Lt Col Ajaydeep Singh

The most dangerous officer I ever flew with had a perfect record.

30 years in the Indian Army - not one incident on his file.

And no real judgement when conditions changed. Because he'd never been genuinely wrong.

In Indian organisations, we celebrate the spotless record. We rarely ask whether the leader behind it has been truly tested.

■ DM me the word COCKPIT - I'll send you 3 questions that diagnose this on any leadership team.

Your team agrees in the room.

Then the offsite ends. And by Wednesday, everyone's doing something different.

This isn't a communication problem.
In the Indian Army - and in every boardroom I've worked with since - it has a specific name.

And a specific fix.

→Follow for the framework.

Aviation names the threats before departure.

Not because every threat materialises.

Because a named threat has a plan — and an unnamed one does not.

Most organisations are excellent at the post-mortem.

They are less practised at the pre-mortem.

What is the one threat to your most important current initiative that nobody has named yet? Drop it below.

→ Follow for more operational frameworks applied to corporate leadership.

In aviation you cannot borrow fuel.

You either planned for what you needed — or you do not make it.

Most leadership teams have a fuel crisis every quarter.

Not because the mission was impossible — because the resource conversation happened after departure.

■ Does your organisation have the fuel conversation before or after the mission begins? Comment below.

→ Follow for more cockpit principles applied to senior leadership.

In aviation, a radio call is 5 seconds maximum.

Who you are. Where you are. What you want. What you have.

Four pieces of information. Nothing else.

Most corporate communication buries the headline, hedges the ask, and never states what action is required.

■ Which meeting in your organisation needs aviation radio discipline? Comment below.

→ Follow for more cockpit principles applied to leadership.

Formation flying demands constant tiny corrections — not infrequent large ones.

Close enough that any error by the leader becomes your immediate problem.

Trust that is absolute — not assumed.

Most leadership teams fly in the same general direction and call it alignment.

Those are not the same thing.

■ Which describes your leadership team right now? Comment below.

→ Follow for more cockpit frameworks applied to corporate leadership.

Every pilot commits in advance to the conditions that will make them turn back.

Not because they cannot handle pressure.

Because they know that under pressure, their evaluation of those conditions will be optimistic.

Most leadership teams make the same call — in the room, under momentum, with no framework.

■ Does your organisation have a Go/No-Go framework? Yes or no — drop it below.

■ Save this for your next major launch or investment decision.

→ Follow for more cockpit-tested decision frameworks.

There is a phenomenon in aviation that has killed more experienced pilots than almost anything else.

Your body tells you exactly which way is up.

And it is completely wrong.

Spatial disorientation does not only live in cloud.

It lives in every leadership team where experience has started to replace evidence.

■ What is the instrument your organisation uses when the instincts are noisy? Comment below.

→ Follow for more cockpit principles applied to corporate leadership.