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The Entrepreneur's Flight Manual: Lessons from Building a Fighter Jet Business Against All Odds
Paperback
Publisher Price: $19.99
Publisher: Freiling Agency, LLC
Published: Nov 11 2026
Pages: 222
Weight: 0.58
Height: 0.51 Width: 5.50 Depth: 8.50
Language: English
The same instincts that keep pilots in the air keep founders in business.
Building a company. Flying a fighter jet. What do they have in common? Quite a lot, if you're the person who built a company, and a billion-dollar industry, by operating fighter jets for the US Armed Forces. Some of the traits you expect in a fighter pilot, like grit, uncanny judgment, and persistence, are the same traits that make a successful entrepreneur.
Jeff JD Parker knows both worlds. As a US Air Force pilot and then a civilian Adversary instructor, he learned that success comes from discipline, adaptability, and the willingness to make hard calls under pressure. Then he built ATAC from scratch, with no roadmap and no industry to copy. Under his leadership and surrounded by his incredible Team, ATAC created the outsourced tactical flight training industry, now a $6B industry. It used legacy fighter and supersonic jets such as the F-21 Kfir, the Mk-58 Hawker Hunter, and the Mirage F1 to simulate adversary threats for US military pilots, ship crews, and ground strike controllers.
The Entrepreneur's Flight Manual turns what he learned into lessons you can use:
- How to sell a vision no one understands yet
- How to win customers one demonstration at a time
- How to stay resourceful when capital is tight
- How to scale without losing what made you great
- How to build a culture that outlasts you
- How to know when your chapter of the story is complete
This book isn't theory. It's a field guide from a founder who bootstrapped, improvised, and built something real against long odds. Whether you're launching, scaling, or preparing for what comes next, the principles here will help you navigate the turbulence ahead. Clear skies aren't promised. But you can learn to fly through anything.
Jeffrey JD Parker is a US Air Force Academy graduate and former USAF pilot. He founded ATAC, created the outsourced tactical airborne training industry, and flew as an Adversary pilot for 13 Navy Topgun classes. He led ATAC through multiple funding rounds, a sale and scale to Textron, and then served as Executive Chairman for multiple PE companies.
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