How Cranfield Airport used Protu to identify future Air Traffic Controllers
Cranfield Airport used Protu to assess 17 candidates for Air Traffic Control Assistant roles, identifying both immediate suitability and potential for future Air Traffic Control Officer training. Its findings aligned with independent interview assessments, improving candidate evaluation and revealing an opportunity to reduce recruitment time by a third.
“I was sceptical about Protu initially. That changed when I read the candidate reports and saw how accurately they picked up both strengths and weaknesses. I remember thinking, ‘I feel like I know the candidates before the interview.’”
Challenge
Cranfield Airport initially introduced Protu to understand the behavioural composition of its existing Air Traffic Control teams.
Recruitment presented a related challenge. Suitable candidates were difficult to find, and there was concern that an already close-knit team could continue hiring people with similar behavioural strengths rather than bringing in complementary contributions.
The existing process relied on CVs, standard interview questions and managerial judgement. With the estimated salary and training cost of an unsuccessful appointment reaching £70,000, excluding disruption to the wider team, the consequences of getting a decision wrong were significant.
Cranfield needed to understand not only whether candidates suited the immediate role, but what potential they might bring to the organisation over time.
Why Cranfield used Protu
Cranfield defined the behavioural demands of its Air Traffic Control Assistant (ATCA) role through Protu’s Role Intelligence process.
All 17 applicants completed Protu assessments, producing individual behavioural insights and a consolidated view of suitability against the role’s requirements.
Crucially, Protu evaluated two separate questions: whether someone demonstrated the behavioural characteristics needed for the ATCA position, and whether they showed potential to progress towards Air Traffic Control Officer (ATCO) training.
The system also generated interview questions tailored to each candidate, allowing Cranfield’s assessors to explore specific strengths, uncertainties and behavioural characteristics rather than relying on standardised questions.
Results
Future potential identified and independently corroborated
Protu identified five candidates with behavioural potential to progress towards ATCO training.
Two withdrew from the recruitment process. Of the three candidates subsequently recruited, two had their ATCO progression potential independently corroborated by assessors who had not seen Protu’s findings.
Those candidates were placed on a fast-track training programme.
Eight candidates identified before longer interviews
Of the 17 applicants assessed, Protu identified the same eight candidates Cranfield independently selected to progress to longer interviews.
The interview panel made its initial selection without access to Protu’s findings.
This demonstrated that Protu could identify promising candidates before the time-intensive interview process, while providing additional behavioural evidence for the decisions that followed.
More valuable interviews, with fewer stages required
Protu’s candidate-specific questions replaced generic behavioural questions in Cranfield’s longer interviews, allowing assessors to investigate the characteristics most relevant to each individual.
The existing process required approximately 36 manager-hours, including initial interviews, shortlisting discussions and longer interviews.
Removing the preliminary stage would save 12 manager-hours per equivalent recruitment round, reducing interview and selection time by approximately 33%, excluding administrative savings.
Cranfield intends to remove that stage from future recruitment, using Protu’s assessments to support its candidate feedback requirements.
Expanding across Cranfield Airport
Following the trial, Cranfield extended Protu across the wider airport, into how its teams are composed and up to its senior leadership team.
“Protu surfaced things that weren’t obvious, and the read felt uncannily accurate and genuinely unbiased. It was like advice from a well-respected coach, and what I did with it was still mine to act on.”
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