The U.S. Air Force is one of the six military branches that defend America every day. There are two tracks you can join; enlisted and officer. Each pathway offers a different set of careers, with officers fast-tracked to leadership opportunities. It’s not impossible, but it is very difficult to change paths once you choose one. A decision you make when you’re 18 can be career impacting, and it’s important to make sure people know all their options.

The people who lead the U.S. Air Force started out mostly as officer aviators, and 96% of those aviators are white men. The U.S. Air Force knows it has a representation problem in the upper ranks, and if the pool you source from is homogenous, everyone thinks the same. It was our job to get more minorities and under represented groups in four main careers - Pilots, RPA Pilots, Air Battle Managers, and CSOs.

We had to figure out why a lack of representation existed in the first place. Was the limiting factor access to opportunity or awareness? In our research of all the different ways an average teenager could discover the Air Force, we found that most people who become officers had someone in the family or knew how to do it because someone they knew did. The Air Force does an amazing job of providing the opportunity to fly in many ways, but the problem was awareness of those opportunities and a lack of belief that those opportunities were for our target audience. You can’t be what you can’t see - so we had to make it visible.

Self-doubt is part of the human experience. We have all heard that little voice in your head that asks you, “do I belong here?” Sometimes, our own worst enemy is the story we tell ourself that we’re not good enough. That we’re not smart enough. That wonderful things could never happen to us. Overcoming that voice is how you get to success. Rising above what holds us back is how we move forward with confidence.

Diverse aviators are just that - diverse. No two success stories are the same, and they each have lessons to teach. My partner and I read dozens of testimonials, interviewed close to 40 aviators and listened to some truly amazing people. We knew this campaign couldn’t be too scripted or it wouldn’t be true and believable, but we did need people who were charismatic and inspirational. The hardest part of this campaign, by far, was selecting only four aviators to tell their stories.

We thought back to who we were at 18. How did we make the life decisions we did? We knew we had to choose people who had already crossed the hardship bridge to success, but could still be relatable to the average teenager. We were careful to choose aviators that were different in how they got to success; some when to college, some had a hunger to succeed from enlisted careers, some were immigrants, and some wanted to push limits. All of our Airmen were inspirational for different reasons, and they all had wisdom to share from their experiences.