Above the Grid

Rob Smith spent over 30 years in the aviation industry. He has also spent over 25 years making businesses work. He is a 747 captain with thousands of hours in commercial aviation, a certified flight instructor, and an FAA Part 107 remote pilot. His master's degree in aeronautics focused on aviation human factors, the discipline that studies how well-designed systems catch the errors that even skilled, experienced people still make. That lens shapes how he approaches every operation he has built since.Before he launched his aerial data company serving the Tampa Bay region, Rob built and sold an independent insurance agency that remains one of the largest in a metropolitan area of 350,000 people. He has also helped build a successful medical practice. Both are heavily regulated, relationship-dependent service businesses where process, trust, and operations matter as much as raw technical ability. The parallels to the drone industry are not accidental.His aerial data operation was built very intentionally. It was built the same way he built in insurance and medicine: by treating the business as the product and the service as the delivery mechanism.Rob still flies the airline. He still flies the drone. He wrote this book because the difference between technically skilled drone operators and legitimate business owners is measurable and completely fixable. He got tired of watching talented people build themselves a job and think they have a business.