Throughout my career, I have produced an inordinate amount of written communication and reports . However, the vast majority of that will never see the light of day. It’s just the nature of my job. However, last week brought a very notable exception. An entry-level textbook focused on how to engineer aircraft for cyber resiliency has been cleared for public release. This is undoubtedly the most comprehensive collection of my work-related writing (and editorial influence) that will ever be publicly available. It is a rare glimpse into the different world where I spend the majority of my productive hours.
At first glance, The Fundamentals of Secure Aviation Design has nothing to do with tennis. However, if you widen the aperture a little bit, it reveals a lot about the mental processes and frameworks that largely inform my overall thought process. The interconnected ideas of resilience, system design, layered defense, identifying threats, and continuous improvement all absolutely color the way I process the tennis world, both from a competitive and administrative viewpoint.
While I usually review books each Thursday, it would be disingenuous to critique my own work. However, it’s worth noting that the central premise of the guidebook, the need to build security in from the start rather than bolting it on later, is a mental model that crops up again and again in how I think about athletic development and tennis delivery systems.
In both aircraft design and tennis, systems tend to break when people fail to anticipate things that could conceivably go wrong. Resiliency demands that we consider the full system from the outset. That includes not only how it’s supposed to work, but all the ways it might fail. People will inevitably find and exploit weaknesses, whether for convenience or advantage. Whether it’s digital dependencies in an aircraft or misaligned incentives in ratings and rankings systems, the ramifications are the same. Robust systems require anticipating failure, not reacting to it as adversity unfolds..
The guidebook also dives deeply into supply chains, lifecycle thinking, and the importance of understanding and prioritizing mission-critical functions under duress. That may sound far removed from recreational or competitive tennis, both on and off the court. However, if you’ve read my recent posts on USTA structures or senior tennis participation, you’ll recognize the influence. I reflexively apply systems engineering principles and design practices to pretty much everything I do. My book embodies those practices.
Obviously, The Fundamentals of Secure Aviation Design isn’t about tennis. And to be clear, I don’t expect anyone who subscribes to this blog to actually read the book. It’s a niche technical guide written for a very narrow audience and it is the exact opposite of light summer reading. However, if you’re curious about the deeper ideas that shape how I approach topics like infrastructure, fairness, agility, and preparing for the worst day rather than the best, it is the most complete expression of my mindset that will ever be widely available. Even if it never makes it onto your reading list, the influence is baked into just about everything I write on this site.
Eventually, The Fundamentals of Secure Aviation Design will be available for free public download from the Lockheed Martin FSAD Portal. However, at the time this post was published, that site hasn’t been deployed. In the interim, anyone who is interested in the book can download it here.
