MilliOnAir Magazine October 2017 | Page 64

MilliOnAir

Jas Hawker

Former leader of the world famous Red Arrows

joins forces with MilliOnAir

MOA: You’ve had a long and distinguished career in the Royal Air Force, including two separate tours with the world-famous Red Arrows. Why did you start Top Jet Aviation?

I was very fortunate to have spent 25 years in the military and 4 years consulting to large businesses before I founded Top Jet Aviation with my business partner Dan Ingall, who is also an ex-fighter pilot. These experiences taught me valuable lessons about teamwork, delivering results and most importantly believing in yourself and aiming high. It never crossed my mind as an 18-year-old joining the RAF that I would lead the Red Arrows one day, performing to tens of millions of people worldwide, but at each step in my career I pushed myself to achieve what I thought was the unachievable. I am a firm believer that if you don’t go for it then you can never achieve it. I wanted to bring these qualities to the private jet sales world as it combines my passion for aviation alongside building a business that offers people a world-class service. I also enjoy a challenge and meeting new people which is a key part of how we are building and growing our network.

MOA: What is the main thrust of your business today, and how do you see this developing?

Top Jet Aviation is an International Aircraft Sales and Charter business, specialising in private jets, commuter aircraft and helicopters. Our philosophy is that we don’t do anything unless we can do it very well. Whilst some of our clients just want to buy or sell aircraft, we have a significant number of clients who want us to manage their aircraft whilst they are deciding what to do with it or whilst it is on the market. We offer that seamless service to manage, charter and sell a client’s aircraft. We have a mantra of ‘world-class service for world-class clients’ but they are not just words to us, they are a way of life – if it can’t be done to that standard then we wouldn’t offer the service. We have a large number of aircraft for sale both on and off market and we don’t want them there forever, so aircraft sales sit fairly high on ours and our customers’ agenda and is likely to be our #1 priority for a while. We are actively seeking to bolster our offering of long-range, luxury large-cabin aircraft such as the Gulfstream G550, Bombardier Global 6000 and Dassault Falcon 7X, as enquiries within this class of aircraft are on the rise.

MOA: Describe a typical week ‘in the office’ at Top Jet Aviation.

Anyone who knows anything about running a business will tell you that there is no such thing as a typical week. However, we do aim to start every week with a management meeting to assess the priorities for the week and allocate specific tasks (maybe a military trait!) and to see what lessons we can learn from the previous week. With a global client base, we have to be flexible when it comes to client calls/meetings but our simple business priorities often help out when having a crazy week: No1 – Clients, No2 – Business Development, No3 – Everything else. We also have a passion for what we do and who we are doing it with and we do allow ourselves to have fun along the way - the feedback from our clients is that this culture is obvious to see from the outside, hopefully this means that they will refer and use us again.