Recalibrating for Tomorrow

January 22, 2026

All successful teams must occasionally reflect on their values, practices and culture to ensure they continue to excel. Recently, King Aerospace launched a thorough review of company attitudes, behaviors and expectations to ensure the company is on the right path toward the future.

“I view this as recalibrating to create the next generation of King Aerospace, one that embraces new technologies and approaches while also holding to the importance of God, Country and Family,” says company Founder and Chairman Jerry King. “It’s kind of like flight training, because it’s about how we want to fly this company toward tomorrow.”

A dedicated task force includes longtime employees from across the company and all departments, along with leading experts in aviation and collaborative problem solving. “We’re uncovering areas where our procedures may be dated or inefficient,” says Ron Soret, senior site manager in San Antonio. “And we’re documenting everything that makes King Aerospace the company it is, for the next generation.”

“This is the magic moment for growth at King Aerospace and for some rethinking and reevaluation of some of the practices,” says Dr. Aaron Glassman, associate professor of aviation management at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University. “We must make sure to maintain King Kulture, but also to modernize it.”

The task force also draws from acclaimed works including The Soft Edge by Rich Karlgaard and Sir Francis Bacon’s “The Six Steps of Scientific Method to Problem Solving.” Despite being more than four centuries old, the latter remains highly relevant today for adapting multi-generational practices to the unique needs of the moment.

“Too often in business, people get complacent and even frozen over time,” King adds. “We need to be willing to recalibrate to make sure we’re on the leading edge of supporting the aviation community and touching lives for generations to come. This is ‘an overhaul for the long haul.’”

Glassman says “everything” about the company will be examined. “You have to kind of start from scratch,” he adds, “and say, ‘if we were to build this company across the street, what would we spend the energy on pulling across the street that we believe in?’”

“A Landmark Opportunity”

That includes acknowledging areas where other companies – from both outside the aviation industry and even competitors within it – may have found better ways of doing things.

“It’s very important that we keep an open mind,” says Alvin Varnadore, general manager for King Aerospace Commercial Corporation (KACC) in Ardmore, OK. “Seeing what they’re doing helps us reflect on our own procedures. We definitely want to grow with the times and grow our culture so that our customers want to come back to King Aerospace.”

However, “we also want to make sure that people stick to the Cornerstone Principles and our culture, which really makes King Aerospace unique in our industry,” says Accounting Manger Robin Woolum. “We don’t want to become just another big company with a ‘cookie cutter’ mentality.”

Embracing new technologies is another important focus area for the team. Soret notes how he used artificial intelligence (AI) to assist him with formalizing process flows for a recent project bid.

“I’m not a process engineer,” he says. “Instead of taking several hours to create the diagram, I described what I was looking for to the AI tool and, within about 30 seconds, it came up with a working process flow diagram for me that I was then able to refine for our specific mission.”

“We can tend to have an insular position within the four walls of our organization while the world around us changes,” Glassman adds. “We must make sure to evolve with it, so that our relevance isn’t just in our minds, but in the market.”

In another example, the team is looking at an “operations center” to help customers visualize the status of their aircraft undergoing maintenance or refurbishment. Longer term, Varnadore notes this could evolve to online portal enabling customers to quickly track their aircraft’s progress from anywhere.

“We’re starting from ‘zero-zero,’” Woolum says, “and building our way back up to ensure we’re doing all we can as King Aerospace employees to spring our company above the others. It’s a challenging process, one that’s even been quite emotional at times, but it’s already proven to be very productive.”

Glassman calls this “a landmark opportunity” for King Aerospace to look toward the future while maintaining its longtime commitment to Servant Leadership.

“The competition will need to reinvent [themselves] in the next three to five years,” he explains. “If King Aerospace makes all the right decisions today, they’ll be on the right course for the next seven to 10 or 15 years to springboard over the competition and land well out in front of them with grace.”