Are You Proactive or Reactive?

I got my commercial pilot’s license back in college; one concept that you really have to understand during flight training, especially advanced flight training, is staying ahead of the airplane. As a pilot, most of what you do is all compressed into a relatively brief period of time during taxi, takeoff, and landing. The actual en route cruise is pretty relaxing and things happen relatively slow in comparison. One of the habits you learn is to always take advantage of those calm periods to prepare for the next busy portion of the flight; as a student pilot, these periods of seemingly frantic action can easily become overwhelming, and I can remember, on more than one occasion, my flight instructor so helpfully pointing out that I was “getting behind the airplane,” meaning I didn’t prepare enough for that given stage of the flight and information was coming at me faster than I could process it.

Usually this wasn’t a problem, other than being incredibly stressful, but when your instructor cuts the fuel flow to one of the engines to simulate an engine failure when you’re behind the airplane, you learn real quick how important it is to always be prepared in the air.

You can learn a lot about how to be successful in life and business by studying what works for people in really intense situations. Am I ever going to be so bombarded with information that I’m incapable of processing it all? Maybe, but certainly not everyday like in the beginning stages of my flight training; but I can use what worked for me then to maximize my performance in everyday life.

Staying ahead of the airplane boiled down to one simple technique, being proactive, not reactive. Instead of waiting for something to happen and then reacting to it, look several steps ahead and foresee problems before they exist. If you do that you’ll be able to act on those problems before they ever become problems. Here’s a simple exercise for you: for the next week, take note of how much of your time is spent putting out fires. If you’re like most people I think you’ll be amazed that the majority of your day is probably spent solving problems that could have been prevented, or at least lessened, with a little proactive action. If you’ve been using that killer tool I told you about, Easy Time Tracker, this won’t take up any more of your time at all.

Good luck.