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With more than 42 years of aviation experience, the last 14+\nbeing with the FAA, Roberts says he\u2019s been blessed to work in one of the most\ninteresting and dynamic career fields one could ever imagine. \u201cLeaving the FAA\nat the end of September 2018, I knew I needed a break to recharge and\nreevaluate what it was I wanted to do with the rest of my life,\u201d said Roberts. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
In\nJanuary, after a three-month hiatus, he put the wheels in motion to start\nworking for himself – doing things where he could leverage his experiences\nacross the private and public sectors (including local, regional, state,\ndomestic and international sectors of government) and give back to the industry\nthat has given so much to him. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
After\nconsiderable consideration, he landed on the business idea of Aviation Insights<\/em>. \u201dMy goal is to take\nmy lessons learned at the school of hard knocks,\u201d said Roberts, \u201cand turn them\ninto realities which may benefit others; Thus, my motto of going from Hindsight\nto Insights \u2013 looking back in order to look ahead.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Amplifying\nthat goal, Roberts said he wants to provide the aviation community, as well as\ncommunities either operating airports and\/or experiencing the benefits\/impacts\nof aviation, ways of \u201cgetting to yes\u201d in a mutually-agreed upon manner.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Roberts first became interested in aviation growing up on a farm\nin western Missouri where everyone had to pull their weight to make ends meet.\nThat meant working whatever jobs he could get. \u201cIt just happened one such job\nwas working near our local airport,\u201d said Roberts. \u201dI\u2019d watch airplanes do\ntouch \u2018n go\u2019s and wonder what it would be like to actually go up in one.\u201d He\u2019d also\nflagged for crop-dusters on his family\u2019s farm (pre-GPS) and said one day that\nhe\u2019d be doing the flying and would let someone else \u201cenjoy\u201d the view from\nbelow. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cMy\ndad, knowing the local airport manager, arranged to get me an introductory\nflight for my 16th<\/sup> birthday,\u201d said Roberts. \u201cI\u2019ll never forget it.\u201d That day turned out to be a brilliant Sunday\nafternoon and the flight was in a red and white Cessna 150. \u201cAfter takeoff, the\ninstructor turned the flying over to me and the rest is history.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n That\nearly time in the cockpit led Roberts to Central Missouri State University where\nthey had a budding aviation program. There, along with getting his pilot\u2019s\nratings, he received a degree in Aviation Technology\/Management followed by a\ngraduate degree in Aviation Safety. It\u2019s\nalso where he met his wife \u2013 they recently celebrated their 43 year\nanniversary. \u201cOur second date was in my Dad\u2019s C-172,\u201d said Roberts. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Realizing\nhe was up against Vietnam vets with considerable jet time, Roberts didn\u2019t think\nhe was likely to get a flying job with the airlines, so he turned to his second\npassion \u2013 something involving math and science. This led to a consulting\nengineering job where he did mechanical drafting, planning and engineering on\nairport projects. \u201cA secondary bonus was flying company executives and staff\naround the Midwest at all hours of the day and night in all types of weather,\u201d\nsaid Roberts. \u201cThese formative years set the stage for many years to come.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n In 1991 Roberts\u2019 career went in a new direction, being named\nColorado\u2019s first director of the newly formed Division of Aeronautics. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cServing as the first director was the biggest honor and privilege\nof my professional life,\u201d said Roberts. \u201cI am so proud of the collaboration and\nwork we did starting the division – setting the stage for those that followed\nto achieve even greater things.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n Blessed to be selected as Division\u2019s first executive director, Roberts\u2019\ninitial directive from the aviation community was to uphold the State\nConstitutional mandate that \u201cany revenues generated by aviation, shall be used\nexclusively for aviation purposes\u201d. \u201cUp\nto this point, those dollars had flowed to the state\u2019s general fund,\u201d said\nRoberts. \u201cDespite many challenges, we ultimately succeeded in getting the\nstate\u2019s fuel tax revenues dedicated to supporting the Division and statewide\naviation development.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Roberts said there were so many things he learned as the Division\u2019s\ndirector, but probably the biggest thing was how to work with people in a way\nthat everyone could come out feeling they got something. \u201cIt formed my general\nprincipal of \u201cGetting to Yes,\u201d said Roberts. \u201cSometimes it meant \u201cNot No \u2013 Just\nmaybe Not Now.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n To Roberts, it didn\u2019t matter if he was working with members of a\nlocal community on noise issues or a U.S. Senator; He learned to treat everyone\nwith respect, to do his homework to know their issues, and to try and reach an\nagreement where everyone walks away feeling that, if they maybe didn\u2019t get\neverything they came for – at least they were listened to and treated fairly. \u201cThose\nhard lessons came from the growing list of experiences I got as Director of the\nColorado Division of Aeronautics!\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n The next step in Roberts\u2019 career was a move to airport\nmanagement. His dream job was to one day become an Airport Director. That goal\nwas partially achieved when he was asked to be the Deputy Director for the\nLouisville Regional Airport Authority. \u201cMy plan was to hone my skills to where\nsomeday, I could successfully compete for the Executive Director\u2019s job. <\/p>\n\n\n\n That plan took a detour when Woodie Woodward, Associate\nAdministrator for FAA Office of Airports, asked him to join the FAA as the\nDirector of FAA Office of Airport Planning and Programming (APP-1). \u201cHaving\nworked with the FAA my entire career, I said \u201chow hard can this be \u2013 I know the\nFAA.\u201d Roberts took the position in 2004 and quickly found out that the view\nfrom the outside is definitely different from the view from the inside. \u201cI\nthought I knew how FAA and the grant process worked but I had no idea what took\nplace behind the curtain,\u201d said Roberts. \u201cWorking with airport sponsors (albeit\non the other side of the fence) on Airport Improvement Program (AIP) grants,\nLetters of Intent (LOI), Passenger Facility Charges (LOI) and Military Airport\nProgram (MAP) projects, let me apply those negotiation skills of \u201cGetting to\nYes\u201d or \u201cNot a No \u2013 Maybe just Not Now\u201d daily.<\/p>\n\n\n\n From that time until his recent retirement, Roberts held a\nnumber of different positions within FAA. \u201cWhile I did move around the FAA in a\nnumber of capacities, I always wanted to do things that made a difference,\u201d\nsaid Roberts. \u201cBecause of my background in local, regional and state governments,\nnot to forget my international experiences while at Aircraft Owners and Pilots\nAssociation (AOPA), I was asked to consider taking on one of several positions\nas Regional Administrator.\u201d The first was\nin FAA\u2019s Northwest Mountain Region (ANM) in Seattle, WA. \u201cHere, I was able to\ndraw on my time in Denver as we built and completed the 3rd<\/sup> runway\nat SEATAC.\u201d Roberts said his instrument\nflying experiences assisted with the Greener Skies Project where, working with\nAlaska Airlines, they revolutionized instrument arrival procedures using\nsatellite navigation and automated onboard flight management systems. <\/p>\n\n\n\n When\nCongress directed the FAA to privatize the Flight Service Station (FSS) program\nin what remains the largest A-76 (outsourcing of a federal program) effort on\nrecord, Roberts was offered the position of Director of the Air Traffic\nOrganization\u2019s (ATO) Flight Services Division back in the \u201cother Washington\u201d. Ironically, while at AOPA, he had led a study\neffort to evaluate the impacts on general aviation should the FSS services be\noutsourced and\/or privatized. \u201cMy challenge was to make sure the vendor\n(Lockheed Martin Flight Services) met all the contractual requirements and that\nusers of the National Airspace System (NAS) continued to have aviation weather services\nin an accurate and timely fashion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n ____________<\/p>\n\n\n\n In\n2010, another opportunity presented itself as Director of the ATO\u2019s Airspace\nServices Division. \u201cThis job pushed me to learn how to better integrate my past\nexperiences of flying and airports with air traffic control and flight procedures,\u201d\nsaid Roberts. \u201cStarting out, we began by taking a more systematic approach to\nairspace design by relying on satellite communication, navigation and\nsurveillance (CNS) versus ground-based technology.\u201d This program started as the \u201cOptimization of\nAirspace and Procedures in a Metroplex\u201d or OAPM. \u201cBecause Administrator Huerta\nhad a hard time saying \u201cOh-App-Um\u201d, we changed the name to just the Metroplex\nProject,\u201d said Roberts. \u201cThis consisted of 21 major metropolitan areas where we\ncould implement NEXTGEN satellite procedures (for multiple airports) in a large\ngeographical area.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n Roberts\nsaid this job stretched him in ways he never imagined. \u201cI had to learn how air\ntraffic actually works, the logic behind flight management systems, how FAA\nFlight Standards Division evaluates and mitigates flight risks as part of a\nrequirements analysis and how human factors play out in the Computer-Human\nInterface (CHI) loop,\u201d said Roberts. \u201cRemembering how we started with the\ninitial CDA\/OPD in Louisville and now watching aircraft\/crews executing these\nprocedures everywhere across the NAS, was truly unbelievable.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n It\nwas the Metroplex Project work in ATO Airspace Services that set Roberts up for\nhis final two positions as regional administrators (RA) in FAA\u2019s Southern\nRegion (Atlanta) and the Western-Pacific Region in Los Angeles. Both had Metroplex challenges as their core\nwork. <\/p>\n\n\n\n In\nSouthern (ASO) Region, Metroplex projects were underway in Atlanta, Charlotte\nand South-Central Florida. These 3 accounted\nfor a huge percentage of the NAS\u2019s total air traffic. Because of their close proximity to one\nanother, Roberts said it was imperative that each be carefully integrated with\nthe others. \u201cCombining this with the large number of flight schools across the\nregion and the volume of special-use military airspace, my job in ASO was\ninteresting to say the least.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n While\nRoberts had initially planned to retire from federal services in ASO, he\nreceived a call from FAA Administrator Huerta\u2019s Chief-of-Staff in November 2016\nstating the RA position in FAA AWP (Los Angeles) was about to become vacant. \u201cThe COS said the Administrator would\nconsider it a personal favor to him if I would move to Los Angeles and take\nthis position,\u201d said Roberts. \u201cBecause\nof my experiences with Metroplex, air traffic\/airports and understanding of\nfederal, state, regional and local community engagement, he felt I was the\nright person for the job.\u201d So, in\nFebruary 2017, he moved to his third RA job (out of 9 total regions) where he\nremained for 19 months until his retirement at the end of September 2018. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Being\na regional administrator is a job Roberts frequently responded to by saying, \u201cYou\nare responsible for everything with authority over nothing.\u201d Unlike the days when the Regional Director\nwas essentially the \u201cczar\u201d with ultimate control over his or her region, Roberts\nsaid today, the RA serves as the executive \u201ceyes, ears and voice\u201d of the FAA\nAdministrator. \u201cWith the straight-lining of nearly all regional office\nlines-of-business to headquarters, the RA is primarily a problem-solver,\nfacilitator and\/or mediator,\u201d said Roberts. \u201cHaving no direct line authority\nover anyone, the RA must rely on his\/her relationships and interpersonal skills\nto reach consensus and move the needles. This is in addition to being the\ncustodian\/caretaker of the regional office facilities.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n For Roberts there have been many milestones that have impacted his\ncareer and life. \u201cI\u2019d say the thing I\u2019m most proud of is looking back to those\nwho have worked for me and seeing how they have succeeded,\u201d said Roberts. \u201cTo\nhave someone say \u201cyou made a difference in my life\u201d is the greatest honor and\nreward I can imagine. My goal has always been to leave something or someone\nbetter than when I first encountered it\/them.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n From a technical product perspective, Roberts said the work they\ndid in Louisville, KY with UPS, Boeing, NASA, MIT-Lincoln Labs and FAA\ndeveloping Continuous Decent Arrivals (CDA\u2019s), now called Optimized Profile\nDescents (OPDs), ranks right up there. \u201cThese are now one of the cornerstones\nfor NEXTGEN, allowing aircraft to descend from flight levels to touchdown at\nnearly flight idle settings. As former FAA Administrator Huerta used to say,\nthese OPDs allow aircraft to move from what used to be like walking down the\nstairs to literally sliding down the banister.\u201d \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n The defining moment for Roberts was riding the jump seat on a\ncommercial flight from Washington-Reagan Airport to Phoenix, AZ where they flew\nthe EAGLE 3 Arrival (RNAV STAR) his team had developed. \u201cWe\u2019d always said\nNEXTGEN and SATNAV would enhance safety by reducing the potential for\n\u2018hear-back \/ read-back\u2019 errors. Well, I saw and heard (or didn\u2019t hear) it for\nreal on that ride,\u201d said Roberts. \u201cThe crew received our arrival clearance from\nAlbuquerque Center (ZAB) at FL 360 (250 miles from landing) and only talked to\nair traffic 4 times until we reported clear of the runway to ATC Ground at PHX\n– Awesome!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Some\nof Roberts principals are: Trust, yet verify; Never burn a bridge you may have\nto cross again; Never ask someone to do something you haven\u2019t or aren\u2019t willing\nto do yourself; When in doubt – would you be comfortable if your action(s) are\non tomorrow\u2019s front page of the NY Times; and Don\u2019t Forget \u2013 Honesty is what\nyou do when no one is watching.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Roberts\nbelieves it\u2019s his mid-western, farm upbringing that influences his actions and\nmany of his relationships. \u201cYou don\u2019t make something more difficult than it\nneeds to be and you never make someone feel anything is too complicated for\nthem to understand,\u201d said Roberts. \u201cIt\u2019s your failure to communicate if the\nreceiver of the information doesn\u2019t understand.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cEveryone\nhas always said that I\u2019m kind of folksy, and like to tell stories to make a\npoint,\u201d said Roberts. \u201cMaybe they are right.\u201d \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n![\"\"](\"\/wp-content\/uploads\/IMG_9619.jpg\")
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