkosh, WI. If you have never made the trip to this annual event, you are missing an opportunity to be immersed in everything aviation.

The 2014 National Business Aviation Association Maintenance Management Conference (MMC2014) is just around the corner. It will be held April 22-24 in Tampa, FL. If you are in an aviation maintenance management role, MMC should be on your list of must-attend conferences!

It’s ironic how things sometimes work out – when he stars, moon and safety wire line up.

I finished sending the Jan/Feb issue of D.O.M. magazine to our printer yesterday. My editorial column was titled, “Have Passion!” It discussed the importance of having a passion for what you do. As the day progressed, passion ended up being the recurring theme.

It is that time of year – people around the world are celebrating the holidays. Here at my house, we are getting ready for Christmas. As I write this, there are still a few last-minute things we need to get, but for the most part we are done with our shopping and preparation. We will be sitting down with our family on the 25th to enjoy some quality time together.

The topic of negotiation has been on my mind for the past month or so. It seems as if many of our elected officials, especially in Washington, D.C., have chosen to abandon the possibility of negotiation, choosing instead to take hard-line stands on one side or another. Sure, we hear, “We are willing to negotiate….” from many politicians, but if they also say, “I am not willing to budge on XYZ issue,” then that is not the groundwork for negotiation, as we saw with the recent government shutdown.

There’s excitement in the air at Helicopter Maintenance magazine’s offices in Wisconsin and Arizona, and we want to share it with you. As the industry’s premier magazine for, by and about helicopter maintenance professionals, we are going to offer an award for the 2013 Helicopter Mechanic of the Year. Following is information on who is eligible to participate and how to nominate an individual.