Sept. 10, 2025
Business aviation must continue to champion workforce growth initiatives and supportive policy proposals to secure the sector’s essential role in supporting citizens, companies and communities in the decades to come.
That was the message from two NBAA leaders at a key industry event in Washington, DC, this week.
At the JETNET iQ Summit, held Sept. 9 and 10, NBAA Senior Vice President, Events and Professional Engagement, Jo Damato, CAM, said it’s vital to invest in initiatives that inspire future leaders to consider careers in business aviation.
Analysts predict that hundreds of thousands of aviation professionals, with a diversity of skill sets, will be needed in the coming decades. “We always need to be in recruiting mode,” Damato said, emphasizing the special role of partnerships in attracting the next generation of professionals to business aviation.
“The single greatest challenge is sustaining a qualified workforce. We’ve made enormous strides in technology and capital investment, but it’s still about the people,” she said. “We need them to fly the airplanes, maintain the aircraft, lead the companies, and support the customers. This is especially true with technicians. Business aviation’s future success depends on whether we can attract new talent into the pipeline, create clear and compelling career pathways, and retain experienced professionals with opportunities to grow, mentor and build strong succession plans.”
Among other initiatives, NBAA in recent years has collaborated with Alpha Eta Rho, the nation’s largest aviation fraternity, to share business aviation’s appeal to a collegiate audience. The association has also partnered with the Barrington Irving Technical Training School, which has trained dozens of professionals for business aviation occupations since its founding in 2022.
Damato said the organization’s focus on attracting talent to the industry will continue as part of this year’s NBAA Business Aviation Convention & Exhibition (NBAA-BACE) in Las Vegas. Specifically, the show will feature the Oct. 16 Collegiate Connect for students and recent graduates, and a new Military Connect program on Oct. 15, to help active-duty servicemembers and veterans explore the many opportunities available in business aviation.
As the summit’s focus turned to the industry’s policy agenda, NBAA President and CEO Ed Bolen spoke about several ongoing priorities, including tariffs and trade, air traffic control transformation and the importance of promoting business aviation’s societal benefits.
Bolen said advocacy for free and fair-trade policies will remain on the industry’s “front burner.” If the industry uses the data it has to demonstrate its positive impact, “we have a good opportunity to make the case that a level playing field on trade is right for safety, security, the economy and the U.S. as a whole,” Bolen said.
He also spoke about the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity offered by the aviation community’s unified commitment to transform the nation’s aviation infrastructure, as demonstrated by more than 50 organizations, including NBAA, that have banded together in the Modern Skies Coalition’s advocacy for new investments in ATC staffing and training, facilities, technologies and other equipment.
Finally, Bolen spoke to another priority: the need to inform Washington policymakers and opinion leaders about business aviation’s value, including the sector’s innovation in sustainability, with the aim of achieving net-zero emissions by 2050. Those themes serve as the basis for the industry’s CLIMBING. FAST. advocacy campaign, an international program supported by 15 stakeholder organizations.
“We have a long track record of new aircraft models being dramatically more efficient than the ones they replaced, and we’re investing billions of dollars into sustainable aviation fuel and new technologies,” Bolen said.
“We have a commitment to the future,” he added. “The CLIMBING. FAST. initiative puts forward the true and accurate picture of who we are. We’re moving forward fast, and we’ve got a sense of urgency” to produce more jobs and economic growth while becoming more sustainable and continuing humanitarian work.”
International Business Aviation Council Ltd.