Vanguard Magazine

28 JUNE/JULY 2025 www.vanguardcanada.com G A M E C H A N G E R See the full interview online Q How did you start out in this industry and how has it brought you to where you are today? I inherited a fascination with aviation from my father, who ran the Pratt and Whitney PT-6 test cell when I was born. When I graduated from high school, the best path to university and aviation was to join the military and attend RMC. That lead to a fantastic career as an Aerospace Engi- neering Officer. This in-turn provided a natural path into the Canadian aerospace industry, providing in-service support to the RCAF. Working in a variety of engi- neering, program management, opera- tions and executive roles in four different companies provided me with the breadth of experience to take on the challenge of leading SkyAlyne. Q How is your organization changing the game within your industry sector? SkyAlyne, together with the RCAF, is building a program that the world wants and needs. Moreover, we are also build- ing on a program model and full credit to the Government of Canada for devel- oping it. Military leaders from around the world talk about the urgent need for collaborative programs. Through FAcT we are adapting and keeping up as the environment around us changes. It's up to all of us working on the FAcT program, across organizations in both industry and government, to now dem- onstrate that this type of model really does deliver. Q What was your most challenging moment? It's not really a single moment, but the first year with SkyAlyne has unquestion- ably been the most challenging and engaging period of my career. SkyAl- yne was formed to deliver the Future Aircrew Training (FAcT) program for the RCAF and only stood up as a stand- alone commercial entity in April 2024. FAcT is a massive and complex program. The first five years involve designing and implementing a complete renewal of the RCAF aircrew training ecosystem. This includes acquiring five new fleets of air- craft, designing and building over 50 large simulators, completely redesigning the training courseware with the RCAF, designing and building the facilities at the Wings, and IM/IT cloud infrastruc- ture. Q What was your A-HA moment or epiphany that you think will resonate most with our reader, tell us that story. The start-up challenge highlighted above means SkyAlyne is really operating like a start-up. We have had to ruthlessly prior- itize to ensure we achieved the FAcT de- liverables, while also building the FAcT Enterprise. My "a-ha" moment came in preparation for our second program review meeting. I realized that almost every other entity in the Enterprise was mature, well established, and often pro- cess driven organizations. Those capa- bilities and systems are fantastic and are why they are all part of Team SkyAlyne, but what we are all doing requires a bit of a change of mindset. Q How has innovation become engrained in your organization's culture and how is it being optimized? SkyAlyne is a new organization, and so we have the advantage of being able to build our own culture from the outset. Any- thing we do, it's the first time we've done it; this creates a fantastic opportunity to pool together our individual experiences and collectively build something new. Q What are some of the biggest impediments to innovation in your industry sector? I think the biggest impediment to inno- vation in the Canadian aerospace and de- fence sector is that historically, industry hasn't been engaged soon enough. Indus- try engagement has tended to come after requirements definition have already been completed. The people doing that require- ments definition are very knowledgeable on the capability being replaced but just don't have access to knowledge on the innovations that can be applied to next generation capabilities. This means that sometimes requirements are so specific that industry can't provide truly innovative so- lutions. I think our government is realizing this and are already pivoting to address this through the selection of strategic industry partners early in the process. Q What is your parting piece of advice? First - never be afraid to practice "ruthless prioritization". Each person only has so much time in any day. Make the decisions you must to progress the items that truly matter most. Second - make decisions with the best available information and then move on; don't let yourself get stuck always chasing some additional piece of information that prevents you from mak- ing decisions. KEVIN LEMKE GENERAL MANAGER SKYALYNE

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