Women Of The C-Suite: Christina Cassotis of Pittsburgh International Airport On The Three Things You Need To Succeed As A Senior Executive

An Interview With Vanessa Morcom

In my book, a successful CEO is committed to maximizing and optimizing the value of the organization through and for its stakeholders while the CEO is in the role and beyond. I see the most successful CEOs as those who know people. I have seen brilliant CEOs who are drained by people issues but surround themselves with a strong number two who can offer that strength and who the CEO trusts.

As a part of our interview series called “Women Of The C-Suite”, we had the pleasure of interviewing Christina Cassotis.

Christina Cassotis is a trailblazing leader in the aviation industry, currently serving as the CEO of Pittsburgh International Airport. With a dynamic background that spans public information, energy, and transportation sectors, she has been instrumental in driving innovative projects and fostering a culture of inclusivity and collaboration. Christina’s passion for creating sustainable and accessible aviation solutions has garnered her recognition as a visionary in her field.

Thank you so much for joining us in this interview series! Before we dig in, our readers would like to get to know you a bit more. Can you tell us a bit about your “backstory”? What led you to this particular career path?

I was born into aviation. My father was a Marine Corps fighter pilot during the Vietnam War and was eventually recruited by Pan American World Airways — back when commercial airlines used to recruit from the military. We moved to Hong Kong when I was three and then moved to a very middle-class, quiet life in a suburb of Boston. I grew up listening to stories of my father traveling around the world — to Rio, Buenos Aires, East Berlin, Dakar and places I had to look up on our spinning globe. He would come home and cook very interesting, exotic dishes from the places he’d been. I loved it, but none of my friends wanted to come over for dinner when my father was cooking. My dad was the only father I knew of who even traveled for business. All of my friends’ dads were home every night for dinner.

I knew aviation was my ticket to an adventurous life and looking back now, I feel like I was destined for it. I didn’t have the skills to be a pilot or the personality to be a flight attendant. Fast forward many years, I spent some time bartending on Beacon Hill, and earned myself a job as a public information officer for the Massachusetts Department of Energy and then I got hired as the Communications Director for the Massachusetts Executive Office of Communities and Development. From there, I had a choice, two opportunities– to work for the Massachusetts Port Authority (Massport) at Boston’s Logan Airport, or to serve as the press secretary for the Governor’s reelection campaign. I didn’t even know airports had jobs like I was offered. I just thought airlines and airports were part of the same thing. It never occurred to me that they were distinct organizations with separate governance structure. The minute I got there, I was hooked.

From Massport, I was recruited to join SH&E, a boutique advisory firm consulting to the commercial airport and airline industry worldwide. Eventually, I led the airport practice. The firm was acquired, and the fit was not good. I was laid off. After 17 years doing what I really believed was my dream job, it was over in an airport Admiral’s Club — that’s where I got the news. And believe me, that shoddy delivery and how they handled my termination was a great lesson in what never to do. A short time after, I got the call from a headhunter recruiting me to be CEO of Pittsburgh International Airport.

Can you share the most interesting story that happened to you since you began leading your company?

When I arrived at PIT, the airport community was still reeling. US Airways had built PIT to be its largest connecting hub in 1992. After two bankruptcies, they dramatically cut the airline service they had been providing out of PIT, and the airport felt empty — for a decade. One of my proudest achievements is the culture change that has led to the kind of innovation no one imagined when I got here. We have turned the culture around by insisting that the ‘how’ is as important as the ‘what.’

Presley’s Place, our in-terminal sensory space, was created as a direct result of the culture change. Our carpenters built CEO mailboxes, an idea I took from a visit to Air Berlin’s headquarters, and we placed them all around the airport campus — with only one keyholder. One of our heavy equipment operators has a son with autism, and he placed a carefully crafted letter in the mailbox with the idea that we should create space for those with sensory sensitivities to help them acclimate and get comfortable before or after a flight. He was nervous to submit it, and he said he peered into the mailbox slot every day to see if it was picked up. As soon as I read it, I knew we had to do it. I wanted to start innovating, but I also wanted everyone to understand that they can innovate, and that innovation is not just about technology — it’s doing anything better. We assembled teams, which was the first time many departments worked cross-functionally since I arrived at PIT. The process of working together was new, as was the work itself. We used the new team as a leadership development exercise and the group worked together to research, design, build, and fund the sensory space, all while managing their existing responsibilities. The way it came together was amazing and we have used that model to do so much more with accessibility, innovation, leadership development, workforce development, user experience design for staff and passengers and more.

It has been said that our mistakes can be our greatest teachers. Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?

I purposely chose my first day at PIT to be a Thursday since I knew starting on a Monday would be overwhelming. My family was still living in New England as my son was in 6th grade. I flew in from Boston on Tuesday night, and had one day, Wednesday, to set up my temporary apartment. I remember thinking, no big deal. I arrived, picked up a pool car, paid no attention to where I would need to return it, and spent the day running around realizing that I had brought a towel but there was no shower curtain in the apartment, no soap, no pillows for the bed. By the time I was driving back to the airport on Thursday morning, I had no idea where I was going. I pulled into the parking garage and I knew I was lost.

Then an airport truck pulled up next to me and the driver asked, “You okay?” And I said, “Actually, I need help finding where I should park.” I went to introduce myself and he said, “Oh, we’ve been expecting you.” All my panic about the first day, having never run an airport, disappeared. I remembered the one thing I tell my son is the key to all success — ask for help when you need it.

None of us are able to achieve success without some help along the way. Is there a particular person who you are grateful towards who helped get you to where you are? Can you share a story about that?

Betty Derosiers, who was Head of Planning at Massport at the time, saw that I was being underutilized and pulled me onto a controversial runway project. The project had been stopped 25 years earlier because neighborhood mothers with baby carriages stood in front of construction vehicles. My husband grew up in that community. My job was to create the strategy around communications and messaging in order to gain necessary regulatory (and public) approval to build the new runway.

And then Deborah Meehan, the President of SH&E: She saw something in me I didn’t see in myself and she gave me an opportunity I had no idea existed. I loved my time with SH&E — the clients, the projects, my colleagues and the industry. She was an incredible mentor, and I am forever grateful to her.

Leadership often entails making difficult decisions or hard choices between two apparently good paths. Can you share a story with us about a hard decision or choice you had to make as a leader?

There are hard decisions every day. In terms of which path to choose when both seem good — that’s when I lean on goals. I’d love to attend many more conferences than I do because of the people there I want to meet and spend time learning from but time is a resource and where is mine/ours best spent? Sometimes the best thing I can do is stay put. I think the hardest decisions are about holding people accountable — especially people you like.

Ok, thank you for that. Let’s now jump to the primary focus of our interview. Most of our readers — in fact, most people — think they have a pretty good idea of what a CEO or executive does. But in just a few words can you explain what an executive does that is different from the responsibilities of the other leaders?

As a CEO, my role is to balance the organization’s needs with stakeholder and partner needs for the long-term viability of the organization and its function. It’s constantly balancing a very short-term view with a very long-term view. A CEO is the person ultimately responsible and accountable to their own team, but also to everyone depending on what the organization does, delivers and impacts. There’s a lot of hats that you’re wearing, internally and externally, and there’s a huge responsibility in that.

What are the “myths” that you would like to dispel about being a CEO or executive? Can you explain what you mean?

That I am the ultimate decision maker; that I don’t have a boss; that CEOs can do whatever they want.

Nothing is as easy as it looks. Everything is so intertwined in terms of actions and reactions — actions and impact. Something is always going to go wrong. It’s what you do with it. The greatest myth is that the job is about financial or operational results first and that however you get there is justified. I believe that the job is about managing resources first and foremost and that people are always the most important resource you as a leader manage. People solve problems. People create problems. People are the answer. I am mortified by the CEOs — and there are a lot of them — who outsource people management to HR. HR should be a key partner but the tone needs to be set from the top.

In your opinion, what are the biggest challenges faced by women executives that aren’t typically faced by their male counterparts?

The fact that you are asking that question is the challenge. I have never, ever, ever read of man being asking the question. Every executive faces unique challenges.

What is the most striking difference between your actual job and how you thought the job would be?

There was nothing that truly surprised me, but I could have used a reminder that you’ll never feel as though you’ve completely arrived. Even when you’ve made great progress — hired great people, stood up departments, innovated throughout — then something like a pandemic happens. It’s the same for the people of Pittsburgh, who thought they were set, and then the industry changed and the US Airways hub went away. You’re never done. The job is actually managing risk and being prepared for anything. In the pandemic, we advanced every single one of our strategic objectives and took care of our team, the community and the industry. We didn’t do things differently, we just did different things.

Is everyone cut out to be an executive? In your opinion, which specific traits increase the likelihood that a person will be a successful executive and what type of person should avoid aspiring to be an executive? Can you explain what you mean?

If they truly want to be, sure. We see it all the time. There is no one type. Nor should there be. In my book, a successful CEO is committed to maximizing and optimizing the value of the organization through and for its stakeholders while the CEO is in the role and beyond. I see the most successful CEOs as those who know people. I have seen brilliant CEOs who are drained by people issues but surround themselves with a strong number two who can offer that strength and who the CEO trusts. Not everyone is cut out to be a CEO, but it doesn’t mean they can’t be — you can make up for skills you’re missing with your team. You can’t be everything.

What are your “3 Things I Wish Someone Told Me Before I Started” and why?

Here are my top three:

• You never arrive. There is no, ‘OK, now we’re all set.’ That does not exist. In the beginning, I remember thinking that I just need to get to this place or this place and then we can breathe.
• People will surprise you in good ways and bad. You develop deep relationships when you’re in a role like this and some of them will actually break your heart. That’s just part of it.
• Every bad situation ends and so does every good one. There’s a shelf life to everything.

You are a person of great influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good for the greatest number of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger.

It would be a clean energy movement, which we’re currently working on. Everything for me is about the pathway to a cleaner, greener future. I think if we can nail sustainable aviation fuel, distributed hydrogen and truly accelerate the adoption of cleaner fuels, it will be inspirational to other hard-to-abate industries and it will surprise people that it is good business.

We are very blessed that some very prominent names in Business, VC funding, Sports, and Entertainment read this column. Is there a person in the world, or in the US with whom you would love to have a private breakfast or lunch with, and why? He or she might just see this if we tag them.

I am obsessed with how Bruce Springsteen can perform at the age of 74 a three-hour show and make every audience feel like that show is as special as any they have ever seen. I am fascinated at his ability to last as long as he has — and his shows are amazing. He has withstood the test of time.

I’d also love to meet Kakenya Ntaiya, founder of the Kakenya Center for Excellence in Kenya. She got her doctorate degree at the University of Pittsburgh. As a young teenager, she told her father that she would agree to female genital mutilation (FGM) if he let her continue her education. When she graduated, she was invited to attend Randolph College in Virginia on scholarship, and the whole village pitched in for her airfare. She ended up returning to her village in Enoosaen, Kenya, to open this school, and she started with nothing. The school has sent hundreds of girls to high school and they’ve all avoided FGM.

Thank you for these fantastic insights. We greatly appreciate the time you spent on this.

About The Interviewer: Vanessa Morcom is a millennial mom of three and founder of Morcom Media, a performance PR shop for thought leaders. She earned her degree in journalism and worked for Canada’s largest social enterprise. She can be reached at vanessa@morcom.media