Spanner Squad Newsletter #1
Welcome to the Squad!
Hello everybody and welcome to the very first newsletter of the Spanner Squad project!
For those of you wondering:
- What the hell … ??
- Did I actually sign up for this?
- I can’t deal with any more spam …
There is an ‘Unsubscribe’ button at the bottom of this page.
For the rest of you … read on!
Who are ‘We’?
In these newsletters, and in other correspondence, you will probably hear us say ‘we’ a lot. In the first instance, let me briefly explain who ‘we’ are.
The Spanner Squad is an idea that originated from a company based in Australia called Ten Hammers. Ten Hammers has been involved in developing 3D models and virtual environments for the purposes of technical training, especially for aviation.
Ten Hammers has two Directors:
- Denis Manson (that’s me), who is an aircraft maintenance engineer and technical training guy; and
- Stewart Todhunter (Stew), who is a digital media expert, private pilot and instructional designer, among other talents.
Together, we are the yin and yang of Ten Hammers and enthusiastic dreamers of what might be possible with the Spanner Squad. You can find us both on LinkedIn and other socials, and you can also find mention of Ten Hammers and Spanner Squad on LinkedIn and also the industry press from time-to-time.
Quite obviously, we are not a big company. We don’t have a lot of money, so we need to start this project very lean, and aim for investment or funding as we progress. For those of you thinking a Spanner Squad Advisory Board position will give you a nice stipend to supplement your income, and perhaps lead to a Board position at Microsoft … I invite you to find the previously mentioned ‘Unsubscribe’ button!
But, hopefully, ‘we’ (Stew and I), will evolve into ‘we’ (Stew and I and our wonderful advisors who will help guide the direction of the project).
The Advisory Board
If you have signed up, or expressed interest in being part of our Advisory Board … THANK YOU! We won’t be able to do it without you!
For this project, we are going to be highly dependent on the opinions, and the experiences of the people advising us. While we are aviation professionals, we are also:
- Male
- Pale
- Stale (well, Stew is a lot younger than me, but it could be argued, especially by my daughter, that I am getting a bit stale)
Haha, I won’t pigeon-hole us too much. But, suffice to say, the project is aimed at women. So, it took all of 3 seconds to realise, unlike many projects in the past, we need women to advise us! Furthermore, the Squad will include representation from people showing diversity in:
- Race/ethnicity
- Indigeneity
- Gender
- Age
- Sexual orientation
- Neurotype
There will also be pilots represented, perhaps the weirdest of all. Eeeew.
So, we need advice from a bunch of different people, from all different backgrounds.
If you have friends or colleagues who may bring extra perspectives to our cast of characters, by all means ask them to contact us.
Men are not excluded from the Advisory Board, but … in the last 100 years of the industry, men have monopolised the conversation! We are aiming to be different.
The Spanner Squad
Let me take this opportunity to (briefly) describe the project. Much, much more detail will follow in subsequent newsletters, because we have a lot to tell, i.e. things we have done already.
The Rationale
From previous correspondence:
The Spanner Squad is a new animation and game idea, the animation for girls aged 12-16. The Spanner Squad will be a resource aimed to increase the number of young women choosing an aviation technical role for their career. Differently, The Spanner Squad aims to depict ’the industry of the future’, where gender imbalance is minimal and young women are well implanted into aircraft maintenance, flight and other technical roles, and well respected for their leadership, technical skills, mentorship and creative decision-making.
Not intending to diminish the struggle to attract women that we still have now, and the great work done by support networks and scholarships, but it’s a “You can’t be it if you can’t see it!” idea.
By introducing an interesting array of characters, with a variety of realistic but humorous storylines, we also aim to attract those other demographics that are under-represented in aviation technical roles, such as young indigenous people and kids from lower socio-economic groups. Again, if these groups think they are somehow automatically excluded from an aviation career, The Spanner Squad is on a mission show otherwise!
Overarching Themes
The overwhelming theme for the animation is that it must be entertaining. To us, that means it must be witty, intelligently written and accurately pitched to the 12–16-year-old female demographic, their likes, dislikes and social trends.
The environment (airport, tarmac, hangar, control tower) needs to depict realistic workplaces. We need to be faithful to the careers and job roles. So we won’t be glossing over things.
We need to keep a strong feminist message. Since I have been in the industry, the proportion of females in technical roles has not changed appreciably. Therefore, one can only assume, while things are certainly better, there has largely been a failure in effective outreach. Things need to change, both in the outreach, and also in the industry itself and the training institutions and academia that support the industry.
Thank you for reading this far!
Any comments on any aspect of The Spanner Squad will be welcome. Email anytime to denis.manson@tenhammers.com
Our next newsletter will look more closely at the two sides to the project – the game, and the animation. We will also start to introduce The Spanner Squad characters and the inspirational people behind them!
We will also relay some of the encouraging words from people along the way, including from some of you who responded so positively to our Expression of Interest.
Remember, spread the word! This newsletter is going out to around 30 women on our Advisory Board so far. But, if you have friends or colleagues who may want to contribute, they would be most welcome!