A Qantas flight from Singapore to Perth did some uncommanded moves that injured people on board and put the aircraft at the risk of crashing. The skilled pilots gained control of the aircraft and landed it safely. Investigation reports stated that, the sensors fed wrong data to the aircraft’s computer and it triggered a panic reaction to do course correction. There was a long two minute delay when the aircraft behaved erratically and when the pilots assumed control overriding the computer. There was a delay because, the pilots were confused why the plane makes these moves when the visual feedback from the cockpit window is perfectly fine; this made jump them through a series of quick recollection of what to do in this situation and after two minutes they disengage the auto pilot. The altitude was very high and hence there was enough time to recover, that 120 seconds did not matter much. If the aircraft had been flying lower, it would have crashed.

Feedback is essential part of any workplace. It is necessary to be 360 degrees as it conveys key information about the environment to an individual. In many organizations it is part and parcel of the workplace culture. When feedback is helpful, acting blindly on it might not provide good results to us. There will be an influence of personality clashes, perceptions, prejudices. Receiving those feedback will leave us in a situation where we observe a disturbing dissonance; just like how the pilots were thinking that the aircraft is flying fine as per their visual feedback but the sensors feed in wrong data. Panic reactions or worries about career path arises a lot when feedback is received as a part of the performance appraisal. In those situations it is necessary to take all the data with a pinch of salt and plan the next steps with a long term goal in mind taking into account of all the priorities. A knee jerk reaction to correct oneself will often result in short term gains and might not be aligned with the individual needs and priorities.

The disconnect in an uncommanded maneuver in career will be quite disturbing. Through a healthy cycle of feedback and introspection such situations can be avoided. Dissonance is what causes unexpected outcomes and wrong perceptions, we should learn to remove it off our radar.