Tag Archives: fire department management

Thinking back on my 14 years with the Las Vegas Fire Department as a Firefighter/EMT-I, I realize that it was one of the most challenging, strength finding, and courageous things I’ve ever done in my life. I am a proud retiree and feel truly blessed. A good and wise friend told me, “that was another life; we all have many other lives.” I think I really understand that now and will cherish it.

Was wondering if you could do me a favor and list what you believe to be the most significant changes/trends in the past 10 years of the fire service.

Not so fast! Are you still telling your stakeholders what YOU need or are you telling them what THEY need? In his best seller, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, the late Stephen Covey calls this “seeing the issue from the other person’s frame of reference and crafting your message so that it comes back to them through their frame of reference.”

Let’s “cut to the chase”, shall we? We've got many paradigms in the fire service that we need to “break" and one of them is how we seek resources to get the job done.

Is your department consistently faced with an inadequate number of qualified and properly equipped firefighters arriving at the scene of a structure fire? Are your people launching an interior fire attack solo, or with only another member with them? (We know this is happening every day in the USA, don't we).

Think it’s not important to your efforts to recruit, hire and retain the right people? Here’s an Fire Prevention Demoanecdote from one of my fire service colleagues on Facebook, Firefighter Irene Silknetter Fitzkee, from Lancaster, Pennsylvania:

First off, a faulty PASS device is UNACCEPTABLE on any fire scene. When firefighters and officers hear a PASS sounding it should ONLY mean that a fellow firefighter is in need of assistance.

The solution for an inclusive and diverse fire department is NOT just recruiting more women and people of color. The SOLUTION is recruiting the RIGHT people—qualified, inclusive, diverse and safety-conscious. And yes, that includes the RIGHT white males who understand why an inclusive and diverse department increases service and safety. Recruitment is not just getting more people to apply and show up for the test. Successful recruitment is the first level of the screening process.

Many photos and videos of firefighters and officers conducting public education sessions, PSAs, and fire apparatus: the usual stuff that we’ve done for many years. But what has been the impact of all that time and effort? Are we really achieving the meaningful outcome we all desire?

I'm not saying that a more educated officer corps will prevent those kinds of things from happening in a department, but I am saying that I believe that it will reduce the organizational risk to a large degree.