Industry Influencers: Nathan James

From early in his instructing career, Nathan displayed a passion for using technology in an industry that was still largely steam powered. In the late 1990s at a time when all his peers were using blackboards and chalk to present their briefings, Nathan developed the material into electronic format. He used basic animation in PowerPoint to create a multimedia experience for his students. He even paid a professional narrator to provide the voiceover. 

When he showed his boss at the time, he was told: “Computers are a passing fad. Don’t waste your time on this stuff.” Wise words indeed. However, undeterred, he kept pushing forward with his vision for streamlining flight training. 

Migrating south 

Rapidly tiring of the perfect Queensland weather (and limited career prospects), in 2000 Nathan decided to drive from Brisbane to Melbourne along with fellow instructor Chris Ban. After some research, Nathan decided that he wanted to work for prominent industry figure Ruth King. His aim was to get an instructor job at the long-since extinct Civil Flying School at Moorabbin. The attraction was their international student clientele, which offered a more reliable student base than the casual one he was used to. 

With no grade 3 jobs available at the time, Nathan ended up starting with Civil as office cleaner. With one foot in the door, he quickly snagged a job instructing, then went on to write all the manuals that helped Civil become a Registered Training Organisation. Nothing out of the ordinary there, sounds like the classic grade 3 career path to us. 

Opportunity knocks 

Sensing a business opportunity, Nathan and Chris created AIATA and promoted their services to other flying schools to help them achieve their own RTO status. This led to them assisting eight or nine other schools to the same end. 

To help these new RTOs to find prospective students, they created a magazine, sold advertising in it and promoted it around the world. This resulted in many of the Australian schools growing student numbers by a factor of five in a year. 

Around in circles 

From Melbourne, Nathan went to Jandakot for a stint at The Aeroplane Company and China Southern. He was then head-hunted by what is now Australian Wings Academy on the Gold Coast. 

His role was to turn an ordinary flying school into an airline academy. As a result, their student numbers went from 23 to 127 within 18 months. Highlights at AWA included being kidnapped in Nigeria and turning into an alcoholic insomniac (we thought the latter was a prerequisite for most pilots). 

GET SMART 

While on a trip to the US in 2010, a chance encounter with a computer programmer led to the conception and ultimate development of the Flight School Manager software system from Smart Class Systems. 

Nathan explains: “The system allows flying schools to digitally manage their entire business from administration, operations through to education, maintenance and safety management. We have all heard stories about how CASA has managed to create this regulatory Frankenstein out of bits of the US and European systems, so any system designed for an overseas market is unlikely to be a good fit. 

“The primary appeal of Flight School Manager for Aussies is that it is the only such product that is specifically designed for the Australian regulatory system. It incorporates the Australian regulations, flight and duty times, and MOS schedules 2 and 3. It auto-updates whenever CASA makes a regulatory change.” 

Into the darkness 

Nathan moved on to CASA in 2013 as a flight training examiner for two years. While there, he was fortunate to get a head start on the new regulations that were eventually introduced the following year. This allowed him to create version two of Flight School Manager, which was ready for release as the new regulations went live. 

Back to the light 

After CASA, Nathan focussed on the Smart Class business. But the lure of hands-on training was calling. So, in 2018 with two partners, he established his latest flying school start-up – White Star Aviation in Ballina. From a bright idea over a beer and pizza (where all the best ideas come from), it took a mere 16 weeks before the hangar doors opened. This was at a time when many other schools were closing due to lack of students and overexuberant regulation. 

The journey continues 

Nathan’s innovation journey has gone from basic PowerPoint to Australia’s leading flight school management software. Where to in the future? Stay tuned. We suspect it won’t be boring.