Operational Risk Beyond Compliance
Experience Across the Operation
Operational judgment built across aviation
Aerospace Safety Associates helps government agencies, aviation operators, and high-consequence organizations evaluate the operational risk conventional audits miss. Our work includes commercial aviation oversight, independent vendor assessments, audit readiness, regulatory support, and practical risk-management advice.
The team has completed more than 120 aviation assessments and supports NASA Commercial Aviation Services, including UAS operator evaluations. We led development of NASA-STD-7919.1, the NASA Commercial Aviation Services standard, and of NASA’s UAS operations standard.
Our associates each bring at least three decades of aviation, safety, and risk-management experience, from the line to senior leadership, across government, military, commercial, and contract operations. That breadth lets us translate between organizations, understand how work is actually performed, and test whether barriers remain capable under real conditions.
Jeff Hicks, President and Founder
Jeff Hicks is an American Airlines captain, former U.S. Air Force and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service aviator, and former JPATS pilot. He is the author of Risk Is the Work and What the Audit Misses. His work includes more than 120 aviation vendor assessments and support to NASA Commercial Aviation Services and UAS oversight. His experience as an operator, evaluator, and oversight specialist keeps the firm’s work grounded in mission accomplishment and decision-grade evidence.
Service-Disabled Veteran-Owned Small Business
The Meaning Behind the Emblem
Operational Risk Beyond Compliance
The emblem expresses our operating philosophy: safety is the outcome, but risk is the work. The central pathway represents the mission, moving through changing conditions toward successful mission accomplishment. Orange marks the signals, decisions, and objectives that require attention. The layered arches represent barriers, communication, capability, and margin.
The circular form represents continuous awareness. Conditions change, threats evolve, barriers weaken, and decisions must be revisited. The outer silver rings represent discipline, experience, standards, and the hard limits that protect the mission without replacing professional judgment.
Operational Risk Beyond Compliance completes the message. Compliance provides a necessary foundation, but real safety depends on understanding threats, building capable barriers, preserving margin, communicating honestly, and entrusting qualified people to exercise judgment where the work occurs.